fitness tracking
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Amazon’s Echo Buds can finally track your workouts
The company started testing the feature a year ago.
Mobvoi's latest TicWatch Pro is its most durable wearable yet
Over the last couple of years, wearable maker Mobvoi has made a name for itself by producing affordable but capable Wear OS smartwatches. The company's latest product, an update to its TicWatch Pro lineup, looks like it will continue that trend.
Peloton's Apple Watch app will offer detailed metrics for indoor runs
If you're a Peloton fan, you might be pleased to learn the company has released an Apple Watch app. Though you would have already been able to view exercise data via Watch's native workout tracker, the Watch app should offer more options and detailed metrics.
These are all of the Alexa devices Amazon unveiled today
Today, Amazon held its second-annual hardware deluge. Like last year, the company had a lot to unveil. It revealed a slew of Echo devices, Alexa-powered wearables, Ring's first indoor security cam and a smart oven. The company also shared Alexa updates -- like the voice assistant's ability to impersonate celebrities.
Apple watchOS 6 launches on September 19th
When Apple unveiled watchOS 6 at its June event, there was a lot of ground to cover. The wearable OS would include an on-device App Store and an even deeper focus on health tracking. Alongside ambient noise alerts to save your ears, the wearable OS will include a menstrual cycle tracker and audiobook support. On the looks front, watchOS 6 adds several new dynamic watch faces, including Meridian, Modular Compact and Solar Dial. Finally, watchOS 6 will be available to download on September 19th, with new Apple Watch Series 5 hardware coming a day later on September 20th. The new watchOS will work on Series 3 and 4 watches at launch, with Apple promising an update to Series 1 and 2 timepieces later this fall.
The latest TicWatch Pro includes 4G LTE to free you from your phone
Mobvoi's second generation TicWatch Pro is available today, and the company hopes it will free you from your phone. The Wear OS-powered TicWatch Pro 4G/LTE offers wireless connectivity, so you can receive voice calls and app notifications, send and receive texts and use popular messaging apps. You can also hit an SOS button that will dial 911, and it will automatically sync your data with the cloud -- all without tethering you to another device.
Garmin's fitness watches are getting period-tracking via an update
Garmin has added a feature for tracking menstrual cycles to its line of connected wearables and smartwatches. Women can now track their menstrual cycle and log symptoms through the Garmin Connect app. They can opt-in to receive reminders for periods and fertility windows on their Garmin smartwatches or wearables. With its new period tracker, Garmin joins other major fitness tracking apps such as Fitbit and Apple Health in giving their female users an option to track their reproductive health.
Multiple iOS apps are reportedly sharing sensitive data with Facebook (updated)
At least 11 popular apps are reportedly sharing people's sensitive data with Facebook, even if they don't have an account on the social network. The Wall Street Journal found that apps which can help track personal information such as body weight, menstrual cycles and pregnancy are sending such details to Facebook.
Daily Roundup: rediscovered Andy Warhol art, Google Glass available to all, and more!
You might say the day is never really done in consumer technology news. Your workday, however, hopefully draws to a close at some point. This is the Daily Roundup on Engadget, a quick peek back at the top headlines for the past 24 hours -- all handpicked by the editors here at the site. Click on through the break, and enjoy.
Withings taking pre-orders for new Pulse activity tracker
When it comes to the "connected health device" market, the leader has been Withings. The company started selling its first WiFi-connected scale back in 2010, and since then has added such devices as a baby scale and a blood pressure monitor to the product mix. Today the company announced that it has begun taking pre-orders for a new activity tracker named Pulse (US$99.95). Pulse weighs just eight grams and has a clip built into the back that performs several functions. First, the clip provides a way to attach the Pulse to your pants, bra or an included sleep wristband. But put your finger on that clip and it turns into a pulse monitor. As you'd expect, the device syncs to your iOS or Android smartphone a number of times throughout the day, and the information is viewable in the Withings Health Mate app that many people are already familiar with. Withings has also built up partnerships with over 100 other health and fitness apps, so the information can be shared with those applications as well. Pulse displays not only your pulse rate, but also the number of steps you take (similar to Fitbit and other devices), elevation gain, estimated distance you've walked and calories burned. If you're running or walking, Pulse displays how many minutes you've been active and how far you've gone. Pulse has an estimated two-week battery life, and also features a touchscreen that you can swipe to view two weeks' worth of fitness data. The device is expected to ship within the next 30 days, and we'll have a full TUAW review soon.
