Tag Archives: Google Fit

A change of pace: Get more from your walks with Google Fit

Everyone wants to be healthy and stay fit, but some days, it can be incredibly difficult to get a workout in. But there is something many of us do everyday that has huge health benefits: walk.

For years, walking has been measured by the number of steps we take. While seeing this count can be motivating, not all steps are equal. Think about it this way: There’s a difference between wandering through the garden and dashing to catch the bus. That difference is intensity, and scientists have found increased health benefits associated with walkingfaster. Everyone has a preferred walking speed — a pace that feels natural — and picking up that pace has health benefits similar to riding a bicycle. Plus, if you start walking faster, your natural pace will get faster over time.

I learned a lot about this from Rob Harle, a research scientist for Google Fit. In fact, we worked together and used this research to introduce a new Google Fit feature called Paced Walking, which is already available for most Android phones now. “The idea is simple: Pop in some headphones during a Paced Walking session and we’ll play an audio beat — a gentle background tick — for you to fall in step with,” Rob explains. “You can use the app to change the beat speed and vary the intensity of your walks. The beat plays on top of other audio, so you can still play music or podcasts while you walk.

Another motivation for launching Paced Walking was to meet people where they are. “Studies show there is a lot of disparity when it comes to fitness; many people don’t have access to gyms or workout studios, or can’t afford equipment or online classes,” Rob says. “Walking is something almost everyone has access to, and picking up the pace can increase the health benefits.”

Once you start picking up the pace using Paced Walking, you’ll earn more Heart Points in Google Fit — for every minute that you walk at a pace of over 100 steps per minute, you’ll earn one Heart Point. This will help you get the American Heart Association® and the World Health Organization recommendations of at least 150 minutes of moderate physical activity per week, all while you are doing something that you routinely do — walking. And a bonus to using Paced Walking? You’ll arrive at your destination a little sooner!

Source: The Official Google Blog

Take a pulse on health and wellness with your phone

Mobile devices have become essential daily tools for people all over the world — from staying connected to taking pictures and accessing information. Thanks to sensors that are already built into smartphones — like your microphone, camera and accelerometer — these devices can also be helpful for daily health and wellness.

Heart rate and respiratory rate are two vital signs commonly used to assess your health and wellness. Starting next month, Google Fit will allow you to measure your heart rate and respiratory rate using just your phone’s camera. These features will be available in the Google Fit app for Pixel phones, with plans to expand to more Android devices.

An image of a phone showing how you use Google Fit to monitor your respiratory rate. — Measure and monitor respiratory rate directly in the Google Fit app.

To measure your respiratory rate, you just need to place your head and upper torso in view of your phone’s front-facing camera and breathe normally. To measure your heart rate, simply place your finger on the rear-facing camera lens.

While these measurements aren’t meant for medical diagnosis or to evaluate medical conditions, we hope they can be useful for people using the Google Fit app to track and improve day-to-day wellness. Once the measurements are made, you can choose to save them in the app to monitor trends over time, alongside other health and wellness information.

Developed to work for more people in real-world conditions

Thanks to increasingly powerful sensors and advances in computer vision, these features let you use your smartphone’s camera to track tiny physical signals at the pixel level — like chest movements to measure your respiratory rate and subtle changes in the color of your fingers for your heart rate.

We developed both features — and completed initial clinical studies to validate them — so they work in a variety of real-world conditions and for as many people as possible. For example, since our heart rate algorithm relies on approximating blood flow from color changes in someone’s fingertip, it has to account for factors such as lighting, skin tone, age and more in order to work for everyone.

With continued advances in hardware and software, sometimes the device that could be most helpful to your health and wellness is already in your pocket. Our team of researchers, engineers, and clinicians are exploring how everyday devices and inexpensive sensors can give people the information and insights they need to take control of their health.

You can learn more about our work in this area by tuning in to The Check Up, a virtual event showcasing how Google is working to tackle some of the biggest challenges in health.

Source: The Official Google Blog

Tackle your health goals in 2021 with Google Fit

It’s the beginning of a new year, and for many of us, it’s also time for a renewed approach to our health. Maybe you want to figure out a new fitness routine that doesn’t require a gym or finally carve out time for meditation. Whatever your goals are, the most important thing is to get started and stay on course. But it can be hard to stay motivated in our busy lives. That’s why Google Fit is designed to address common challenges we all face in reaching our goals. Here are some simple tips for using Google Fit to set yourself up for success.

