Hi Marco, I am doing HRV with the Apple Watch now for 4 years, and i fully agree with your assessment.
There is one glitch I like to point out: I noticed that the Health App does not immediately update the HRV reading. It can happen that HRV4training reads the last value before the Breath App was used. Therefore I made it a habit to open the Health App after using Breath, and make sure that the latest reading is available in Health.
One feature that i am missing in HRV4training is a way to scroll through the Health App values and select the right one to be imported to HRV4TRAINING.
Also, the Limitation to the last 3 hrs of readings could be revised. Sometimes I take a reading but forget about it, but later I delete all “rubbish” values from Health and try to import, and HRV4TRAINING refuses, because the data is older than 3 hrs. I don’t really see why this Limitation is implemented.
Hi there Marco! I'm ready to buy HRV4Training app, also I am familiar with your recommended HRV measuring protcol. Now, I have Apple Watch, that I want to use not only for HRV measurements, but also for RHR and sleep tracking. When sleep mode is on, Apple Watch does not include heart rate during night and does not provide me RHR values that are based on night, but rather it changes during a day, which I think is pointless (I had a couple of times that I sat down after intensive training, was cooling down, and apple watch picked it up as my resting heart rate increasing value from 50 to 70 for that day). Do you have any recommendations on how to keep tracking those 3 values, maybe its possible with HRV4Training? I guess I could just sell my apple watch and buy ie. Garmin to measure those things without all the hassle.
thanks Robs! Indeed I agree with you, pointless to do it that way. If you want to track night heart rate then an Oura ring, Garmin or Coros watch will do. Then you can measure your resting heart rate and HRV in the morning using HRV4Training and the phone camera. Take care!
So you're saying that some value of heart rate during HRV measurement could be an equivalent of RHR? cheers, thanks again for all your valuable articles here!
Marco, I found this work very insightful and purchased your app after being frustrated with HRV data being presented by my Apple Watch. Yet it just says “measurements are hidden” when I open the app after collecting HRV data. I have checked Apple Health and all permissions between the two apps are allowed, and the primary collection method in your app is set to “Apple Health”. What am I doing wrong here?
Great post thanks - Can you verify if the research behind HeartMath is superior technology when it comes to HRV? Or is there a better technology that you recommend? Or just stick to the camera functionality mentioned in other comments? Thanks (Specifically the InnerBalance product that I purchased from them: https://store.heartmath.com/innerbalance-btle )
Hi Katie, thank you. The sensor you have should also work well and be compatible with other apps like ours. If you find it practical it can be a valid alternative. My recommendation is just to be consistent with the method you pick, because they are not all interchangeable
Hi Marco. I have been using the HRV training app for several years, always measuring with the phone camera every morning when I wake up. I also have an apple watch. Marco, do you recommend measuring with the phone camera or better measuring with the apple watch? Which of these two do you think would be the best measurement method? thanks
I agree the app is simpler in terms of tech. But I feel I have to stay very still with my finger on the iphone mini. I'd prefer to relax more and use the watch, but had some syncing problems in the past. @marco said at that time that the phone sensor was better since, "can also better detect signal quality and provide you with more HRV features and feedback". Is that still the case? Or can I try the watch again? Will it require waiting for a new baseline?
hi Lenny, in terms of the baseline, it depends, the data should be similar, but in case of an offset, then a few weeks will be required to re-adjust. Feel free to give it a try with the watch, even though my comment still stands, i.e. with the camera we can make sure the data is higher quality (or you can visually see it), while with the watch, we have to trust apple, and sometimes there can be issues (i.e. in case of artifacts or ectopic beats, they don't tag the data as poor quality, but provide incorrect HRV also in the Health app).
hi, as a follow up to this, I've tried the Apple watch again. It consistently reads about 1 "point" lower than the camera phone. It has started to lower my baseline. For instance, today I did two readings the one with the watch was 5.6, and the camera was 7.2. That later is my usual baseline. However, the apple watch seems consistent... it is consistently lower that the camera. The scientific question is why it is different and which is "correct"? The training question is: if I prefer the apple watch, is it robust to use for training if it is "wrong" but consistent?
hi Lenny, there can be differences even just based on sensor location (e.g. finger vs wrist). Normally this should not be the case (or the difference should be rather small), but in this instance it is quite marked and therefore it is important to use always the same method. If you prefer to use the watch, that should be okay, as it has shown to be accurate for spot checks. Have a good week!
Thanks for the quick response, but do you have data that it is "accurate" to use with the HRV4T app? It seems to be precise, but if it differs so much from the camera, I'm not sure if it is accurate.
Would it be possible to get HRV from ECG readings? I believe there’s an API for importing/exporting the ECG waveform. It would then need some post-processing to calculate HRV.
Some possible advantages:
- More accurate
- Results are not mixed with the random HRV measurements from the watch.
- Could get a manual HRV reading at almost anytime.
Thanks and I enjoy reading your articles. As a 'veteran" athlete I find HRV useful, especially as overtraining is easy to do as you get older. It might be worth mentioning in the article that "Breathe" is found in the Mindfulness app on the Apple watch and there is no separate Breathe app. The app is useful as it makes you breathe at a fixed rate and respiratory pattern over a minute which I guess may improve the standardisation of the reading.
hi Florian! We recommend sitting, especially for endurance athletes with a low heart rate, but otherwise even lying in bed is fine in most circumstances. Regarding breathing, it is important to breathe normally, relaxed, but without forcing deep breaths.
Hi Marco, I am doing HRV with the Apple Watch now for 4 years, and i fully agree with your assessment.
There is one glitch I like to point out: I noticed that the Health App does not immediately update the HRV reading. It can happen that HRV4training reads the last value before the Breath App was used. Therefore I made it a habit to open the Health App after using Breath, and make sure that the latest reading is available in Health.
