Apple makes its biggest health push yet with latest AirPods and Apple Watches

Apple (AAPL) unveiled its latest iPhone line, including its all-new iPhone Air, during its annual fall event in Cupertino, Calif., on Tuesday.

While the Air and upgraded iPhone 17 and iPhone 17 Pro line were the stars of the show, Apple also used the show to further one of its most ambitious initiatives with its new AirPods Pro 3 and Apple Watches: its work in the health and fitness space.

Apple CEO Tim Cook famously told CNBC that the company’s biggest contribution to humanity will be in health, and the iPhone maker has been moving in that direction for years, rolling out features including sleep apnea detection, elevated heart rate alerts, and the ability to identify signs of atrial fibrillation via its Apple Watch.

The company is pushing even further into the health space with its new AirPods Pro 3 and Apple Watch Series 11 and Ultra 3.

AirPods Pro 3 with heart rate tracking

In addition to improved acoustics, AirPods Pro 3 now come with built-in heart rate trackers in each earbud. It’s the smallest heart rate monitor Apple has ever built and was trained on 50 million hours of fitness activity.

Apple combines the trackers with AirPods Pro 3’s built-in accelerometer and iPhone sensors to help you track 50 different exercises, providing a range of information, including average heart rate and distance run, as well as your course map, if you were running or walking.

You won’t, however, be able to see things like your cadence or vertical oscillation, which require an Apple Watch.

If you do have an Apple Watch, the AirPods Pro 3 and your watch will work in tandem to determine which heart rate tracker is capturing the most accurate reading and rely on that particular one. If that tracker struggles to follow your heart rate, the system will switch to the next best one.

“While heart rate sensing on headphones has been around for a while, most users were unaware of its existence or the benefits of tracking through the ear,” International Data Corporation research manager Jitesh Ubrani said in a statement.

“The stationary position in [the] ear leads to better heart rate tracking, and with Apple’s scale, it won’t be long before consumers finally see the benefits and start demanding this from other brands too. All this provides a well-rounded package, making the AirPods Pro 3 a worthy upgrade,” Ubrani added.

In addition to heart rate tracking, Apple has improved the AirPods Pro 3’s hearing aid capabilities with a new feature called Conversation Boost. This feature raises the volume of whoever you’re speaking to when you’re in a crowded environment.

Apple said the functionality will also be available on AirPods Pro 2 and AirPods 4 with active noise cancellation via software updates, but that it will likely work best on the Pro 3 due to its enhanced audio capabilities and microphones.

Apple Watch with high blood pressure alerts

Apple Watch Series 11 and Ultra 3 also get some major health-related updates. Both watches can now provide alerts when they detect patterns consistent with hypertension, otherwise known as chronic high blood pressure.

It works by capturing a photoplethysmography, a waveform generated via the optical sensor that looks at the blood volume in your blood vessels from beat to beat. You won’t notice the measurements, because the watch takes them in the background throughout the day over a 30-day period and will alert you if it finds consistent signs that can be associated with hypertension.

Apple is careful to point out that the watch cannot diagnose hypertension. If it sees signs of the problem, it will tell you to purchase a dedicated blood pressure cuff and log the results for seven days. It will then provide you with a PDF file of your various results that you can provide to your doctor.

Apple said it anticipates receiving FDA clearance for the feature soon, and that based on its user base and the number of people in the world who have hypertension but don’t know it, the watch could help notify more than 1 million people about the issue in the first year alone.

“That is a feature that we’ve been hoping for for the past five years, and [it’s] fun to see it moving forward,” Deepwater Asset Management managing partner Gene Munster said in his Pressure Points podcast following the event.

“When you collectively put that alongside what they’ve got with the … heart rate [tracking], of course the EKG, the sleep tracking, this is really [becoming] a powerful wellness device,” Munster added.

Hypertension alerts will be compatible with Apple Watches as far back as the Series 9 and the Ultra 2 through software updates.

Apple’s latest watches also come with a new 100-point sleep score system meant to help users better understand their sleep patterns.

Sleep is rated based on duration, which accounts for 50 points; bedtime consistency is worth 30 points; and interruptions are worth 20 points.

Consistency bases your bedtime on the past 13 days you’ve gone to bed. Interruptions are scored the lowest because users can control when they wake up at night.

It all combines to create a capable health and fitness ecosystem that could significantly impact the company’s users over the long term, not to mention Apple’s bottom line.

Email Daniel Howley at dhowley@yahoofinance.com. Follow him on X/Twitter at @DanielHowley.

Click here for the latest technology news that will impact the stock market

Read the latest financial and business news from Yahoo Finance