Oura Ring Generation 3 Review: Silver Heritage Edition
Disclosure: Some of the links in this article may be affiliate links, which can provide compensation to me at no cost to you if you decide to purchase.
I gifted my fiancé an Oura ring this year, so I decided to ask her to write a review article to add content to my new blog!
Enjoy!
-Kevin
I have had my new Oura ring since January of 2024 and have been absolutely loving it. It has so many features beyond just sleep tracking, such as body temperature, cycle tracking, stress, and more. The ring is so light weight and has a pretty good battery life off of one single charge, which despite being water resistant, I will throw mine on the charger when I shower. As someone who regularly wears rings, I have found that the Oura ring has been a stylish and easy wearable activity tracker and would definitely recommend it! The one I currently wear is the Gen3-Herritage in Silver, but there are other models, like the Gen3-Horizon, and comes in other colors like black, gold, stealth, brushed titanium, and rose gold.
Oura Ring Heritage Silver
Since this is such a favorite product of mine, I wanted to give an honest Oura ring review and provide the most accurate information if you are or have been considering buying one. I am not a health or fitness expert, but based on my personal opinion, this is my favorite sleep tracker, womens’ health tracker, and smart ring. I encourage you to do your own research from the best available sources as well to see if the Oura ring is right for you!
How I got Interested in an owning an Oura Ring
I stumbled across digital creator and entrepreneur Jules Acree on Instagram in early 2022. She was promoting the app Notion and so I decided to purchase her Design Your Year Notion pack, and have used it daily ever since. I subscribed to her weekly newsletter, Slow Brew Sunday, and subscribed to her YouTube channel as well.
Fast forward to late 2023, I had heard her mention her Oura ring in a few videos. I was intrigued by the product, particularly because I stopped wearing my Apple Watch at night and wanted to find a solution to continue to track my sleep.
The more I heard Jules talk about her Oura ring, and more people on Instagram thanks to the algorithm, I was getting more interested in more of its features beyond just sleep tracking, and had been getting interested in a more natural way to track my cycle. I ended up also signing up for Natural Cycles to use with my Oura for natural cycle tracking and truly have not looked back since.
What's the best way to order an Oura Ring?
One of my favorite features of buying an Oura ring is that the ring size is made to fit your finger comfortably and easily. When we got mine, we actually ordered the wrong ring size, since I had planned to wear the ring on my index finger, which is actually the finger that Oura recommends for best results. For this reason, I suggest getting the sizing kit first.
The kit comes with 8 different sized plastic rings ranging from size 6 to 13. You want the ring to be comfortable but snug on the finger you choose before buying, so getting the sizing kit first is the way to go. Oura suggests wearing the plastic sizing ring on your non-dominant hand (to reduce wear) for about 24 hours to ensure the actual ring is going to be comfortable for 24/7 wear. Once you are comfortable with your size, you can complete your order online of the actual ring.
Oura Ring App and Monthly Subscription costs
When purchasing an Oura ring, you will also have to get a monthly subscription to use the Oura ring app. It is a $6.49 monthly subscription fee, and this gives you access to see all your data real time on your phone. Since I use my Oura mobile app with Natural Cycles, which was $99.95 for an annual subscription but they also offer a monthly subscription model as well, syncing the app is the first thing I do each morning. Syncing your Oura ring first thing in the morning gives you 2 scores, one for readiness and one for sleep, two metrics that the Oura ring tracks.
What are the key data metrics and features for the Oura Ring?
The actual Oura ring is made of titanium and is very light weight. The sensors sit on the underside of the ring. As mentioned before, it is a good idea to wear your ring on your non-dominant hand as to reduce the wear of the ring. The ring is water resistant, but my personal best practice is to take off my ring when I shower, so I can ensure it is getting a little bit of charge each day. The ring is meant to be worn 24/7 for best results and can go for a few days on a single charge, but you should be sure to throw it on your charger whenever you get the chance.
The Sensors
The Oura ring has three special sensors that help it to collect all of this health data for you. The first are infrared photoplethysmography sensors, or PPG. These sensors measure your heart rate and respiration rate. The second are negative temperature coefficient, or NTC, sensors that read and record your body temperature throughout the night. The last set of sensors are 3D accelerometer sensors that track your movement. With all three of these sensors working together, it allows you to have the most detailed sleep, health metrics, and overall health data.
Readiness Score
Your readiness score will tell you overall how prepared your body is for the day based on its recovery from activity and stress levels from the day before. It is calculated with your lowest overnight resting heart rate, body temperature, previous day physical activity, as well as sleep data and heart rate variability (HRV). Generally, a score over 80 qualifies as an optimal readiness score, meaning your body recovered well from the previous day.
Sleep Score
Your sleep score analyzes your sleep data and will overall tell you your sleep quality, or how well you’re sleeping on a daily basis. It analyzes your resting heart rate, body temperature and movement, and the time slept in each of the three sleep stages: light sleep, deep sleep, and REM sleep. A score over 85 qualifies as an optimal sleep score. The Oura ring will also track any naps which will also be added into your overall sleep and readiness scores for the following day.
Can the Oura Ring determine your Chronotype?
Another good thing that the detailed sleep data can tell you is your Chronotype. It takes about 3 months worth of data, but then you will be able to see what the data tells you about your chronotype. A more general way of describing your Chronotype is if you are a morning or evening person. The way your Chronotype is derived is greatly from your genetic makeup, but also reflects your own circadian rhythm, or your body’s 24-hr clock that regulates your alertness, hormone release, and more.
