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Oct 19, 2024

The best smart rings of 2024: Expert tested and reviewed | ZDNET

'ZDNET Recommends': What exactly does it mean? ZDNET's recommendations are based on many hours of testing, research, and comparison shopping. We gather data from the best available sources, including

'ZDNET Recommends': What exactly does it mean?

ZDNET's recommendations are based on many hours of testing, research, and comparison shopping. We gather data from the best available sources, including vendor and retailer listings as well as other relevant and independent reviews sites. And we pore over customer reviews to find out what matters to real people who already own and use the products and services we’re assessing.

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Comfort

Before you can even begin to use a smart ring, smart watch, or other wearable, you’ll need it to feel comfortable and light on body. If it isn’t, the chances are low that you’ll wear it regularly and get the most use out of a pricey product. Plus, if it doesn’t fit right, the sensors may not be placed in the right location and the data it collects won’t be as accurate. The best wearables fit comfortably and boast a lightweight build that feels nearly invisible on your body. Another element of comfort is sizing diversity and fit. The best wearables have multiple sizes that will fit as many bodies as possible.

Battery

Battery life will vary depending on the wearable and whether it has a screen or is screenless. A good smart ring battery lasts around six to seven days before charging. A good smartwatch battery might last three to five days, depending on the brand. The less time you spend charging your wearable, the more time you can spend actually using it to document your activity, stress, and sleep.

Sleep and readiness scores

Wearables monitor your activity and sleep. The best wearables offer up scores or aggregate your biometric data into a digestible format you can understand. That’s why the most reliable wearables have some form of scoring to your activity, recovery, or sleep data to provide at-a-glance suggestions or guidance throughout the day, like when to take it easy or challenge yourself with a workout.

In-app design

Some brands lay out the data they aggregate in the app in an easy-to-use format, while some have random tabs or completely useless extra features in the app that block you from viewing your essential data.

Special features

Some wearables have automatic workout detection features, Find My capabilities, or AI wellness assistants. While these special features are supplements, they aren’t to be discounted.

Smart rings track everything a smartwatch does, like sleep, activity, and wellness, all around your finger and without a screen. Plus, they tend to have longer battery life than smartwatches, so you spend less time charging and more time wearing them.

While Oura used to dominate the smart ring space, brands ranging from newer startups to established companies are throwing their hat -- or rather, their ring -- in the ring. It's never been a more exciting time to put one of these new, high-tech rings on your finger.

Also: The best fitness rings

The best smart rings, like smartwatches, house a comprehensive suite of health and sleep-tracking features. They also take a more discreet approach. Some options even include NFC features like contactless payment and virtual business card functionality.

At ZDNET, we've gone hands-on with several of the top smart rings, spending weeks or months wearing them to test out how their apps, battery life, and other features perform. Our tested pick for the best smart ring overall is the Oura Ring 4, thanks to its lightweight fit, quick charging abilities, and impressive health suite. Read on to learn more about the perks of the Oura and which other top smart rings are worth considering.

At this point in the smart ring race, everyone is trying to beat Oura. But the Oura Ring 4 proves that the smart ring pioneer's position isn't wavering anytime soon. While most smart rings simply provide you with the health data it collects, the Oura Ring 4 tells you the story and the context behind that data for greater information on your health.

Oura recently revealed the Oura Ring 4, the successor to its popular Oura Ring 3 it debuted in 2021. The new generation comes with smart sensing technology for a more accurate, thinner, less obtrusive, and longer wear with fewer gaps in data capture. Oura upgraded the number of signal pathways (basically how the sensors monitor and collect data inside the ring) from eight in Ring 3 to 18 in Ring 4. It also flattened the inside of the Ring 4 for a more comfortable wear (if you have worn the Ring 3, you know how irritating the domed sensors could get around your finger after prolonged wear). Lastly, the smart sensing allows for one extra day of battery life, upgrading from seven days in Ring 3 to eight in Ring 4.

