Samsung Electronics today announced a major update to the Samsung Health app, transforming the upcoming Galaxy Watch into a proactive, intelligent health partner. Starting 8 June, Samsung will begin rolling out the app update to showcase the key health features included in the upcoming Galaxy Watch. The update^[1] makes daily health management effortless by translating complex biometric data — from overnight sleep to daily activity — into simple, actionable guidance.

“Samsung Health is evolving to connect health data measured by Galaxy Watch with AI-based insights, enabling users to understand their physical and mental conditions more easily and intuitively,” said Hon Pak, Senior Vice President and Head of the Digital Health Team for the Mobile eXperience (MX) Business at Samsung Electronics. “Samsung Electronics will continue to expand proactive and personalised health management experiences based on the connected Galaxy ecosystem and digital health innovations.”

This advancement is a key milestone in Samsung’s overarching vision for a truly AI-powered health platform designed to help users stay ahead of their health. The newly announced health features will first be available on the upcoming Galaxy Watch.

Features Transforming Galaxy Watch into an Intelligent Health Partner

The Samsung Health update comes with the following features:

• Vitals: A Better Understanding of the Body’s Signals — Previously, Samsung Health monitored specific health metrics to help measure users’ daily Energy Score. Now, Samsung Health is taking this a step further. When users wake up, the new Vitals feature analyses five key overnight bio-signals — heart rate, heart rate variability, respiratory rate, skin temperature and blood oxygen — against their true resting baseline. It sends notifications only when it detects meaningful deviations, helping users determine if they need more rest or are fighting an illness, without causing alert fatigue.

• Heart Health Score: Improved Long-Term Wellness — Last year, Samsung introduced Vascular Load to help users monitor vascular stress and adopt a more holistic approach to health. Today, that vision evolves into the Heart Health Score. This single daily metric takes the insights previously found in Vascular Load — such as sleep, stress and activity — and combines them with body composition data. The result is a unified score that clearly identifies the habits impacting users’ long-term well-being, giving them immediate clarity on their heart health.

• Daily Cardio Load: Smarter Cardiovascular Training — When users are deciding how hard to push during aerobic exercise, Daily Cardio Load measures accumulated cardiovascular strain. By calculating daily load and maximum training capacity, it recommends optimal training targets and rest times to ensure users reach their goals without risking burnout or injury.

• Fitness Index: Seamless Progress Tracking — The Fitness Index ensures exercise routines are working by analysing metrics like heart rate, VO₂ max (a key measure of aerobic fitness) and daily steps against users’ peers. By clearly identifying individual physical strengths and weaknesses, it delivers tailored content and personalised goals so users can make continuous, targeted improvements.

New Samsung Health Design for a Simplified, Personal Experience

To make these proactive insights easy to find, Samsung Health introduces a streamlined layout organised into five core pillars: Sleep, Activity, Nutrition, Mindfulness and Vitals. Within the Home screen, users can now easily access their daily wellness tips alongside their AI-powered Energy Score. This centralised view removes guesswork from health management, allowing users to quickly understand how different aspects of their routine interconnect at a single glance.

Upgraded Capabilities for Proactive Wellness

 Samsung Health is also significantly advancing the core features users already rely on, delivering deeper personalisation with greater precision. As users navigate their day, Antioxidant Index now provides an even clearer roadmap of their nutritional intake. With new trend charts and daily history logs, it visually connects users’ dietary choices to physical responses over time. Behind the scenes, the AGEs index has been enhanced to quietly work in the background, capturing automatic overnight measurements to build a long-term picture of how lifestyle choices accumulate in users’ bodies. This helps users uncover health insights that truly matter for their well-being.

Comprehensive wellness extends to external environments as well, with Samsung offering a brand-new Hearing Health feature that integrates seamlessly across the Galaxy ecosystem. By monitoring surrounding ambient noise through Galaxy Watch, it delivers personalised analytics to help protect the user’s ears — whether they are on a loud commute or dialling up the music during a workout.

