The Apple Watch Turns 10. Here’s How Far It’s Come

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Every year, Apple launches one standout health feature, from measuring VO2 Max on the Series 3 to the ECG sensor on the Series 4, all the way to sleep apnea notifications on the Series 10. “If you zoom out way into the future, and you look back and ask what Apple’s biggest contribution was, it will be in the health area,” Cook said in an interview with WIRED last year.

This is a bold thing to say, especially given that the Series 10 and Watch Ultra 2 don’t even have blood oxygen measuring, due to a patent dispute with the medtech company Masimo. For a while, Apple has been doing research into features that would transform the Apple Watch for people with chronic conditions, like adding noninvasive blood glucose monitoring for diabetics, or adding blood pressure measuring for people with hypertension. Alas, despite promising advances, these features have yet to materialize.

Apple’s latest project, an AI-assisted comprehensive health service, is far behind other health manufacturers such as Oura, Whoop, or even Garmin. Imagine, for example, being able to take a picture of your meal with the Watch Ultra and uploading it to the (still rudimentary) Health app, the way you already can with the Meals feature on an Oura Ring 4. You have to imagine it for now, of course, because the Apple Watch doesn’t currently have a camera, and Apple’s Visual Intelligence is still limited to the iPhone 16. But it seems within reach.

Still, the Watch’s wearability and seeming ubiquity does mean that it has a track record of saving peoples’ lives, whether that’s by notifying users of an irregular heart rhythm via the ECG feature or calling the emergency services if it recognizes the user has fallen or been in a serious crash. I also have a personal anecdote to report—before the blood oxygen feature was removed, I had pneumonia. How did I know? My blood oxygen level, as measured by the watch, was at 84 percent. I went to urgent care and got antibiotics, stat.

While Apple has not historically always been first to market with a new health feature, it’s a fast follower, and the features nearly always work. “Apple owners are very patient when it comes to Apple,” Naranjo says. “They’ve come to believe that Apple doesn’t rush to market with something that isn’t almost perfect.”

Why You Wear It

That point seems to bear out with the research. In 2022, nearly 80 percent of Apple iPhone owners also owned an Apple Watch, and it accounted for 56 percent of smartwatch sales in the North American market. Most importantly, research suggests most people who own an Apple Watch are pretty satisfied with their device.

As most of them are likely Apple users already, it helps that the Watch—like all Apple devices—integrates seamlessly with Apple’s ecosystem. It’s intuitive, easy to use, and has an interface that is pleasing to experience—both for the first time, and 10 years on. I still twirl and push every day the tiny digital crown every day, and find it a great way for navigating the device’s smaller menus without obscuring text with your fingers.