Oura adds new fitness metrics to show how workouts impact your body

Oura, a leading player in the smart ring market, has announced the addition of two new fitness metrics to enhance users' understanding of how their workouts affect their bodies. The company unveiled Cardio Effort and VO₂ max measurements to broaden its workout tracking capabilities beyond just exercise duration and heart rate zones.

Cardio Effort enables users to gauge the stress placed on their cardiovascular system during workouts. This metric is calculated weekly in comparison to each user's personal baseline, shifting the focus from the quantity of movement to the quality and impact on fitness. Cardio Effort consists of two parts: Workout Cardio Effort, which assesses the impact of individual workouts, and Weekly Cardio Effort, which provides a weekly total categorized as Light, Fair, Maintaining, Building, or Reaching.

On the other hand, VO₂ max is a measure of how efficiently the heart, lungs, and muscles collaborate to deliver and utilize oxygen during exercise. While traditionally, measuring VO₂ max required either a lab test or a six-minute walking test, Oura can now estimate this metric passively through GPS-enabled workouts. Users with Gen3 and newer Oura Ring devices can access their initial VO₂ Max estimate, along with insights on their fitness category, trends over time, and the last update to their estimate, all within Oura Labs, the company's experimental features hub.

By introducing these advanced workout metrics, Oura aims to differentiate itself from competitors like RingConn and Ultrahuman, who are seeking to disrupt the smart ring market.