Apple Watch’s Latest Health Feature Gets FDA Clearance
When Apple announced the Apple Watch Series 11 earlier this week, one of the headline new features was “hypertension notifications.” It’s since been revealed that it’s coming to some older Apple Watch models , but despite that, everyone was willing to wait a little longer. That’s because Apple was still waiting for FDA approval for the new feature even when it announced the new watch. Now, it looks like that’s over.
While Apple initially promised the feature would only be available “this month,” in a statement sent to the press last night, Apple revealed that its hypertension notifications have now been cleared by the FDA and will be released alongside watchOS 26, which hits the public on Monday . That means there won’t be any delays with the update — it’ll be available for the Apple Watch Series 11 at launch, with Series 9 and Series 10 owners able to try it out before then. If you’re after something a little fancier, yes, the Apple Watch Ultra 3 will also get notifications at launch, and the Ultra 2 will be among the older watches getting them on Monday.
This is great news for my family, who have a history of heart problems. While these notifications won’t replace a full-fledged blood pressure monitor, their purpose is to help you spot potential problems early so you know when it’s time to bring them to your doctor’s attention or pay more attention. According to Apple, the watch works like this : Using its optical heart rate sensor, it passively tests “how your blood vessels respond to your heartbeat” for 30 days, then sends you an alert if it detects signs of high blood pressure. It then recommends that you measure your blood pressure for a week using a third-party cuff and schedule an appointment with your doctor.
In other words, it won’t give you exact data, but it can tell you if you’re at risk. Given that high blood pressure often goes undiagnosed until it’s too late, Apple hopes these notifications will help change that.
Personally, I’m inclined to believe so. Earlier this year, my husband actually had surgery for another heart condition called atrial fibrillation (AFib), and his Apple Watch Series 10 played a major role in identifying and tracking it before it became a serious problem. As part of his treatment, he had to have his blood pressure measured regularly with a cuff, but we’re both looking forward to the additional data the watch will now provide him.
Apple says its hypertension alerts were developed based on data from more than 100,000 test participants, then validated with data from another 2,000 patients. While I can’t guarantee they’ll work perfectly right away, that’s a good sign, even though Apple cautions that the new feature “will not detect all cases of hypertension.” Notably, this comes after the FDA rejected a similar feature from Whoop , even though that feature claims to provide more data than Apple’s.
If you want to try Apple’s hypertension notifications yourself, you don’t have to do anything yet. Just make sure you have a compatible Apple Watch, then update it to watchOS 26 on Monday and try to wear it as often as possible over the next 30 days to give it enough time to collect data.