Together, these advanced refinements and new ecosystem-connected features turn everyday data into simple, practical guidance, setting the perfect stage for the future of Samsung Health.

A Seamlessly Connected Health Ecosystem

Samsung’s expansive ecosystem unlocks the true power of these new features, seamlessly managing health across users’ Galaxy mobile phones and connected devices. This frictionless integration ensures that personalised insights are always accessible, providing a unified view of user well-being. These advancements offer a glimpse into the future of Samsung Health — a future that will be fully realised with the launch of Samsung’s next generation of Galaxy Watches, engineered to bring this proactive intelligence to life like never before.

_{^[1] New health features are for wellness only, not for the diagnosis or treatment of any medical condition. If concerned about health, be sure to see a medical professional. Available on Android phones (Android 10 or above) and requires the Samsung Health app (v7.0 or above). Samsung Account login required. Certain features may require user activity and data accumulation over time to enable personalised results. Feature availability, supported devices, and rollout timing may vary by market, model, and other factors and are subject to change.}

What’s New:

• New features^[1] include Bedtime Guidance^[2], to optimise your sleep; Vascular Load^[3], which measures stress on your vascular system while sleeping; Running Coach^[4], to help strategise your training; and Antioxidant Index^[5], to measure your carotenoids for healthy aging.
• The new features are part of the One UI 8 Watch, which will be available on the newest Galaxy Watch series.

Why it Matters: 

The goal of these new features is to help you build healthier daily habits, which can be challenging because they don’t develop instantly. It takes time to accumulate these behavior patterns, and meaningful changes are often only apparent after a long period. But the rewards are worth it.

• For example, eating unhealthy food may not immediately impact your health, but over time, it can have significant consequences.
• Conversely, adopting healthy habits may not show immediate results, but over time, they lead to positive changes in your body and mind.
• Samsung Health’s new features aim to help you develop healthy habits by motivating you through instant feedback on your health. These features inspire you to maintain your habits by providing rewards or warning signs and demonstrating immediate impact of your behaviors.

“Sleep remains a cornerstone of our approach to health, as it influences physical and mental well-being, social relationships and even work performance,” said Dr. Hon Pak, Senior Vice President and Head of Digital Health Team, Mobile eXperience, Samsung Electronics. “Now, we envision our Galaxy Watch delivering holistic insights centered around sleep — insights that lead to meaningful changes in daily life. We believe this aligns with our vision of empowering you to lead healthier lives through proactive care and holistic health management.”

Explore New Health Features

Samsung Health’s new features aim to help users develop healthy habits, using instant health feedback as a motivating tool.

Bedtime Guidance 

A single night of restful sleep offers immediate health benefits, encouraging more proactive behavior changes and leading to a healthier tomorrow. This starts with a regular and optimal bedtime.

• We constantly seek to advance our sleep-related tools, which include sleep pattern analysis, sleep coaching, and optimising sleep environments. They also include the feature that detects signs of sleep apnea^[6] — a sleep disorder — and help you take proactive steps.
• Now, we are providing additional tools for better sleep by suggesting an optimal bedtime based on your lifestyle and sleep patterns while sending reminders to help you stick to it.
• By analysing your past three days’ sleep patterns, the feature evaluates your need for sleep pressure and your circadian rhythm to calculate a bedtime that maximises alertness the next day.
• This feature is particularly helpful for those trying to optimise their sleep after periods of irregular bedtimes. For example, if you go to bed later than planned over several days, or have inconsistent sleep schedules between weekdays and weekends, the bedtime guidance will consider these factors to ensure you get enough sleep.

Vascular Load 

Sleep is a window into overall health, as it impacts holistic well-being. Galaxy Watch uses this opportunity to measure vascular load — the amount of stress on your vascular system while sleeping.

• The vascular system carries blood throughout the body to deliver oxygen and nutrients and remove waste, making it a strong indicator to determine good heart health.
• During sleep, stress on your vascular system should naturally dip; however, excessive fluctuations can negatively impact cardiovascular health.
• Simply wear your Watch while sleeping, and it will measure your vascular load, providing insights into the stress on your vascular system.
• Additionally, since all health factors are interconnected, the feature also provides insights into lifestyle factors such as sleep, exercise, and stress to help you maintain a healthier lifestyle and develop positive habits.