Measure what matters

Steps, miles, calories. Tracking so many different things can be overwhelming. A simpler, proven way is to follow the science. The American Heart Association® and the World Health Organization recommend getting at least 150 minutes of moderate to vigorous physical activity per week to improve your chances of getting better sleep and having more energy, as well as lowering your risk of diabetes and heart disease. That’s why we designed Google Fit’s primary metric to be Heart Points, one simple way to measure what matters: You get one point for each minute of moderately intense activity, like walking briskly, and double points for more intense activities, like running.

Stay motivated

It's one thing to kick off a new routine, but it's quite another to stick with it. One way to commit to a new healthy habit is to make it social and fun. Sharing your workouts with friends and family helps keep you accountable to your goals, and the new Google Fit social sharing feature makes it easy to share your activity directly from your journal. Have fun with it and include a post-workout selfie or that beautiful snap from your hike.

Make every move count

No gym? No problem. Even brisk walking earns you Heart Points. If you want to be more adventurous or creative, Google Fit tracks more than 100 activities, from table tennis to sledding. You can also connect your favorite fitness tracking apps and devices with Google Fit so that you get credit—and gain Heart Points—for all of your activity, and it’s tracked in one place.

Invest in rest

If you aren’t well-rested, it’s hard to do anything else. Adequate sleep is a significant part of maintaining your health. A number of sleep apps and devices connect with Google Fit so you can collect your sleep data in one place. Check your weekly stats at a glance on the homescreen, and look at a deeper view for insight into your sleep patterns over time.

Adopting meditation and mindfulness practices can help you find balance. Wear OS by Google watches have guided breathing sessions to help you get started.

I hope these tips help you get started and stray on track to reach your health goals in the coming year. If you’re new to Google Fit, try the app out on your Android phone or iPhone. Here’s to a strong start and a healthy 2021!

Source: The Official Google Blog

iPhones just got more helpful with Gmail, Drive and Fit widgets

When iPhone 12 was released a few weeks ago, we launched helpful widgets for your favorite Google apps on iOS. Over the next few days, we’re adding more for Gmail, Drive and Fit—and Calendar and Chrome widgets are on their way too.

Gmail

With the new Gmail widget, you can search your inbox, start a new message and check for unread messages at a glance.

Google Drive

The new Drive widget helps you access files you’re most likely to need—and lets you search for any file from your homescreen.

Google Fit

For those of you keeping track of your activity with Heart Points and Steps in Google Fit, this helpful new widget puts those numbers front and center on your iOS device.

Coming soon

Finally, we’re pleased to announce that in the coming weeks we’ll launch a Calendar widget and in the new year a new widget for Chrome. Calendar will put your upcoming appointments on your homescreen and give you quick access to your full calendar.

The Chrome widget will give you quick access to search, open a new tab or incognito tab, voice search and QR code scanning— and the smaller widget comes with a little prehistoric surprise. If you have Chrome Beta you can try widgets today, and we’ll be bringing them to everyone early next year.

To install any Google widget on iOS, first make sure you have the latest corresponding app downloaded from the App Store. Then follow these steps:

Press and hold on the home screen of your iPhone or iPad
Tap the plus icon on the upper left corner to open the widget gallery
Search for & tap the widget you’d like to install
Swipe right/left to select the widget size
Tap “Add Widget”
Place the widget and tap “Done” at the upper right corner

Source: Drive

New tools for a healthier, more active life

Health and fitness apps and device trackers can be incredibly motivating, but keeping track of all the information they provide can also get overwhelming. On your journey to improving your wellness, you might want to monitor your sleep, see if you’re meeting your workout goals and keep an eye on your heart rate. We wanted to make it easier to find all of this quickly, and more easily in one place. To do this, we’ve made a few new updates to Google Fit and Wear OS by Google that make tracking and understanding all of your wellness information easier.

A single hub for all your health and wellness information

We’ve revamped the Google Fit app on Android and iOS to bring all of this information across your different connected apps and devices into one easy-to-view hub. In addition to being able to view a summary of your metrics at a glance on the homescreen, you’ll be able to see if you’re meeting your daily and weekly goals for Heart Points and Steps, view your most recent workout and keep track of your heart rate, weight and blood pressure trends over time.

