No sleep-tracking?

[emir]

It was one of the features I anticipated the most alongside advanced fitness and bio-metric data collection.

As rumours suggest they were looking into integrating blood pressure, o2 saturation, hydration levels etc. now the watch doesn't even have a sleep tracking feature.

Most probably there will be one via a 3rd party app but my expectations were so high when the drawings of the "Health App" came from the rumour mill of iOS 8. There always will be a second watch and iOS 9 but I'm let down they didn't lean more into fitness/activity stuff. I would love to see more than what Jawbone is offering with UP3.

I don't want to care even more about notifications, they zone me out from social situations enough as is. I respect that it might fit some people(especially very, very busy ones apparently) but right now it is a definite no buy for me, a very expensive iPhone accessory, for this gen. at least. And I don't expect it to be huge in sales besides the Apple fan community. Maybe in the future like the original iPhone, but not now.

edit: we don't even know if the watch is capable of tracking heart rate all the time without smashing battery life.

 

[8CoreWhore]

24/7 from MotionX is a great app. It integrates with Health app. SoI hope they make an app for the Watch.

http://24-7.motionx.com

 

[Shenaria]

Considering that you'll be charging the watch every night i don't think a sleep tracking feature would work very well when it's not going to be on your wrist.

 

[papa8706]

I'm sure there will be some third party apps but I think the minimal battery life poses an issue. Using an app like that all night makes it impossible to charge the watch for a days use. Might be better off buying a separate sleep tracker IMO

 

[Rob73]

If tracking sleep is important, one could take the watch off a couple hours before bedtime to charge up. Will probably require a charge during the day as well. Ackward at best, battery life needs to be 24 hrs.

 

[Peace]

Nope but it will remind you every 15 minutes throughout the night to stand up for a while.

 

[Michael CM1]

Considering that you'll be charging the watch every night i don't think a sleep tracking feature would work very well when it's not going to be on your wrist.

Seriously. There are a few decent sleep tracking apps for iPhone. Get one of those.

 

[Exile714]

Is motion-based sleep tracking really that good anyway? Fitbit does it and it's utterly useless if you lie awake motionless.

Heart-rate tracking would be more effective I guess, but only if your heart rate changes during sleep. I don't think it does compared to a normal resting rate.

There are sleep trackers which you place next to your bed and they watch you or something. I can't speak to those, but maybe others can. One way or another, something on your wrist probably isn't going to tell you much about your sleeping habits.

 

[emir]

Is motion-based sleep tracking really that good anyway? Fitbit does it and it's utterly useless if you lie awake motionless.

Heart-rate tracking would be more effective I guess, but only if your heart rate changes during sleep. I don't think it does compared to a normal resting rate.

There are sleep trackers which you place next to your bed and they watch you or something. I can't speak to those, but maybe others can. One way or another, something on your wrist probably isn't going to tell you much about your sleeping habits.

It'll tell much more than an iPhone lying on the mattress, which a lot of people are already using as a method.

IMHO, tracking heart rate + movement all night is going to tell a lot of things about your sleep. REM and non-REM phases differ in heart rate and waking up in non-REM is essential to a good day. For me especially, as a person who wants to sleep much less to save time (less than 7 hours) but whose body really can't handle less than 7 hours of sleep consecutively for a few nights, it is a crucial feature.

I'm skipping on Apple Watch Gen 1 for the time being, waiting on the release and reviews of Jawbone UP 3. (if it ever gets released)

Apple Watch might steal my heart with Gen 2 or 3 if they take it in the right direction (i.e. more sensors and fitness/health abilities, less notifications and other "send drawings" gimmicks)

I was expecting Apple to think out of the box with this and I thought that was why they took their time with it, instead they made something not drastically different than Android Wear already does, unlike the effect iPhone had with its first iteration.

Judging by JawBone UP3's incredible delay and Apple's inability to give the expected with sensors, my judgement is that technology just isn't ready as of 2015-2016.

 

[psylence2k]

I dont know why people are acting like this watch can ONLY be charged while you're sleeping. There's work around methods if you really want to wear it when you sleep. Just take it off two hours before bed and charge it to a full charge.

If the watch is dead by the time you get home that'll probably be the only option anyway. Otherwise you might have like what ? 10-20% battery left ? I feel like that should get most people through the night. Then just give it a quick hour or two charge when you wake up before you start getting ready to leave.

I think battery life for those who wont try to use this as a replacement for their Iphone will be pretty decent. Some people might even be able to get two days.

 

[bob24]

That also is a feature I would have liked, but I stopped expecting it when it became clear that a daily charge would be required.

As mentioned by a previous poster, I also think sleep tracking technology is not fully ready yet (all current trackers are guessing sleep patterns solely based on data from an accelerometer, which gives interesting results but is far from being fully accurate). Jawbone announced something much better with their UP3, but months later nothing is coming - so we probably need to wait a bit to get reliable data. And in the meantime I think the best option is something like the Withings Activité (Pop) which is powers be replaceable batteries which last for a few months instead of requiring regular charges.

I don't really expect the Apple Watch to become a good sleep tracker anytime soon though, as I doubt Apple will be able to drastically improve battery life in the next generations if they want to keep the same feature set.

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I dont know why people are acting like this watch can ONLY be charged while you're sleeping. There's work around methods if you really want to wear it when you sleep. Just take it off two hours before bed and charge it to a full charge.