Running Coach 

While sleep is a precious time to cultivate and care for your health, managing your health during active moments is equally important. Running is one of the most basic and universally available fitness activities, and Samsung has long sought to support runners, offering features to help everyone stay active and achieve their fitness goals.

• Many runners face injuries due to over-pacing or are not optimally pushing themselves. Running Coach is designed to help runners safely complete marathons through optimised-intensity and injury-preventive training, making it ideal for beginners.
• Our new Running Coach feature delivers motivation and real-time guidance, creating a unique training program based on your fitness level to help you achieve your goals.
• Just wear your watch and run for 12 minutes; it will analyse your performance and running level from 1-10. You’ll receive a detailed training plan to help you complete a 5K, 10K, half marathon, or full marathon based on your level. Complete your training session, and you’ll level up and unlock your next running challenge.

Antioxidant Index 

When taking a holistic approach to health, we naturally focus on aging and inspiring healthy aging.

However, behavioral factors, such as drinking alcohol, smoking, UV exposure, stress and lack of sleep, can accelerate aging by increasing free radicals in the body. These free radicals damage cells and accelerate aging. Antioxidants, nutrients found in many healthy foods, are molecules that neutralise these free radicals, helping prevent chronic illnesses and promote healthy aging.

• Use Galaxy Watch to measure carotenoids, which are antioxidants found in green and orange vegetables and fruits, stored in your skin.
• Galaxy Watch employs an industry-first feature to measure carotenoids in just five seconds via its advanced, light-activated BioActive sensor.
• These insights reflect behavioral changes. For example, drinking carrot juice can show changes in the index, providing motivation to adopt healthier habits.

Great health comes from the combination of many small changes — and with Galaxy Watch, it is now possible overnight.

^{[1] Samsung Health features are intended for general wellness and fitness purposes only. The measurements are for your personal reference only. Please consult a medical professional for advice. Samsung account login required. Vascular Load, Running Coach and Antioxidant Index are available on Android phones (Android 10 or above) and requires the Samsung Health app (v6.30.2 or later). Vascular Load and Antioxidant index are Labs features that you can preview before its official launch. If you don’t want to use these experimental features, you can turn them off in Samsung Health settings.}

^{[2]  Not intended for use in detection, diagnosis, treatment of any medical condition or sleep disorder. Bedtime guidance is available on Android phone (Android 11 and above) requires Samsung Health app (v6.30.2 or later). It is based on 3 days of sleep analysis of user’s circadian rhythm and sleep pressure.}

^{[3] Service only available with Galaxy Watch Ultra or later released Galaxy Watch Series. To measure vascular load, it is required to wear Galaxy Watch when sleeping for at least 3 days out of recent 14 days.}

^{[4]  Service only available with Galaxy Watch7 Series or later released Galaxy Watch Series. To use running coach program, user needs to take a running level test and get a level before starting the coach program.}

^{[5] Service only available with Galaxy Watch Ultra or later released Galaxy Watch Series. To measure, place the center of your finger on the sensor at the back of the Watch and hold it for 5 seconds. While Anti-oxidant index can be measured using any finger, the thumb is recommended for the most accurate result. Repeat measurement due to uneven skin texture may lead to inaccurate results.}

^{[6] The Sleep Apnea feature is an over-the-counter (OTC), software-only, mobile medical application operating on a compatible Samsung Galaxy Watch and Phone. This feature is intended to detect signs of moderate to severe obstructive sleep apnea in the form of significant breathing disruptions in adult users 22 years and older, over a two-night monitoring period. It is intended for on demand use. This feature is not intended for users who have previously been diagnosed with sleep apnea. Users should not use this feature to replace traditional methods of diagnosis and treatment by a qualified clinician. The data provided by this device is also not intended to assist clinicians in diagnosing sleep disorders. Availability may vary by market, carrier, model or a paired smartphone.}

HPSSC’s Michigan Performance Research Laboratory (MiPR) found a significant correlation between Galaxy Watch and the clinical and sport science reference devices’ measurement of heart rate, sweat loss, VO₂ max and body fat percentage measurements, validating the reliability of Galaxy Watch’s monitoring capabilities. This partnership demonstrates how the collaboration between the two organisations makes advanced and precise fitness solutions to more people.

