Can Apple Watch measure blood pressure?

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The Apple Watch is a marvel of miniaturized technology. Seriously, it’s a wrist-mounted computer with a ton of features and health-monitoring options. But does that include measuring blood pressure alongside everything else?

Apple has stuffed the Apple Watch full of advanced technology, including a ton of sensors. It can track your biometrics, sleep, movement, and more. It can even dial 911 when it detects a fall, which is pretty darn great.

With all of those sensors, can it measure your blood pressure?

Can the Apple Watch measure your blood pressure?

Short answer: Not yet

The last time we heard anything about Apple working on blood pressure monitoring, the feature was still a ways off from completion.

Apple was trying to figure out a way to measure it without directly measuring it. Also, it was planned to show blood pressure trends, not baseline measurements of systolic and diastolic blood pressure.

That’s not to say that a future Apple Watch couldn’t show baseline measurements. A British start-up called Rockley Photonics has Apple as one of its main customers.

If you guessed that Rockley makes sensors that could measure blood pressure, give yourself a gold star. They make sensors that can measure everything from blood alcohol levels to glucose and even blood pressure.

Those are potentially ready for market next year, so the Apple Watch 9 or later could feature accurate blood pressure monitoring.

So, in summary – the Apple Watch does not currently measure blood pressure directly on its own, but Apple may add this capability via new sensors and algorithms in future models.

For now, those needing to monitor their blood pressure should use a dedicated FDA-approved blood pressure monitor device rather than rely on estimations from an Apple Watch app.

Have any thoughts on this? Let us know down below in the comments or carry the discussion over to our Twitter or Facebook.

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Joe Rice-Jones

Maker, meme-r, and unabashed geek with nearly half a decade of blogging experience at KnowTechie, SlashGear and XDA Developers. If it runs on electricity (or even if it doesn't), Joe probably has one around his office somewhere, with particular focus in gadgetry and handheld gaming. Shoot him an email at joe@knowtechie.com.