2 big drawbacks if you do that:
- you can't use the watch in the evening.
- when you get up in the morning, the battery will already be half empty, which means you will also need a mid-day charge and therefore be unable to use the watch at some point around lunch time or in the beginning of the afternoon. Not to mention that you will need to carry the charger with you everyday and be close a a power source when needed.

I am not sure this is very practical ...

 

[psylence2k]

2 big drawbacks if you do that:
- you can't use the watch in the evening.
- when you get up in the morning, the battery will already be half empty, which means you will also need a mid-day charge and therefore be unable to use the watch at some point around lunch time or in the beginning of the afternoon. Not to mention that you will need to carry the charger with you everyday and be close a a power source when needed.

I am not sure this is very practical ...

C'mon man, people can spare 2 hours while they're lounging around at home before bed to charge their watch. People spend way more time than that in order to charge their phone if it runs out during the day which is a way more important device and they've been surviving just fine these past 8-12 years. I always feel like people really blow little scenarios out of proportion that they'll definitely adjust to with no big deal.

and the battery will be half dead by morning ? Are you expecting notifications to be lighting your phone up every 5 seconds between the hours of 10 PM to 6 AM ? while at the same time skipping sleep to play on your watch through the night and maybe accept a couple of calls ? I seriously doubt the watch fully charged is gonna be half dead when you wake up even with a sleep tracking app running all night.

 

[bob24]

People spend way more time than that in order to charge their phone if it runs out during the day which is a way more important device

The fact that it is a more important device is why people are willing to do that. If it is a device that is nice to have but that they don't really need, people won't bother and will stop using it (which is already happening with many Android smartwatches).

Also Apple is selling it as a more personal device than your phone and insisting on the fact that you will always have it on you.

and the battery will be half dead by morning ? Are you expecting notifications to be lighting your phone up every 5 seconds between the hours of 10 PM to 6 AM ? while at the same time skipping sleep to play on your watch through the night and maybe accept a couple of calls ? I seriously doubt the watch fully charged is gonna be half dead when you wake up even with a sleep tracking app running all night.

OK it wouldn't be half dead (assuming sleep tracking is energy efficient), but based on what Apple said it would likely not have enough charge left to go through a full day.

 

[psylence2k]

The fact that it is a more important device is why people are willing to do that. If it is a device that is nice to have but that they don't really need, people won't bother and will stop using it (which is already happening with many Android smartwatches).

Also Apple is selling it as a more personal device than your phone and insisting on the fact that you will always have it on you.




OK it wouldn't be half dead (assuming sleep tracking is energy efficient), but based on what Apple said it would likely not have enough charge left to go through a full day.

I really dont think people are gonna stop using an Apple Watch because they have to lay it down a couple hours a night at home when they'll probably be distracted with other things anyway. People who are so obsessed with their watch that even regularly at home surrounded by all your bigger electronic devices you're still constantly burying your nose in you watch probably means that bad battery or not you're not gonna give up your watch anyway so that handles even the most extreme cases.

When I said the Iphone is a more important device I was implying that it is your primary source of communication for celluar based data (phone calls & texts) and in certain situations all data (E-mails, Social Media, Browsing, etc) The Watch is simply a companion piece/extension of the phone. When your watch is charging you can still get everything you need from your phone that your watch would usually give you. It's not like your access to everything will be cut off, you'll just have to cope with your much more enabled, capable, and powerful base device for the watch for a couple hours, is that really that bad ? I really feel like you're making this scenario/issue seem way more dire than it would be. You dont really miss anything THAT important taking off your watch as long as you mind your phone for just a couple hours out the day. We all have been learning how to mind our phones all day long for the past decade or so , this shouldn't be that hard.

and whatever fraction of a decrease you have when you wake up can probably be restored with a 15 or 30 min charge while you're getting ready. These watches should easily last all day even with a 80% battery UNLESS you're really trying to substitute your phone with the watch but at the same time the same can be said for Iphones. For years someone who use their Iphone non stop all day to watch video or browse the web would have a dead phone before their day was up. THAT is way more crucial than a dead apple watch since a dead phone completely cuts you off from most communication. It's really not that serious with the watch.

 

[randy98mtu]

I see myself charging it in the car in the morning and evening, which I do with my Fitbit now a couple times a week. Hopefully a 30 minute charge twice a day will get me through. I'm still on the fence thought. I would bet on some third party apps for sleep tracking. The Fitbit tracking seems pretty accurate to me.

 

[VFC]

Is motion-based sleep tracking really that good anyway? Fitbit does it and it's utterly useless if you lie awake motionless.

Heart-rate tracking would be more effective I guess, but only if your heart rate changes during sleep. I don't think it does compared to a normal resting rate.

There are sleep trackers which you place next to your bed and they watch you or something. I can't speak to those, but maybe others can. One way or another, something on your wrist probably isn't going to tell you much about your sleeping habits.

My Surge tracks my sleep pattern with motion detection and heart rate. My "awake resting HR" is around 54 bpm; however, my HR goes down to 40 bpm when I'm in a very deep sleep. I'm fairly impressed with the FitBit fitness app; particularly the sleep tracking data.

I find the sleep tracking capability of the Surge the single most useful feature. The first thing I do when I wake up is check the hours that I'm in deep sleep, restless, or awake. I also can see the exact times I get out of bed to go to the bathroom. My experience so far is that when I have poor sleep stats, I should just stay home rather than take a chance on having another bad day at the office.

I am currently experimenting with different behaviors (activity, diet, etc) and how they impact my sleep quality; understanding now how much that affects my work and physical performance.