The Oura mobile app can determine your Chronotype based off of this detailed data and may be one of the following six Chronotypes:
The Early Morning type: means you generally feel alert and energetic in the early morning. It is the ideal time for you to workout or do any intellectually stimulating work. According to Oura, less than 10% of people fit this Chronotype.
The Morning type: means you like to wake up with the sun and also go to bed early. You are still alert in the morning, meaning you will have a nice start to your day.
The Late Morning type: suggests you are a morning type, but not to an extreme. You can still be productive in your mornings and like to go to bed early as well, but you can handle a late night every once in a while.
The Early Evening type: is someone who enjoys a late night every once in a while, but you also like going to bed early. Your social activities feel pretty easy, but you also don't like too many early mornings.
The Evening type: is someone who loves their late nights. You tend to be more awake and alert in the evening as opposed to the morning.
The Late Evening type: is someone who needs to sleep in the mornings. Some days may have you starting to feel alert and awake starting in the afternoon. Like Early Morning types, less than 10% of people are classified with this Chronotype based on their sleep data.
Body Temperature
I also check in on my body temperature each morning. This is particularly to check in on where I am in my cycle, but can also be a good indicator of interrupted sleep or an oncoming illness. I like being able to see how my body temperature varies throughout the week and month. I have often noticed that when I am traveling or sick, I can see this reflected in outliers in my regular body temperature wave graph.
What are the best features of the Oura Ring?
Health Data
Starting off with the data capturing. I am someone who just loves knowing data about myself. I love knowing how much I sleep, how much I move during the day, how high my heart rate skyrockets during a scary movie (111-122bpm during the movie Barbarian, in case you were wondering) etc.
I feel like I have a better understanding of how much traveling impacts my sleep and my day. Every time I have traveled so far in 2024, my sleep has been so out of whack. My readiness has been poor and I have seen it reflected in how I feel and act throughout my day. It has led me to really reinforce my nighttime and sleep routines while I travel, such as bringing a travel sleep mask with me for the hotel rooms, keeping my night routine consistent even in a hotel, and resisting the urge to sleep with the TV on, just like at home.
Another good thing about the detailed sleep data is that the Oura app can tell you the ideal time to start winding down and go to sleep.
Cycle Accuracy / Body Temperature
The second thing I have loved about my Oura ring is the body temperature accuracy and cycle tracking. If you are someone who menstruates, you know what I mean. I have been tracking my menstrual cycle naturally for a good 14 years now, and it can be frustrating to not know the immediate day that your cycle starts consistently each month. Since I have started wearing my Oura ring, I now can pretty confidently know the exact day my cycle starts. Over the last 8 months, it has been exactly accurate to start the day my temperature goes from above normal to below normal by a good 0.2 degrees or more. Without fail, every time I see my temperature go from anything above 0 to below 0, my cycle starts. This has been accurate for over 6 months, so I feel really confident with this pattern!
How's the wearability of the Oura Ring?
Another favorite thing about the Oura is how awesome its wearability is. I actually had to stop wearing my Apple Watch at night because the alarm buzzing on my wrist in the morning made me angry at the end of my sleep and I would wake up irritated, so I decided to stop wearing it.
The Oura is super lightweight and feels great on my finger. I wear my Gen3-Herritage ring on my left index finger. As a right handed person, I knew that wearing a “thicker” ring on my right hand would be irritating for me when it came to holding a pen or even driving, perhaps that is just a me thing. I am also someone who typically wears rings, so perhaps I am just used to the feeling. Even though it is a thicker ring than I usually wear, I have gotten so used to it on my finger that I sometimes don’t even know it's there. Not to mention, it is a super stylish and sleek design.
What are your least favorite Oura Ring features?
Now onto some of my less favorite things about my Oura ring. I have a hard time calling these cons, because none of these features would be enough for me to be unhappy with my ring, but are just some of the things I don’t love.
Movement
The movement tracking can sometimes be spotty, particularly with step count. There will be days my ring says that I hit over 6,000 steps by 5pm, which, considering I work a desk job 9-5, I have a hard time believing is accurate. It also greatly varies from my Apple Health activity tracking. Fortunately for me, I don’t have this ring for the sole purpose of movement tracking. I still wear my Apple Watch and trust that more for actual steps and workouts.
Connectivity
Sometimes, I have found the ring has a hard time connecting with the mobile app. This is usually a pretty easy fix, where I just take the ring off my finger and put it back on a few times. The app usually catches up, but it can sometimes be annoying when the app can’t find my ring. Again, this isn’t a big enough problem that would make me regret my ring.
Price point
Since this is a true honest review of my experience, it is worth mentioning that the price is a bit high. I am very lucky to have been given this as a gift. That said, I would be lying if I said I hadn’t done some mental math and accounting to prepare to buy one on my own. I had seen some great reviews from Jules Acree and others online (like Tori Sterling and more) and was fully committed to paying the $299 on Prime for this ring.
Based on the reviews I read, it was not the best for activity tracking or fitness tracking, but everyone raved about the other features like sleep and cycle tracking, like I mentioned in this article. For me, I was not looking to get this for fitness tracking, so that shortfall didn’t deter me. At the end of the day, the price was not enough to stop me from getting it, but did make me groan a little.
Overall Experience
Overall, I am very happy with my Oura, and had it not been a gift, I still would have bought one for myself. It looks great on my hand, is so lightweight, and has really helped me gain a better understanding of what is going on in my body, particularly while I am asleep.
Thanks for reading! Thank you Caroline for writing!
Original Post: Oura Ring Review
Disclosure: Some of the links in this article may be affiliate links, which can provide compensation to me at no cost to you if you decide to purchase.