With WWDC 2024 now behind us, we can finally take a closer look at some changes coming in Apple’s future software updates. Although watchOS 11 isn’t as big of an upgrade as watchOS 10 was, that doesn’t mean it lacks exciting new features for Apple Watch users. Besides a redesigned Activity Ring, Apple also introduced a new Vitals app with a Training Load feature. In this write-up, we’ll cover everything you need to know about these features.
Vitals app: Apple is introducing the Vitals app in watchOS 11. It helps you better understand your daily health status. Previously, those numbers were in the Health app on your iPhone. However, it was up to you (or a third-party app) to understand what those numbers meant. Now, your overnight health data is conveniently available in one place.
Track your sleep: By wearing your Apple Watch to bed, you’ll get a more holistic understanding of your daily health status, as you can see overnight health metrics on your watch, such as heart rate, respiratory rate, wrist temperature, blood oxygen, and sleep duration.
See what’s typical for you: Vital establishes a typical range for each of your health metrics collected as you sleep. So you’ll always know at a glance how your metrics are stacking up.
Pay more attention to your body: With watchOS 11 and the Vitals app, it’s easy to pay more attention to your body. If two or more metrics are outside the typical range, you’ll receive a notification along with context for factors that may be involved, like medications, elevation, alcohol, or even illness.
Alongside watchOS 11’s new Vitals app, Apple also introduces yet another feature: Training Load. Based on your sleep data, it helps you understand how you should tackle exercising every day.
Help to achieve your goals: Training load helps you see how the intensity of your workouts may impact your body over time. With the data it provides, you can make informed decisions about how and when to adjust your workouts.
Track your effort: After completing most cardio-focused workouts in the Workout app, you’ll be able to review a new effort metric in the summary showing how hard you exercised.
Overtraining or undertraining: Training Load compares the intensity and duration of your workouts over the last seven days to what you’ve done over the previous 28 days. It then classifies your current training load on a scale from well below to well above.
Wrap up
So far, this is everything we know about watchOS 11 Vitals app and Training Load feature. As the beta cycle follows, we’ll keep sharing all the latest watchOS 11 news.