Oura presents my sleep, activity, and recovery data through a scoring system on the main page. These scores and descriptions allow me to track my progress or pinpoint weak spots over time. The simplified overall score of, say, my readiness or sleep, appears with a detailed chart monitoring heart rate, body temperature, and blood oxygen levels throughout the day and night. The ring also automatically senses when you're stressed and adjusts your daily activity goals accordingly. One recent night, it detected my significantly raised body temperature and suggested I use the rest mode function, which deprioritizes activity and prioritizes rest and recovery.

There are also eye-opening features like Daytime Stress, which captures your body's stress levels over the day and showcases them on a timeline. Oura allows me to understand my physiological responses to various forms of stress, like a high-intensity workout, a night out with friends, or a bad day.

What differentiates Oura from its competitors is its amazing user interface that hosts all the health data you could ever need -- while staying mindful so as not to overwhelm. Every number or graph is normally followed up with some short and digestible summary that turns your data into a helpful suggestion for sleep, activity, or stress. You can also easily click into a metric, whether that's heart rate variability or respiratory rate, and get a historical view of it over time. The ease in which you can look at daily, weekly, and monthly health data -- and how that data is clearly communicated through the app -- is a major reason why Oura is the best smart ring.

There are many reasons to opt for Oura, but one that comes up in conversations a lot is how many apps partner with Oura. Natural Cycles, Strava, and more health apps offer data syncing into the app. I love that when I use Strava for runs, it automatically shows up in my Oura timeline.

This comprehensive but simple approach is evident in the ring's form factor and integrations. The ring syncs with Apple Health, Google Fit, and iOS and Android apps, allowing you to see your daily and even monthly metrics from your mobile device.

The downside, which Redditors and reviewers often point out, is that there's a $6 per month membership cost to unlock personal insights, like in-depth morning sleep analysis and temperature trend monitoring (which can even predict early stages of illness). Non-paying members only have access to sleep, readiness, and activity insights.

Thankfully, Oura's customer service is great. ZDNET staff writer Allison Murray called them after her ring's battery began to falter, and the company sent her another ring free of charge.

Also: The Oura Ring 4 is the best smart ring I've tested so far

Oura Ring Gen 4 tech specs: Material: Lightweight titanium with non-allergenic, non-metallic inner molding | Battery life: up to 8 days | Charging: Full charge in 20 to 80 minutes | Compatibility: iOS and Android | Durability: Water-resistant up to 328 feet | Sizing: 4 to 15

If you're all in on tracking your macros and micros, counting your steps, training for your next marathon, guided workouts, and more, then there's no better smart ring for you than the Ultrahuman Ring Air. This ring is designed for fitness enthusiasts who want to optimize their body's power for mental and physical energy throughout the day. From the moment you wake up until the minute you fall asleep, Ultrahuman offers insights into how to get the most out of your day through reminders on when to consume caffeine, expose yourself to sunlight, get up and walk, and wind down.

I've been testing the Ultrahuman Ring Air, and I love how the app presents data digestibly and offers specific insights on the home page that I don't have to search for. I also like that it gives me at-a-glance health data on the homepage, like body temperature, heart rate data, and which phase of my menstrual cycle I am in, and how I can maximize these phases for energy or rest. Plus, Ultrahuman just got a major feature upgrade. You can now sync your Strava data onto the Ultrahuman app, which is ideal for runners, bikers, and avid walkers who use the popular fitness app.

The ring is as discreet and comfortable as can be. Unlike the Oura Ring, which seemingly gets scuffed and scratched when in contact with any abrasive material, the Ultrahuman Ring Air has maintained its matte sheen—and I can't detect a single mark on it so far.

Of course, because this is a newer smart ring brand, the ring isn't without its flaws. Redditors have reported lower HRV data and other tracking flukes that the company has addressed through continual software updates.