One feature that i am missing in HRV4training is a way to scroll through the Health App values and select the right one to be imported to HRV4TRAINING.
Also, the Limitation to the last 3 hrs of readings could be revised. Sometimes I take a reading but forget about it, but later I delete all “rubbish” values from Health and try to import, and HRV4TRAINING refuses, because the data is older than 3 hrs. I don’t really see why this Limitation is implemented.
Hi there Marco! I'm ready to buy HRV4Training app, also I am familiar with your recommended HRV measuring protcol. Now, I have Apple Watch, that I want to use not only for HRV measurements, but also for RHR and sleep tracking. When sleep mode is on, Apple Watch does not include heart rate during night and does not provide me RHR values that are based on night, but rather it changes during a day, which I think is pointless (I had a couple of times that I sat down after intensive training, was cooling down, and apple watch picked it up as my resting heart rate increasing value from 50 to 70 for that day). Do you have any recommendations on how to keep tracking those 3 values, maybe its possible with HRV4Training? I guess I could just sell my apple watch and buy ie. Garmin to measure those things without all the hassle.
thanks Robs! Indeed I agree with you, pointless to do it that way. If you want to track night heart rate then an Oura ring, Garmin or Coros watch will do. Then you can measure your resting heart rate and HRV in the morning using HRV4Training and the phone camera. Take care!
So you're saying that some value of heart rate during HRV measurement could be an equivalent of RHR? cheers, thanks again for all your valuable articles here!
correct, it would be different from night HRV, but it’s still a measurement of resting physiology (as part of the morning protocol)
Marco, I found this work very insightful and purchased your app after being frustrated with HRV data being presented by my Apple Watch. Yet it just says “measurements are hidden” when I open the app after collecting HRV data. I have checked Apple Health and all permissions between the two apps are allowed, and the primary collection method in your app is set to “Apple Health”. What am I doing wrong here?
thanks! Please go to Menu / Settings and make sure “show daily advice” is checked.
Hi Marco,
Great post thanks - Can you verify if the research behind HeartMath is superior technology when it comes to HRV? Or is there a better technology that you recommend? Or just stick to the camera functionality mentioned in other comments? Thanks (Specifically the InnerBalance product that I purchased from them: https://store.heartmath.com/innerbalance-btle )
Hi Katie, thank you. The sensor you have should also work well and be compatible with other apps like ours. If you find it practical it can be a valid alternative. My recommendation is just to be consistent with the method you pick, because they are not all interchangeable
Hi Marco. I have been using the HRV training app for several years, always measuring with the phone camera every morning when I wake up. I also have an apple watch. Marco, do you recommend measuring with the phone camera or better measuring with the apple watch? Which of these two do you think would be the best measurement method? thanks
Thank you Luis, if you have no issues with the camera in terms of data quality, that’s what I would use, simpler that way
I agree the app is simpler in terms of tech. But I feel I have to stay very still with my finger on the iphone mini. I'd prefer to relax more and use the watch, but had some syncing problems in the past. @marco said at that time that the phone sensor was better since, "can also better detect signal quality and provide you with more HRV features and feedback". Is that still the case? Or can I try the watch again? Will it require waiting for a new baseline?
hi Lenny, in terms of the baseline, it depends, the data should be similar, but in case of an offset, then a few weeks will be required to re-adjust. Feel free to give it a try with the watch, even though my comment still stands, i.e. with the camera we can make sure the data is higher quality (or you can visually see it), while with the watch, we have to trust apple, and sometimes there can be issues (i.e. in case of artifacts or ectopic beats, they don't tag the data as poor quality, but provide incorrect HRV also in the Health app).
hi, as a follow up to this, I've tried the Apple watch again. It consistently reads about 1 "point" lower than the camera phone. It has started to lower my baseline. For instance, today I did two readings the one with the watch was 5.6, and the camera was 7.2. That later is my usual baseline. However, the apple watch seems consistent... it is consistently lower that the camera. The scientific question is why it is different and which is "correct"? The training question is: if I prefer the apple watch, is it robust to use for training if it is "wrong" but consistent?
hi Lenny, there can be differences even just based on sensor location (e.g. finger vs wrist). Normally this should not be the case (or the difference should be rather small), but in this instance it is quite marked and therefore it is important to use always the same method. If you prefer to use the watch, that should be okay, as it has shown to be accurate for spot checks. Have a good week!
Thanks for the quick response, but do you have data that it is "accurate" to use with the HRV4T app? It seems to be precise, but if it differs so much from the camera, I'm not sure if it is accurate.
Hi Marco,
Would it be possible to get HRV from ECG readings? I believe there’s an API for importing/exporting the ECG waveform. It would then need some post-processing to calculate HRV.
Some possible advantages:
- More accurate
- Results are not mixed with the random HRV measurements from the watch.
- Could get a manual HRV reading at almost anytime.
thank you Laurent, we will look into this.
Hi Marco,
Thanks and I enjoy reading your articles. As a 'veteran" athlete I find HRV useful, especially as overtraining is easy to do as you get older. It might be worth mentioning in the article that "Breathe" is found in the Mindfulness app on the Apple watch and there is no separate Breathe app. The app is useful as it makes you breathe at a fixed rate and respiratory pattern over a minute which I guess may improve the standardisation of the reading.
hi Florian! We recommend sitting, especially for endurance athletes with a low heart rate, but otherwise even lying in bed is fine in most circumstances. Regarding breathing, it is important to breathe normally, relaxed, but without forcing deep breaths.
@Marco
Thanks for your very quick answer - I just found your article "How should you measure your morning HRV" at Medium.
That's why I deleted my first comment but you have been so quick in responding *wow*
Thank you very much for all the insights - I am just doing my first baby steps using HRV4training :)