As part of our ongoing effort to provide you with bedtime tools, we’ve also brought more sleep information into Google Fit. If you have a connected device like the Fossil Gen 5E Smartwatch, Oura Ring or Withings sleep tracking mat, or use a sleep-tracking app like Sleep As Android or Sleep Cycle, you’ll be able to track your nightly activity, view sleep stages, set a goal for your bedtime schedule and more. Look out for more supported devices and apps as we expand this feature.

Tracking your favorite workouts just got easier

Staying active and achieving your weekly Heart Point goals can help you stay healthy through the holiday season. In the Google Fit Workouts Tile on Wear OS by Google smartwatches, we added shortcuts to take you to your most recent workouts so you can get moving faster. And while you're working out, you'll be able to see all your metrics in one view on your screen. You can set goals for your workouts and receive pace alerts to know if you’re staying on track.

The Google Fit app on Android or iOS lets you view a summary of your walk or run on a map, along with pace and mile markers. To celebrate your accomplishments and encourage friends and family to get active, you can now share stats, routes or photos from your favorite Google Fit journal entries to social media or by messaging apps.

A breath of fresh air

If you’re anything like me, you’re growing a little weary of indoor workouts (or just the inside of your home in general). Getting a little fresh air can be rejuvenating, and also give you more energy and mental focus. To help, we’re updating the weather experience on Wear OS by Google smartwatches with a bolder design that’s easier on the eyes and provides you with more relevant forecast details, including precipitation and weather alerts.

And whether you’re outside or indoors, the new Breathe Tile helps you decompress with easier access to guided breathing sessions. Once it’s finished, you can view a summary that includes how your heart rate changed between the beginning and end, and you can also see a recap of your breathing sessions for the week.

These updates will be rolling out over the next few days. We hope these tools give you everything you need to improve your wellbeing at home, or on the go.

Source: The Official Google Blog

How to be healthy at home

Right now, your home could be an office, a gym, a playground or even your own personal restaurant where all of your friends (virtually) hang out. While we’re all trying to figure out how to stay well and adjust to health routines at home, search interest in “exercise” and “handwashing” have reached an all-time high. Since health and wellness are top of mind right now, here are a few resources to help you be well.

Make the most of your time at home

YouTube is encouraging the world to Stay Home #WithMe by featuring videos from creators that help you promote mental and physical wellbeing while you’re at home. Check out topics ranging from “Meditate With Me” to “Work Out With Me” and “Dance With Me.”

Staying healthy can mean breaking a sweat while exercising or sitting still and calming your mind. Google Play has created a collection of special deals and free content for “Workout & wellness” and “Mindfulness & meditation.” Google Play also has feature roundups of apps by category for when you’re at home to help you “Sleep well & find balance” and “Stay healthy & work out.”

Google Play Offers (1).png — Google Play is featuring special offers on helpful apps while you’re at home.

Also on Android TV, Google Play is adding new collections to help you find useful apps for your smart TV quickly. Starting with the “Stay mindful & fit” collection in the U.S., you can easily find apps like Peloton, which offers workouts that can be done with or without equipment, to help you get moving right in your living room. “Stay mindful and fit” will be rolling out to Google Play on Android TV devices starting this week.

New app categories for Google Play on Android TV surface useful apps for your TV.

You can also kickstart a workout by asking Google Assistant, “Hey Google, show me workout videos” and follow a YouTube tutorial on your Smart Display, like Nest Hub Max, or on your phone.

Performance at a glance

Whether you're in the middle of your at-home workout, yoga session or taking a quick jog around the block, the latest Google Fit update on iOS and Android app bring bold text and bright visuals to the design, making it easier for quick check-ins on your activity goals. You’ll also start to see tips from WHO for reducing the risk of catching or spreading infections.

Fit update.png — Google Fit redesign makes it easier to check progress towards activity goals.

On Wear OS by Google smartwatches, we've made it easier to keep track of your at-home workouts and see how you’re doing throughout the day or week at a glance. The latest design includes visual updates to the Heart Points tile which now shows your progress toward the World Health Organization-recommended amount of physical activity. We’ve also added a new Workout tile to start tracking your go-to workouts with just one tap.

Wear OS by Google tiles bring quicker access to the best of Google Fit.