Notably, founder Mohit Kumar is quite active on review pages and seemingly attentive to customer feedback and support. I'd say this is the closest competitor to Oura in the smart ring space so far. If you're looking for a subscription-free smart ring with up-to-snuff data tracking, battery life, and other helpful features, Ultrahuman Ring Air is your best bet.

Review: Ultrahuman Ring Air

Ultrahuman Ring Air specs: Sizing: 5-14 | Material: Titanium coated with Tungsten Carbide Carbon | Colors: Matte grey, Aster black, space silver, bionic gold | Water resistance: Up to 330 feet | Sensors: Infrared Photoplethysmography (PPG) sensor, Non-contact medical-grade skin temperature sensor, 6-axis motion sensors, Red LEDs (heart rate monitoring and oxygen saturation) Green LEDs (heart rate monitoring) Infrared LEDs (heart rate monitoring) | Connectivity: Bluetooth Low-Energy | Battery: Up to six days

Let me introduce you to the newest smart ring in the game and the first smart ring released by a leading tech brand. The Samsung Galaxy Ring was released in July, and it's a wearable any Android user -- that's right, no iOS compatibility on this ring -- could get excited about.

The Galaxy Ring is similar to many of the smart rings on this list in terms of features and functions, with a few fun exceptions. Like other rings, you're getting sleep and activity tracking. The Galaxy Ring uses an AI algorithm to determine your sleep quality, patterns, and more, and offers a sleep score every morning that sums up your night's sleep. There's snoring analysis, movement during sleep, sleep latency, and heart and respiratory rate tracking.

Review: Samsung Galaxy Ring

All this data is collected and stored through the Samsung Health app, which Android users can access (and Apple users... can't). This also means iPhone users can't use the Galaxy Ring with their phone unless they make the Android switch.

Another benefit of having the Galaxy Ring within the Samsung ecosystem is that you can record workouts on a Samsung Galaxy smartwatch and log your sleep on the smart ring, then store all your data together. You can still use the ring for activity logging, too, as Samsung offers features to support activity, like energy scores, inactive alerts, and automatic workout detection.

Like Oura, the Galaxy Ring also partners with Natural Cycles and delivers cycle insights in the Samsung Health app. It tells you whether you're in your fertile window, how many days until your period, and which phase of your menstrual cycle you're currently in. Plus, it has symptom logging.

One new feature novel to the smart ring space (and the rings on this list) is the double pinch gesture you can perform with the ring on your pointer finger. This feature snoozes alarms and snaps photos, all through the pinch of your fingers.

Given how new the product is, we haven't had the chance to test this ring extensively yet, so wait for our full review in the coming weeks and months. Even before the review comes out, though, we predict that the ring could become one of the major players in the smart ring space.

Galaxy Ring tech specs: Material: Titanium | Battery life: Seven days | Sizing: 5 to 13 | Compatibility: Android: | Durability: 10ATM waterproof rating | Charging: Charging case

The RingConn Smart Ring is a great option for people looking for two things: 1) A ring that includes many of the great features of the Oura or Evie Ring, like heart rate, SPO2, and sleep tracking, but is available for men, women, and nonbinary folks, and 2) A ring that does not require an additional monthly subscription fee. All you have to pay for with the RingConn Smart Ring is the up-front $279 cost. (Again, the Oura Ring requires a $6 monthly membership fee on top of the cost of the ring itself.)

"I was much more impressed with the RingConn Smart Ring than I expected to be," ZDNET contributor Matthew Miller wrote in his review of the ring. "I'm close to switching to it as my primary smart ring [from the Oura Ring] because I like the extensive amount of data provided and the ability to easily swap smartphones that I connect to the ring." Redditors agree that the extent of data tracking on RingConn's smart ring is some of the most impressive in the smart ring space.

Review: RingConn Smart Ring

Alongside the ring's long, seven-day battery life, the charging case offers a 500 mAh battery that can power your ring for up to 150 days.