Using Jawbone UP with MyFitnessPal to track your calories and workouts
MyFitnessPal is a fitness platform that is part calorie counter, part fitness goal tracker and part exercise journal. It compiles a wealth of information about your fitness program and makes it accessible on the web and your iOS device. With Jawbone's recent update, you can now share some of that fitness data with the Jawbone UP system. Jawbone UP and MyFitnessPal have a two-way relationship that shares meal data from MyFitnessPal and calorie counts from the UP. MyFitnessPal is meant to be the cornerstone of your daily exercise regime. You log each meal and workout and then track the amount of calories you need to consume to either lose weight, gain weight or remain steady. Meal and workout entry is made easy by the platform's large database of foods and activities. When using MyFitnessPal with the UP, meal data that you enter in MyFitnessPal will show up in your Jawbone UP software. It syncs a few times a day and pulls over your aggregate meal data. The meal data is not broken down during the transfer, so your lunch of an apple and yogurt will show up as one unnamed item with 325 calories and combined nutritional information. Meal data also is sent over with the same time code, at least in my experience. According to my UP feed, my breakfast, lunch and dinner were all consumed at 3PM. You can edit this time stamp within the Jawbone UP app, but this is an unnecessary extra step that hopefully will be improved in a future update. On the other side of the coin, the Jawbone UP shares some of its fitness data with the MyFitnessPal software. When you are logging a workout in your MyFitnessPal app, you will notice a line with calorie information from the Jawbone UP. This value is an adjustment based on the activity level recorded by the UP. It is the difference between what is estimated by the MyFitnessPal app and what is recorded by the UP. In my experience, this number was not a large amount (200 calories or so each day), but every little bit helps. Overall, I like the combination of the Jawbone UP and MyFitnessPal. There is some overlap as you have to enter your workout data in both the Jawbone software and the MyFitnessPal app as the two don't exchange detailed workout information. This duplication is just a minor inconvenience. I like the exchange of meal information which is useful, even without a detailed breakdown of items. In the end, I find that I use MyFitnessPal for its calorie counting and the Jawbone UP for its sleep tracking and overall activity counts (number of steps taken). Both work together to provide me with a wealth of fitness information that'll help keep me healthy. MyFitnessPal is available on the web at myfitnesspal.com or as a free iOS app. The Jawbone UP fitness band is available for $129 and its companion iOS app is free.
Fitbit Flex hands-on at CES 2013 (video)
Fitbit's been in the fitness-tracking game for a while now, but today marks its first official entry into the wearable band space. Shown off here at CES 2013, the Flex is a wireless band much in the vein of Nike's Fuelband and Jawbone's rebooted Up. But while it shares many similarities with those existing products, there are a few very notable areas where it breaks apart from the pack-- namely, the inclusion of Bluetooth 4.0. Now, health nuts can wirelessly update their stats to an iPhone or limited selection of Android (!) devices via that standard without having to manually sync. While it doesn't boast the Yves Behar design that Jawbone fancies, the Flex should prove to be a welcome accessory for fashion conscious consumers. To that end, it comes in five different colors -- navy, black, tangerine, slate and teal -- and features a thin strip of LEDs that can be activated by a simple tap. Those lights, five in total, each represent 20-percent towards a user's assigned goal, so current progress can be easily monitored. And, as you might expect, there's a vibration motor within the band to alert users based on settings made from the companion app. The Flex is indeed a waterproof product and can be worn in the shower or even the swimming pool, though we wouldn't advise you take it diving. Despite this H20 resistance, the Flex won't track your butterfly strokes (or doggie paddles), but it will keep count of your steps, calories burned, sleep and distance walked. Perhaps one of the most welcome innovations of this particular wearable is its ability to play friendly with Android -- specifically, the Samsung Galaxy Note II and Galaxy S III. Users who purchase this band will be able to download that app from Google Play at the end of January. Further, there's one additional perk for Android users: the ability to tap-to-pair with NFC. In theory, this functionality should provide users with easy access to their stats, but we (in addition to the company's many reps) had significant trouble triggering the action on repeated occasions. If you've been monitoring the fitness-tracking space, but have been holding out for a band that offers just a little extra, then it's worth considering the Flex. You can look for it to hit this spring for $100. Stay tuned for a video demo of the Flex in action. Sarah Silbert contributed to this report.
Nike+ Basketball and Training stat tracking shoes launch, kick off 'Game On, World' challenge (video)
While the Nike+ fitness tracking platform has been around for years, the footwear giant has only just unleashed shoes with the technology built right in. The Nike Hyperdunk+ (last seen skying through the FCC) is its first basketball shoe in the line, while the first training shoes are the Lunar Hyper workout+ for women and Lunar TR 1+ for men. All feature not only the new Nike+ Pressure Sensor that tracks its wearer's movement, but also lightweight Flywire construction and Lunarlon cushioning. Both can wirelessly transfer their data to apps on user's phones (currently iOS only, pre-iPhone 4S hardware will also need the $20 Nike+ Sport adapter) or PCs, tracking activity during games, height on a dunk or movement as part of a training workout or drill. So what is Nike going to do with all that data? Its first plan for the summer is "Game On, World", which is a series of challenges inspired by pro athletes encouraging all Nike+ users to set their personal bests in various categories. If you're still not sure how all this comes together, there are several demo videos embedded after the break. Now all we need to do is find someone (else) to get all sweaty, let us know if it works and keep us on top of the leaderboard -- has anyone seen Dan Cooper lately?
