I wore the Ultrahuman ring for six months straight and the health tracker changed my life
IT SEEMS like these days, everybody is obsessed with tracking their health.
Whether it’s checking how many calories you burn, or monitoring how many hours of sleep you get, it’s never been easier thanks to a surge in wearable technology.
Fitness watches have been popular for a while, but they can be uncomfortable to wear for long periods, not to mention, they need frequent charging.
- Ultrahuman Ring Air,
$349$314 / £250, (save 10% off with NEWS10) -
Enter the smart ring, in particular, the Ultrahuman Ring Air, a new ring tracker that promises to give a 24-hour real-time analysis of your lifestyle; tracking you from the moment you wake up, to the moment you go to sleep. Similar to the Oura ring, the Ultrahuman ring makes a case for being the most comfortable ring to wear and is eleven times lighter than your average fitness watch.
In the past, I’ve tested different trackers without any real commitment lasting beyond a few weeks, so in an attempt to see whether I could improve my health with non-stop tracking, I slipped on the ring.
READ MORE REVIEWS:
Plus, if you’re interested in reading more about fitness trackers, you can check out our Oura ring review and Whoop review.
- Ultrahuman Ring Air,
$349$314 / £250, (save 10% off with NEWS10) -
Overall Rating: 4.5/5
Pros:
- Lightweight and comfortable
- Free app
- Advanced sleep tracker
- Helpful guidance and insights
- Long battery life
- Expert stimulants advisor
Cons:
- Coating scratched
- Constant reminders
- Limited fitness tracking
- Some functions are still in development
Ultrahuman Ring Air: How we tested
To truly get a full experience of the ring, I gave it a solid six months of wearing it before coming to my final verdict.
I wore the ring every day and put it through its paces by tracking all of its functions including new features that were added within the time and compared it to Apple Health.
In addition, Ultrahuman gives you a weekly report every week, so I used this to gauge whether I was making any improvements to my health.
I also did a Bupa Health Assessment and compared it with the ring's findings.
Plus, throughout the six months, I went on four holidays abroad so I tested the ring out in different conditions and time zones.
Ultrahuman Ring Air review: first impressions
Order and unboxing
I don’t wear rings every day, so I was worried about whether I would find it comfortable to wear all the time.
Thankfully, before you get your ring, Ultrahuman send out a free sizing kit containing seven different ring sizes so you can find your perfect fit.
It’s recommended to wear your ring on either your left or right index finger and after trying all the rings, I settled on one that felt comfortable, secure and not too tight.
Set up
Getting started was very easy, so I have to give Ultrahuman brownie points for its great user experience. Instructions are clear, after charging the ring you need to download the app on your phone to pair the devices together.
The process is pretty speedy, less than 10 minutes, and the ring charges fully in just two hours. Plus, the app is free to use so you can use your ring straight away. There are some extra paid-for features like a personalised coach, but they’re not necessary to the tracking experience.
Design
I got a mix of responses on the design of the ring, some friends were surprised that it was a tracker, while others thought the chunky design gave it away, but the majority agreed that it was far more discreet than a watch.
When I got the ring, it was only available with one design, aster black. While the matte style is very minimal, it isn’t my personal style preference so it sometimes looked a bit odd against shinier jewellery. However, the ring now comes in four colours, and even though black isn’t my colour, it’s still simple and doesn’t interfere with any of my outfits.
The ring is also water-resistant so you don’t need to worry about washing your hands or showering with it.
The biggest drawback is that the coating of my ring scratched against a dumbbell and has some obvious scruff marks. And within six months, I started to notice that the coating was coming off the edges. It’s made out of titanium and resin, but I wished that the coating was more resilient as it’s such a shame.
The charger is very compact and has a small dock for you to place your ring on top of and the light indicates that it’s charging. It comes with a dual-ended USB-C cord which does limit where you can charge it and I tended to connect it to my laptop. But you can also replace it with your USB-C to USB port cord if you want to plug it into an extension cord.
Tracking Features
Sleep tracker
The sleep tracker was the feature I was the most excited to try, especially given that I have quite poor sleep and have had insomnia. The ring’s best feature is that it’s far more comfortable than a watch and after a week, I barely noticed I had it on so it never affected my sleep.
It’s in-depth and measures your time in bed, total sleep, average heart rate, average heart rate variability (HRV) and efficiency percentage. After every sleep, you get a score out of 100 indicating how well you slept.