RingConn Smart Ring tech specs: Material: Titanium | Battery life: Seven days | Sizing: 6 to 14 | Compatibility: iOS and Android: | Durability: IP68 waterproof rating | Charging: Charging case

Smartwatches and smart rings serve different purposes. Smartwatches tend to perform better for activity tracking, while smart rings excel at sleep tracking. If you want both a smartwatch and a smart ring, I'd recommend buying the Amazfit Helio Ring, the only smart ring that also boasts smartwatch compatibility, to have all your fitness data and sleep data in one place.

This ring isn't perfect for everything, as ZDNET's Matt Miller writes in his review, but it's great for sleep tracking. The sleep tracking includes a readiness score, a sleep score, sleep resting heart rate, sleep heart rate variability (HRV), and recovery time. A further breakdown of your sleep, including time and percent in deep and REM sleep, appears on the sleep tab of the Zepp app.

When Miller wore the Helio Ring, he compared the data to the Oura Ring and Polar watch and found that the Helio Ring's sleep score, sleep duration metrics, and HRV, all aligned with the two other wearables. "However, the time in each sleep stage, resting heart rate (RHR), and readiness scores ended up looking quite different," Miller wrote.

Review: Amazfit Helio Ring

One drawback to this ring is that you'll need to pay extra to access all your data, like weekly or monthly reports, readiness insights, or Zepp AI Coach details. Also, the ring is only available in two sizes (10 and 12), but Amazfit plans to roll out more sizes in the future.

Amazfit Helio Ring specs: Material: Titanium | Battery life: Four days | Sizing: 10 and 12 | Sensors: PPG heart rate sensor, temperature sensor, EDA sensor | Compatibility: iOS and Android | Waterproof rating: Water resistance 10 ATM

Every other ring on this list has a starting price of around $300. The Evie Ring only costs $270 without any additional subscription. What you gain in affordability, though, you lose out on in terms of useful health data features, but if you're new to the wearables space and are looking to dip your toes into smart rings, that won't be a problem with this ring.

This is an entry-level smart ring designed for women looking to monitor their menstrual cycle and wellness through activity and sleep tracking features, as well as mood and symptom logging. "The symptom-logging feature is competitive and thoughtful, and it helps you to understand the ebbs and flows of your moods throughout your menstrual cycle. Each day you can log your energy level and mood level, tag certain adjectives like 'calm,' 'depressed,' 'anxious,' and more, document your menstrual flow and your symptoms, and add tags like whether you drank alcohol, are sick, or are working through an injury," I wrote in my review.

Review: Evie Ring

Through continual documentation of mood logging, you can understand how your mood fluctuates with your menstrual cycle, activity, sleep, and more. Evie seems to offer a well-rounded view of health that relies on not only data but also works with you to understand the "why" behind your data.

One downside of the Evie Ring is that it's for women only, and the Evie app is only available through the iOS store, so Android users can't get it right now. Another downside is that the battery life is not as competitive as other smart rings, and many features aren't accessible while the ring's battery is low.

Movano Evie Ring specs: Sizing: 5 to 11 | Material: Liquid metal | Colors: Silver, rose gold, gold | Water resistance: Up to 1 meter | Sensors: Heart rate, heart rate variability, SpO₂, skin temperature, and active metabolic calorie burn | Connectivity: Bluetooth | Battery: Around four days

Here are a few things you might want to consider before buying a smart ring or smartwatch:

All in all, depending on what you want from a health wearable, you might choose a smart ring over a smartwatch and vice versa. It's all a matter of which suits the data you'd like to track best and your preferences for comfort, style, and battery life.

I recommend the Oura Ring 4 as the best smart ring based on its extensive software and hardware capabilities. However, there are other great choices out there, too. This table compares the best smart rings based on price, battery life, and materials.

*Lowest price at the time of writing. Please note that prices may vary based on retailer and available promotions, sales, or discounts.

