Health Tracking: An Insight into the Popularity of Smartwatches
A girl is in the middle of class zoning out of a lecture. Suddenly she sees a faded light flash from her wrist, then takes a glance at it and smiles. What is she looking at? A smartwatch. Unless you are living under a rock, you are probably familiar with smartwatches. Maybe you have one, if not, then you may have seen it on a family member, friend, classmate, coworker, or any random person in public. Apple released the Apple Watch in 2015 and the product was booming around 2017 giving Samsung and other major tech companies another area to compete in. The increase in the sales and use of smartwatches over time has directly or indirectly influenced more customers to obtain a smartwatch.
In the span of 5 years, smartwatch sales increased from 9 million units in 2016 to 22.6 million units in 2020. With big names such as Apple marketing the smartwatch, tech-savvy people are drawn to adopt the product. Smartwatches are more advanced than ordinary watches since they not only tell time on a digital screen but they pair with a smartphone and perform various functions. A smartwatch offers convenience for communication and notifications. People like the idea of just glancing for notifications and accessing daily applications on your wrist rather than pulling your phone out from your pocket. A major feature that gave the smartwatch a great consumer appeal is its ability for health tracking.
The health tracking capabilities of a smartwatch exceed the capabilities of health tracking in a smartphone alone. Smartwatches can track steps, heart rate, and blood pressure as well as monitor sleep which can really help someone who wears a smartwatch all day to monitor their health. When paired with one’s smartphone, it can give them detailed insights about their health and help them address concerns or set goals.
I surveyed some people in their early 20’s to learn about their smartwatch use and their overall opinions of a smartwatch. Most people I surveyed were smartwatch users but there were a few non-smartwatch users. I wanted to see how frequently the mention of health-related use would be mentioned by smartwatch users. A common theme I saw in all of the responses of smartwatch users is that they all used smartwatches for health trackings such as heart rate and steps. Also, the people who don’t have a smartwatch plan on getting one soon.
*Names were changed to maintain anonymity.
One person I surveyed, Jamie, has been using a smartwatch for 2–4 years. To get a sense of her lifestyle during this time, she is a busy college student that has been in rotations of either working full-time or attending classes full-time. She has her smartwatch on her all the time, whether she is at school, work, or at home. Jamie thinks that adding a smartwatch into her routine changed her life as she has grown accustomed to using it. She primarily uses her smartwatch to check the time, notifications, heart rate, steps, and weather. The greatest convenience her smartwatch provides for her is the ability to check notifications without pulling out her phone from her pocket or bag. Additionally, she likes the idea of wearing watches in general and finds the smartwatch’s features useful.
Daria, a recent college graduate who is currently working full-time, has also been using her smartwatch for about 2–4 years. She also incorporates gym and exercise into her routine once in a while. Daria described smartwatches as “compacted, mini-smartphones for quick access to apps.” She primarily uses her smartwatch for steps, heart rate, calories, and notifications. I asked, “Is there anything a smartwatch doesn’t currently offer that you wish it offered?” Daria suggested that smartwatches could incorporate a brain-waves or brain-activity tracker to detect strokes, epilepsy, seizures, abnormal changes, or life-threatening issues.
Alexa has been using a smartwatch for 1–2 years. She is working full-time and finishing up her degree part-time. Just like the others, her primary smartwatch use is for notifications, steps, and heart rate. She also primarily uses it for the sleep tracking feature. She wears her smartwatch all the time and finds sleep tracking to be more accurate on a smartwatch than any other device (i.e. smartphone). Alexa also mentioned that she likes having a smartwatch as an accessory.
Hailey, a current med student, has been using her smartwatch for less than a year. She uses it occasionally, a few times a week, and finds it useful for tracking heart rate and steps while exercising. The greatest convenience it offers her is the ability to change songs or view her miles just by lifting her wrist while exercising. Hailey pointed out that its heartbeat calculation has better accuracy in comparison to other products.
Two people, Carmen and Pauline do not currently use a smartwatch but they both said they would consider buying one soon. Carmen is currently a college student and stated that he would get a smartwatch just to have one and may find it convenient to use. Pauline who currently works as a medical assistant, exercises routinely, and is preparing for med school, finds that the features of a smartwatch would be helpful especially when her phone isn’t around. Considering her active lifestyle, she thinks that smartwatches are a cool tool once getting into the habit of it. Both people indicated that money was a factor in not owning a smartwatch at the moment.
The takeaway from the survey responses in the college student or early 20’s demographic is that health tracking was the primary convenience noted by all smartwatch users. All smartwatch users reported using smartwatches to track heart rate and steps. Some highlighted health-related features are sleep tracking and viewing miles during exercise. Any suggestions that were made to improve smartwatches involved adding more health tracking features. Also, some responses mentioned that smartwatches provide great accuracy in their health statistics such as heart rate and sleep.