The MiPR studies verified the accuracy of Galaxy Watch’s fitness tracking features by monitoring key metrics from elite runners, including:

• Heart rate: As the most commonly checked health metric during workouts, heart rate measures how hard the heart works during physical activity. Findings show an excellent 90% correlation with electrocardiogram equipment while running, the gold standard in heart rate measurement.
• Sweat loss: Sweat loss estimates the amount of fluid lost during physical activity and helps guide proper hydration after workouts. The study found a 95% correlation for Galaxy Watch in assessing sweat loss over varying distances ranging from 2.5 km to 20 km.
• VO₂ max: Understanding how much oxygen the body absorbs during a workout helps individuals assess their fitness levels and set optimal goals and limits. The study demonstrated an 82% correlation, indicating acceptable alignment between Galaxy Watch and clinical-grade diagnostic equipment.
• Body fat percentage: Measuring a person’s body fat percentage allows for a better understanding of physical health and fitness than tracking body weight alone. Galaxy Watch readings showed a 95% correlation with dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry (DEXA) results, the standard diagnostic test for body composition using low-dose X-rays.

“We’re proud to be recognised by the renowned Michigan Performance Research Laboratory — their skilled researchers and expertise in wearable technology give us confidence in the accuracy of the Galaxy Watch’s fitness tracking capabilities,” said Dr. Hon Pak, Senior Vice President and Head of Digital Health Team, Mobile eXperience Business at Samsung Electronics. “We are committed to delivering precise and insightful fitness tracking experiences through strategic partnerships and advanced research.”

“Our partnership with Samsung exemplifies the power of combining industry-leading expertise with pioneering independent research at the academic level,” said Co-PIs Adam Lepley, MiPR director and associate director of HPSSC research. “Together, we can advance scientific discovery and provide information back to consumers that will enhance the use of Samsung’s technology. This synergy underscores the power of uniting academic excellence with industrial innovation, and we are grateful for this collaboration.”

“We are excited to continue our partnership with Samsung to ensure that innovations in wearable technology are accessible and accurate across all segments of the population,” said Kenneth Kozloff, HPSSC co-director. “HPSSC and MiPR are eager to unveil these outstanding outcomes that solidify our commitment to enhancing heart rate and health monitoring and are look forward to future collaborations.”

The following tips can enhance your fitness journey with the Galaxy Watch series, from setting personal goals to post-workout recovery:

• Body composition^[1]: Get a comprehensive snapshot of your body, including body fat percentage, body water content and skeletal muscle mass. Set personalised goals based on your current body status and track your progress.
• Personalised heart rate zone: Creating a personalised heart rate zone tailored to your activities allows you to align your health and wellness objectives, and train at optimal intensity levels according to your physical capabilities.
• VO₂ max^[2]: Gain deeper insight into your fitness levels by analysing how much oxygen your body uses during physical activity. VO₂ max is widely regarded as the best indicator of cardiovascular endurance.
• Sweat loss: After a run, measure your sweat loss and re-hydrate appropriately after each workout based on data​ for improved recovery.

^[1] Body Composition is only supported in Samsung Galaxy Watch4 series and later released Galaxy Watch models. Body Composition should not be used if you have an implanted pacemaker or other implanted medical devices, or if you are pregnant. Any health-related information accessed through the device and application should not be treated as medical advice. Measurement results may not be accurate if you are under 20 years old. The measurements are for your personal reference only. Please consult a medical professional for advice.

^[2] Accurate VO2 max reading requires running outdoors for at least 20 minutes with GPS on; consult user manual before use.