Oura Adds Cardio Effort And Automatic Vo2 Max To Smart Rings
Oura’s new metrics compare workout strain with a personal baseline and estimate aerobic capacity from qualifying GPS-enabled activities.
Oura is adding two cardiovascular fitness features to its smart rings: Cardio Effort, which tracks the strain of workouts, and an automatic estimate of VO2 max, a measure of aerobic capacity. Both are intended to help users see how their exercise affects fitness over time. The features are available to members with an Oura Ring Gen 3 or later, though automatic VO2 max is launching as a beta feature in Oura Labs, according to The Verge.
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Cardio Effort puts workouts in perspective
Cardio Effort considers both how intense a workout was and how long the effort lasted. It assesses individual sessions and compares a user’s accumulated weekly effort with a personalized baseline, rather than focusing on distance, speed or calories burned. TechCrunch reports that a short, intense workout can produce a similar result to a longer, gentler one.
The weekly assessment falls into five categories: Light, Fair, Maintaining, Building and Reaching. According to The Verge, the highest category can signal that recovery deserves attention, rather than simply encouraging the user to exercise harder. TechCrunch says Oura bases the measurement on elevated heart rate relative to each member’s long-term resting heart rate and sets weekly ranges using recent activity patterns.
VO2 max no longer requires a walking test
Oura already offered an aerobic-capacity estimate under the name Cardio Capacity, but that feature required a six-minute walking test, The Verge reports. The new automatic VO2 max estimate becomes available after a user completes five qualifying GPS-enabled activities, including walks, runs or hikes. TechCrunch describes VO2 max as a measure of how effectively the heart, lungs and muscles deliver and use oxygen during exercise.
Once the estimate is available, users can find it in the Oura app’s My Health Heart Hub. TechCrunch says the display includes a value in milliliters per kilogram per minute, a category of Low, Fair, High or Peak, changes over time and the date of the last update. The app also provides insights when the estimate changes meaningfully or remains consistent. Unlike Cardio Effort, automatic VO2 max is being introduced through Oura Labs, the company’s area for experimental features.
More detail in a competitive market
Together, the metrics aim to connect the effort of individual workouts with longer-term aerobic fitness. TechCrunch frames the additions as part of Oura’s response to growing smart-ring competition from RingConn and Ultrahuman. For users, the immediate change is a more personalized view of whether their recent exercise is maintaining fitness, building it or placing unusually high demands on their cardiovascular system.
Sources
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