It depends on your needs and your budget. For example, if you want a smart ring that will help you optimize your fitness routine, the Ultrahuman Ring Air is your best bet. Or, if you want the most durable option, the titanium body of the Oura Ring 4 will keep up with your wildest adventures. Below, our table helps you determine the right ring for you based on specific uses:

If you're interested in purchasing a smart ring, you should consider the following factors:

ZDNET went hands-on with every smart ring on this list. We spend a few weeks or months wearing the rings to test out how their apps, battery life, and other relevant features perform -- not just for a day or two, but over the course of many wears and through different environmental conditions. When we think a product is worth your money, we put it on this list and write up a spotlight highlighting its best qualities and specifying who it's for.

Also: How we test smart rings at ZDNET

Plus, we are constantly scouring the web for new products that are worthy of testing, and following news on product rollouts and upgrades. We know buying an expensive smart ring can set you back a few hundred dollars, and that's why our advice is tailored to your needs and budget and our picks are expert-vetted.

To learn more about my process for testing smart rings, visit this article, which covers it in depth.

Other ZDNET experts also assessed the Oura Ring 4 as the best overall smart ring in the fitness wearable market, especially if your goal is to track exercise and workout recovery specifically. If you aren't interested in the monthly subscription that comes with an Oura Ring, a great alternative fitness ring is the Ultrahuman Ring Air, which, in my opinion, is a sleeper hit fitness ring for anybody who wants to track their diet, get reminders and insights to maximize their energy levels throughout the day, and follow guided workouts, all on the app. This is in tandem with the already amazing health data you get on the Ultrahuman app.

Yes, by measuring heart rate variability (HRV), the Oura Ring 3 has also proven to show early signs of sickness. Wake Forest University's Dr. Jason Fanning, for example, told ZDNet that he saw that his "heart rate variability went through the floor" thanks to his Oura Ring data days before he tested positive for COVID-19.

Smart rings can provide more accurate readings than smartwatches because they are worn close to large blood vessels located in the fingers. In contrast, smartwatch sensors utilize small capillaries for readings.

The Apple Watch and the Oura Ring are the only two wearables with full Natural Cycles compatibility. The recently released Galaxy Ring, along with the Galaxy Watches, has cycle insights powered by Natural Cycles. However, it doesn't offer the full extent of fertility tracking (or charge you $20 a month, as a Natural Cycles subscription does), meaning you probably wouldn't want to use the Galaxy Ring's cycle insights as a form of contraception.

Smart rings can be useful for a variety of functions. A ring like the McLear RingPay is ideal if contactless payments are your top priority. If you want 24/7 monitoring for your blood oxygen and heart rate, go with the Circular Ring. Smart rings can go as far as you need, and you can even program your own with the Hecere NFC Ring.

Smart rings also have long battery lives, while some don't require charging.

Yes, the Oura Ring is waterproof up to 100 meters, so you can wear it in the shower, at the beach, or in the training pool.

Smart rings vary in price, depending on their features and which finish you get your ring in. A matte black smart ring is going to cost much less than a rose gold smart ring. On average, a smart ring will cost you around $250 to $450, depending on the finish and features.

Despite how small smart rings are, their battery life can compete with, say, smartwatches. Look for a smart ring that can last up to four to seven days while you're shopping around. If you are paying around $300 for a smart ring, it should last you at least four days, but ideally five or six. The more you have to charge this ring, the less you'll want to wear it and reap the benefits of the health data tracking suite.

There are various smart rings on the market that didn't make the cut for my top five. However, I've included a few other smart rings that receive honorable mentions:

The Go2sleep ring is dedicated to one function: Tracking your sleep based on heart rate, blood oxygen levels, and heart rate variability. If you or anyone in your family lives with a sleep condition, this ring could be a useful tool. I've started using it to track my hours and quality of sleep, and the app offers all the data that I need to understand my slumber.

The Hecere NFC ring is the best smart ring for tech-savvy people who may want to use their ring to open their phone or even as a networking tool. It's delivered blank with a built-in rewritable chip. You can download an NFC app for free and program the ring to function however you want, whether you want the ring to turn on Wi-Fi, make a call, or share a contact.