Whoop Adds Clinical Blood Testing to Its App
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If you think fitness trackers are just about counting steps and heart rate, get with the times. This week, Whoop, a maker of wearable performance devices, announced its intention to integrate clinical lab testing directly into its ecosystem, partnering with Quest Diagnostics to launch Whoop Advanced Labs this fall. This confirms the growing trend of wearables increasingly becoming comprehensive and all-in-one health platforms.
How Whoop will track blood tests
Whoop members will be able to purchase Quest clinical lab tests, schedule appointments, and receive results within the Whoop app. This feature is designed to analyze biomarkers covering metabolism, hormones, inflammation, cardiovascular health, and nutrient levels—data that goes far beyond what can be obtained with wearable sensors alone.
The idea is that Whoop subscribers will have access to the types of clinical trials that doctors prescribe (such as those from Quest Diagnostics) to help guide their patients. “At Whoop, we strive to provide our subscribers with the most comprehensive picture of their health and well-being,” said John Sullivan , Whoop’s chief marketing officer.
A third-party provider will process testing requests, order tests, provide results through the Whoop app, and provide phone consultations upon request. Whoop Advanced Labs is scheduled to open late this fall, and participants can sign up for a waitlist now at whoop.com/waitlist .
Do you really need to control everything?
Again, Whoop isn’t the first wearable company to move in this direction. Ultrahuman, maker of the Ring AIR smart ring , launched its Blood Vision feature earlier this year.
This feature could help people identify health issues early and take preventative measures to address them. However, it also raises questions about whether consumers really need this level of health monitoring from commercial healthcare providers.
In my view, all of this points to a kind of “medicalization” of everyday well-being. While access to medical data can be inspiring, it can also be anxiety-provoking and encourage people to over-monitor aspects of their health that may not require constant attention. After all, blood biomarkers can fluctuate for many reasons , and abnormal results don’t always indicate health problems.
A look into the future
As Whoop prepares to launch Advanced Labs this fall, it will be interesting to see how consumers respond to this deeper level of health monitoring. For now, it appears the line between fitness tracker and medical device will continue to blur. Rumor has it that the company’s current user base already consists primarily of serious athletes and health-optimization enthusiasts, those who would be interested in comprehensive biomarker tracking.
Anyone interested in integrating blood testing into Whoop can join Advanced Labs’ waiting list . Whether they’ll truly want to know everything their blood tells them is another matter.