Nghts where I slept for shorter but stayed solidly asleep throughout, made me feel more energised and scored higher than nights where I had more hours of sleep.
The only time where the sleep tracker didn’t work was when I took an overnight flight 12 hours across two different time zones, but seeing as that was a one-off occasion, it didn’t bother me too much.
Regardless of what your issues are, the ring does a great job of informing you what type of sleep works best for you.
Movement tracker
Movement is the easiest tracker to understand and the Ultrahuman app has a clear interface that shows how many steps you’ve taken in the day. I compared one day of movement from the ring to Apple’s Health app and there was over a 1,000-step difference between, with the ring showing every step since waking up, while Apple’s only shows movement when I had my phone with me.
Like other trackers, it gives you a daily score based on your movement, with 100 being the perfect achievement.
What I found interesting is that it gives you extra points when you move earlier in the day, and encourages movement throughout the day, as opposed to reaching all your steps in one go. It’s not as detailed as the sleep tracker but shows your total amount of steps in comparison to your daily step goal, your active minutes and total calories.
Be warned, the step goal is initially set to 13,000 when you first use the app, but you can adjust this in the profile settings. I had mine set at that but adjusted it to 10,000 to make it more realistic for my everyday life, which includes a lot of desk sitting. The only downside is that the app sends a lot of reminder notifications which can be a bit irritating.
I’ve done a Bupa health assessment which includes a blood test so I know the exact amount of calories I burn in a day, and while the Ultrahuman isn’t as detailed, it’s actually within the same range so it's a decent indicator.
Recovery and fitness tracker
Based on your sleep and movement, the ring also gives you a recovery score out of 100, signifying whether you need more rest in the day or can physically push yourself.
Again, the score is indicated by your resting heart rate, skin temperature, seven-day HRV, sleep and movement index of the day before. I found it more useful to use the sleep tracker as an indicator of my recovery as it would show more detailed insights.
The fitness tracker has changed throughout my testing and is the feature that needs more development - you have to manually pick your exercise before you start so it can record the activity. There's a wide range to choose from, like HIIT, traditional strength training, indoor walking, tennis and more, making it more varied than I expected.
Once you select your exercise, it’ll record your average heart rate, total calories and your workout zone throughout.
The recordings depend on the ring connection and sometimes I would be disappointed to find that the ring would only record part of my workout before disconnecting. I’m physically active about five times a week, and I found that the ring was beneficial for more cardio-based workouts like football and running, over strength training.
Ultimately, it’s great for keeping track of your activities but doesn’t tell you more than how many calories you burnt and what your heart rate was like. I lift weights frequently, and it would’ve been useful to see whether I need to take longer or shorter rest periods in between sets to improve my performance.
Other tracking functions
In addition, the ring has many other tracking functions including your skin temperature, heart rate, food and menstrual tracking, which was newly introduced. Most of the other trackers were good guidance, but I didn’t use the food tracker as you have to manually add what you eat into the app to see your total macros.
I don’t track my calorie intake as I’m not looking to lose or gain weight so it wasn’t relevant to me, but I found that there were limitations and certain food items weren’t listed as options.
One of the most helpful functions was the stimulant restriction window. While not a tracker, Ultrahuman creates a schedule for you based on your sleep cycle of when is best for you to drink any stimulants, i.e. caffeinated-based drinks and when to cut it off for optimal sleep.
It’s more guidance than a strict routine but I found it a useful indicator, and it did help me wind down in the evenings. This was one of my favourite functions and as a coffee lover, I was still able to enjoy my espressos without having it negatively affect my sleep.
Ultrahuman Ring Air: final verdict
It’s been six months since I first wore the ring and I haven’t taken it off at all. I think that what’s best about the ring, isn’t that it gives you detailed insights, but that it helps give you advice based on its findings.
While I still suffer from sleep problems, I’ve managed to understand why I have poor sleep and the ring has helped me actively improve my sleep cycle. It was eye-opening to discover that having a better sleep was more important than a longer sleep. I always look forward to waking up and checking the ring.
The ring has also made me move more, whether it’s opting to walk up the stairs over an escalator or making sure that I’ve worked out during the day.
While there are still many developments, the tech is decent and even if you run out of battery, the ring will still save up to six days of data.
There are still some downsides - at just under £300, it’s a hefty investment. But I think anything that can actively encourage you to improve your lifestyle for the better is always worth it, and the Ultrahuman ring does just that.
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- Ultrahuman Ring Air,
$349$314 / £250, (save 10% off with NEWS10) -