Help washing your hands

WHO recommends washing your hands for 40 seconds, which might be longer than you’re used to. Over the last month, search interest for "hand washing songs" spiked 850 percent in the U.S. To stick to 40 seconds, simply say, “Hey Google, help me wash my hands” and Google Assistant will play a song on your Smart Display, smart speaker, phone (Android and iOS) or Wear OS by Google smartwatch with speakers. If you want to skip the tunes, Google Assistant can set you up with a 40 second timer, or on Wear OS you can now add a hand-wash timer as a tile or as a shortcut on your watch face.

These new features are all currently available, or rolling out in the coming weeks. We’re also always adding more apps and content to our collections, so stay on the lookout for more ways to stay healthy.

Source: The Official Google Blog

Putting your heart first on World Heart Day

World Heart Day is this Sunday, and it raises awareness around the cause and prevention of cardiovascular diseases around the world. As part of these efforts, the World Heart Federation recognizes “people from all walks of life who have shown commitment, courage, empathy and care in relation to heart health” as heart heroes. It’s an honor to have been included this year for my focus on using technology to promote lifestyle interventions such as increasing physical activity to help people lead healthier lives.

Heart disease continues to be the number one cause of death in the U.S., so it’s more important than ever to identify and share simple ways to keep your heart healthy. I have two kids under the age of five and life can get really busy. When juggling between patients, children, work and errands, it’s easy to feel active when in reality, I’ve lost track of healthy habits.

With Google Fit’s smart activity goals and Heart Point tracking, I realized I wasn’t reaching American Heart Association and World Health Organization’s recommended amount of weekly physical activity and I needed to make changes to earn more Heart Points throughout the week.

Meeting weekly Heart Point goals improve overall wellness and health

On busy days, I’ve started to use a 7-minute workout app every evening that provides video overviews and audio descriptions of each exercise. It’s quick, easy and fun. And to top it off, my kids will often join in on a wall sit or climb on me for some extra weight during a plank. I’ve found these exercises to be a quick and efficient way to earn 14 Heart Points, which quickly adds up to help me reach my weekly goal.

Using a workout app may not be for everyone—there are many ways to incorporate incremental changes throughout your week that will help you be more active. Here are a few other things to try out:

Get your body moving and rake the leaves outside or mow the lawn.
Pick up the pace when you’re on a walk, with yourself, your friends or your dog.
Wear sneakers and make it a walking meeting—this way you and your co-workers get health benefits.
Sign up for a workout class! A 45-minute indoor cycling class earns you 90 Heart Points.
Before you shower, take a few minutes to do simple exercises like jumping jacks, squats, wall sits, push ups or planks.

The beauty of it all is that you don’t have to go to a gym or buy special equipment. Just getting moving can have health benefits that add up. For World Heart Day, I challenge you to find opportunities that work with your schedule to earn more Heart Points.

Source: The Official Google Blog

How tech can make health science accessible to everyone

Throughout my medical career I’ve treated patients in vastly different settings—from Zambia, where I went to medical school, to the U.S., where I still practice medicine today. All of these places shared a troubling trend: While we successfully treated people for conditions like malaria or heart failure, they continued to get readmitted for recurrences of these conditions. It became clear to me that even though the medical community has a tremendous amount of knowledge about what it takes to improve health and save lives, we struggle to share that knowledge with everyone.

Decades later, we’ve made some progress, but there’s more to be done. In the nearly 20 years since I left Zambia, prevention efforts have cut the incidence of malaria in half. At Johns Hopkins Bayview, a hospital in East Baltimore where I started as a resident physician and later on became the Director of Heart Failure, I helped lead efforts that eventually reduced the heart failure readmission rates by one third. These successes did not require the creation of a new drug or device, they simply relied on translating the existing science we had into something that people can put into action.

Today, as the medical lead for Google Fit, an app that helps coach people to live a more active and healthy life, this idea still drives me. If we can better share existing scientific knowledge with everyone, then we can help people live longer and healthier lives no matter where they are.

There’s general agreement in the medical community that physical activity improves health. In fact, some studies show that people who meet the physical activity guidelines have 40 percent lower rates of diabetes, 35 percent lower rates of heart disease, 20 percent lower rates of dementia and depression and 20 percent lower rates of cancer. And that’s not all: There are even more short-term benefits linked to physical activity, like lowered stress and improved sleep. But despite all the medical research, people are more sedentary than ever.

