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Apple Has No Plans For a Smart Ring

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Though smart rings with health capabilities have been growing in popularity, Apple has no plans to join the smart ring market, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. While Apple explored the idea, there is no active development of a ring going on at this time, and Apple has no plans to launch a ring.

samsung-ring.jpg
Samsung's Galaxy Ring​

Smart rings on the market from companies like Oura measure heart rate, track body temperature, and have sleep tracking capabilities, all of which are functions of the Apple Watch. If Apple released a smart ring, it would have the same feature set of the Apple Watch, and it would likely cannibalize Apple Watch sales.

Back in February, Gurman said that Apple's industrial team had suggested that Apple work on a smart ring, with the device possibly serving as a lower-cost alternative to the Apple Watch. Apple executives apparently weren't interested, and active development didn't happen.

Gurman's report followed a February rumor from Korean site Electronic Times, which said that Apple was "speeding up development" of a smart ring that could be used for health tracking. The site claimed that Apple was weighing the idea of a smart ring as an expansion of its wearables lineup, but those rumors may have been spurred by Samsung's Galaxy Ring.

Samsung introduced the Galaxy Ring in July alongside new foldable smart phones. Designed to work only with Galaxy devices, the Galaxy Ring tracks movement, sleep, heart rate, and respiratory rate, providing users with a daily sleep score and an energy score.

New devices from Samsung can spur rumors about Apple products because the two companies typically compete in the same markets, but there are some instances where Apple has not followed in Samsung's footsteps. Samsung has had foldable smartphones for years now, and Apple still seems to have no concrete plans for a foldable iPhone.

There have been Apple patents for ring-like devices, and those patents have also led to "iRing" rumors, but Apple patents all kinds of strange things that never make it to launch.

Gurman is a reliable source for information on Apple's future plans, but there are some who still seem to think an Apple ring is coming. CCS Insight told CNBC just this week that Apple might launch a "connected ring" to rival Samsung by 2026.

Rather than launching a ring, Apple may instead lower the price of the Apple Watch. The next-generation Apple Watch SE that's slated for 2025 is expected to include a plastic casing that could bring lower costs and more appeal to customers looking for something cheap and durable, either for themselves or for their children.

Article Link: Apple Has No Plans For a Smart Ring
 
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https://www.macrumors.com/2024/10/10/apple-smart-ring-no-plans/
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MacRumors said:
Though smart rings with health capabilities have been growing in popularity, Apple has no plans to join the smart ring market, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. While Apple explored the idea, there is no active development of a ring going on at this time, and Apple has no plans to launch a ring.
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Nothing to Ring in the new year. 🤣

related
Apple could launch a connected ring to rival Samsung by 2026, according to CCS Insight, adding to the U.S. tech giant’s focus on health.
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The call is part of CCS Insight’s annual predictions report and if it came true, it would be the first new product from the Cupertino giant since the Apple Vision Pro headset launched this year.
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“Health has become a fundamental pillar for Apple. In fact, I would go so far as to say, at the point that Tim Cook decides to relinquish control and he retires ... I would like to think that one of his major legacies from Apple would be around personal health,” Ben Wood, chief analyst at CCS Insight, told CNBC’s Beyond the Valley podcast published on Tuesday.
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Cheap plastic SE with basic features is a way better idea than any ring. I think at this point they could get the best basic features in at a low price.

If they did do something like a ring, it would have to be more along the lines of a Pencil type accessory where it’s used to facilitate a specific purpose.
 
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roar08 said:
"Apple has no plans to make a phone."
"Apple has no plans to make a tablet."

Whether or not they say they have plans to make anything, you don't know until they want you to. Or an FCC filing happens.
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Well in those cases they meant that they were actually making genre defying devices with some features of phones and tablets.

Has anyone asked if they’re making any ring shaped objects?
 
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Apple don't want a device like that. They want one where you spend time watching the screen. Hard to monetize services for a sensor.

Oura should price those at $100. Might be at a loss but it could get traction and with so many users, be bought by a big company. Apple is the best at hardware and I would be the first to buy a ring instead of using an Apple Watch. I just want something to measure my heart rate and maybe a few other things. I don't like the Apple Watch.
 
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If it's just sensors, I'm not sure what Apple could do with a ring to make it special or any better than what's out there, so there's probably no strong reason for Apple to get into that (probably very niche) market.
Maybe someday a ring could be used to help navigate AR glasses.
 
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Apple would have the opportunity to reinvent what smart rings are for, as a ring would be a perfect accessory for the Vision Pro. Especially since Apple is allergic to allowing even optional motion controllers. A ring could give tap/click and swipe gestures without needing to be visible to cameras; and potentially even offer a tiny bit of haptic feedback, but a lack of Vision for the Vision Pro is par for the course on the product.
 
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Would’ve been about $500 for a device that you would’ve had to access content from your phone. Apple Watch probably would do everything the ring can do.
 
A shame. I'd love an Apple Ring for the battery life. I imagine Apple could bring a load of ecosystm features to it - for example, they could incorporate a capacative sensor to allow rubbing your thumb over the ring to change the volume of your music, fast forward your videos or scroll through lists on your phone. If it could include an NFC chip for Apple Pay that would be the icing on the cake.
 
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kiranmk2 said:
A shame. I'd love an Apple Ring for the battery life. I imagine Apple could bring a load of ecosystm features to it - for example, they could incorporate a capacative sensor to allow rubbing your thumb over the ring to change the volume of your music, fast forward your videos or scroll through lists on your phone. If it could include an NFC chip for Apple Pay that would be the icing on the cake.
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Well the apple pay one may be a problem since you'd need some verification of your identity such as your face which needs a camera and lidar or some other new method
 
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