Northeastern University Squid Shirt torso-on
It seems like everyone's got a solution for workout tracking, these days, and the undergrad students at Northeastern University are no different. We traveled to the bowels of the Boston school's Egan Research Center, to try the Squid Shirt that we saw back in February on for size. Our own Terrence O'Brien donned the garb, and while the current prototype has dropped much of the unwieldy wires and suction cups that gave the wearable its name, it's still a bit of a production, taking several minutes to put on with the aid of assistant academic specialist, Mark Sivak (who assured us that the student this specific model was designed for had gotten the whole thing down to a two or three minute streamlined process). The shirt has a total of 13 EMG sensors, monitoring data from three muscle groups: the pecs, lats and delts. Every signal requires two sensors (with one attached to the hip for ground), which are ultra cheap and disposable, meaning you can just toss them away at the end of each workout session. In addition to monitoring muscle activity, a standard Polar heart rate monitor slips into a sleeve inside the shirt to keep track of your pulse. The shirt itself is machine washable, which again is good news, if you plan on working out in the thing. This is due in part to the fact that the box -- the brains of the operation -- is removable. This also means that you can use a single box to plug into different garments, which could include things like workout pants in the future.%Gallery-158046%
New Nike+ apps and shoes cater to basketball players and training athletes
Nike just keep building on its Nike+ brand, turning what started life as a glorified pedometer, into a full-fledged workout-tracking platform. Hot on the heels of the FuelBand comes Nike+ Basketball and Nike+ Training, two new experiences with their own dedicated footwear. For ballers, the Hyperdunk+ features a pressure sensor that measures speed, jump height and even abstract concepts like "hustle." It also features a ego Showcase mode that lets you superimpose workout data over video of you dunking and post it to the web. Nike+ Training, like almost every other workout app or digital accessory, turns getting in shape into a game. The app features a series of drills and challenges meant to improve speed, agility and strength, and your performance can be uploaded to a global leaderboard. The new apps and shoes, including the Hyper Workout+ for Women and the TR 1+ for men, will be available on June 29th in the US, UK, Germany, France and China. Head on after the break for one more image and PR.
Squid is a shirt that keeps an exercise journal so you don't have to
Wearable fitness trackers are everywhere these days. Everyone has a GPS watch, companies like Jawbone have turned to slightly stranger form factors, while AT&T and Under Armour are putting sensors inside clothing. Students at Northeastern University think the latter have the right idea, and have put an array of electrodes inside a compression shirt. The apparel is part of system being called Squid, which also includes a smartphone app and an exercise tracking site. Unlike other tech that ends with monitoring hear rate and tracking GPS coordinates Squid can actually gauge muscle activity and count reps so you don't have to. The shirt probably can't tell the difference between a bench press and push up, but at least its one less task to worry about while whipping yourself into fighting shape. No word on if or when the system might become available to the general public, so you'll have to make do with the video after the break to see it in action.
Apple patents clothes that track how you wear them, tell you when it's time to update your wardrobe
There's a huge problem with working out that has yet to be solved: when, precisely, do our workout clothes become too worn to wear anymore? Apple knows we can't be wasting endless minutes looking for holes and tears in our shirts and pants, so it's just obtained a method patent to let you know when your gear is past its prime. The patent claims sensor-equipped garments that can track how you use them, report that info back to a central database and alert you when the clothing has reached "its expected useful lifetime." (Read: it's time to buy some new, undoubtedly more expensive gym clothes.) This latest bit of IP doesn't just cover clothing either, Cupertino's claiming the same method for running shoes, too. The footwear bit also provides real-time feedback that compares your current running style to an established profile to keep your workouts consistent -- useful feature, that, though we can't imagine such iShoes would make the folks in Niketown too happy. We're not sure how Apple aims to make the needed wearables equipped with embedded electronics, but we can offer you plenty of typically broad patent legalese explaining the system that'll get you buying them at the source below.
AT&T plans to sell exercise apparel that tracks your vitals, performance
It's not enough for AT&T to simply sell cellphones, its emerging devices unit also traffics in everything from GPS dog collars to connected pill bottles. Now the company wants in on the fitness tracking craze. Forbes is reporting that Ma Bell will start offering apparel that could track GPS routes, heart rate and other vital stats -- similar to the E39 shirt above from Zephyr and Under Armour. The clothing isn't just for athletes though, the military, first responders and seniors could also benefit from the technology. Sadly, no firm release date or prices were announced, so don't expect to wander into a Modell's and pick up a wicking t-shirt that uploads your workouts to RunKeeper any time soon.