The Google Fit team realized the need to convert the highly technical scientific guidelines for physical activity into actionable information that people can understand and incorporate into their lives. The scientific report from the World Health Organization (WHO) and American Heart Association (AHA) that underpins their physical activity guidelines is 700 pages long! So to start, we worked with the WHO and AHA to get the guidelines accurate from a technical perspective.

Then our designers turned the information into something that was easier to understand, no matter who was looking at it. After all, it’s tough for most people to know the difference between moderate and vigorous activity, or take into account every little bit of your activity throughout the day. To cut through the noise, we created a unique metric for the Google Fit app called Heart Points. This metric helps people incorporate physical activity into their lives so they can reach the recommended levels. The most surprising thing is how simple changes, like picking up your pace while walking on your commute, can have a huge impact. It’s not always about putting on workout clothes or investing money in a gym membership. You can use the Google Fit app on any Android or iOS phone, or any Wear OS by Google smartwatch.

Google certainly isn’t the only company working to use technology to improve wellbeing, and physical activity isn’t the only way to achieve a healthier lifestyle. In fact, we’re at an exciting time when advances in technology can bring new opportunities to promote healthier habits. The next challenge will be to come together across industries and companies to bring science-backed information to people in ways that can affect their day-to-day actions and, ultimately, improve their health.

Source: The Official Google Blog

Power down with Google Fit

I recently took up running to improve my overall health and wellbeing. And let me tell you, it's harder than it looks. I've learned that it's not just about building my mileage every week, but it's also about making bigger lifestyle changes like getting more sleep and building healthier habits.

The Google Fit app already tracks my Heart Points and Move Minutes, and I've been monitoring my sleep through apps that I connect to Google Fit so I can make sure I’m well rested for my daily routine. At Google Fit, we understand that maintaining a healthy lifestyle is more than just tracking what you do on the go. It’s also about resting up and powering down. So today, we’re bringing improved sleep insights and dark theme to our Google Fit app.

Catch some ZZZ’s

You can now track your sleep patterns alongside all the other activities you do throughout the day. Connect your favorite sleep app to Google Fit and you’ll see charts that show you your sleep patterns over time. You’ll also be able to add, edit or access your sleep history through the journal.

Paint it black

Now you can enable dark theme to help you wind down at the right time and get a better night’s sleep. Even better, dark theme can be gentler on the eyes and help save your battery life. All you need to do is turn on the feature in your settings.

Now on iOS: See your route

On Android, Google Fit captures a summary of your workouts along with a map of your route, whether you ran, hiked or biked. Now we’re bringing the same useful map routes into the iPhone app for workouts actively tracked on your Wear OS by Google smartwatch, Apple Watch or other connected apps.

We’ll be rolling out these updates on your phone over the next week. If you’re new to Google Fit, try the app out on your Android phone or iPhone.

Source: The Official Google Blog

Google Fit is now on iOS

Being more physically active in your everyday life can help reduce the risk of heart disease, improve sleep and increase overall mental health. When we launched the new Google Fit last year, we translated the science behind physical activity into two simple and smart activity goals: Move Minutes and Heart Points. Now, we're bringing the Google Fit app to more people—starting today, it's available to download on iOS.

Track your Heart Points and Move Minutes earned

Move Minutes and Heart Points help you build smarter, healthier habits throughout your day. The more you move, the more Move Minutes you earn. The more intensely you move, the more Heart Points you earn. And the more Heart Points you earn, the closer you are to reaching AHA and WHO’s recommended amount of weekly physical activity to reap the health benefits. Whether you go biking or pick up your pace while walking to your next meeting to earn more Heart Points, you can check your journal to track progress on these two activity goals and see how small changes can make a big impact to your health.

Connect your apps and devices on Apple Health with Google Fit

Tracking your progress throughout the day should be simple and easy. Regardless of which apps or devices you use to monitor fitness, sleep and general wellbeing, Google Fit has you covered.

Apps you connect to Apple Health, such as Sleep Cycle, Nike Run Club and Headspace, sync with Google Fit to provide a holistic view of your health and show the Heart Points and Move Minutes you earn through other activities. And whether you own an Apple Watch or Wear OS by Google smartwatch, Google Fit keeps track of your workout sessions. With your journal, you’ll get a snapshot of the things that you do to help you get better sleep, be more mindful and get more active.

Visit the App Store and download the new Google Fit app today.