Google introduced two features in Google Fit App, Measuring Heart rate and Respiratory rate using your smartphone way back in February and these are limited to Pixel devices.
Today let’s test how accurate / how close is Google Fits Heart rate measure is as compared to Pulse Oximeter.
As this feature is available only on pixel devices you need a Pixel Smartphone. But sadly I don’t have a Pixel device but luckily I’m on a Pixel Based Custom ROM. (check out my PPUI ROM review. The Custom ROM which I’m currently using).
Here’s what I’ve found in my testing.
Above are the results when I first tested it. And you could see the results as 75, 73, 76, 62, 75,75, and 68. All these are measured at different periods and when I measured using Pulse oximeter the results were very similar.
Here’s a side-by-side comparison of both using Smartphone and Oximeter.
As you can see in the above images and you can see On My Smart Phone it is showing 71 and on Pulse Oximeter it is showing 70. I’ve run multiple tests and the results are similar with a minor difference of one or two.
To know it accurately, I’ve done testing it after doing some Fast Pace run and light exercise to the body. Here are the results.
Above are the results after doing some exercise and you could see a Spike in the Heart rate and At the start, the heart rate went all the way to 131-133 BPM and slowly fall. In the end, Google Fit heart rate monitoring showed 118 BPM and on Oximeter it has shown 109 BPM and there’s a difference of 9.
Google Fit’s Heart rate monitoring results are surprising. The difference is not huge and the heart rate monitoring on Google Fit is Quite accurate and it’s on par with Oximeter measurements. Google has done amazing with its AI and machine learning to achieve this.
Can we take it as Medical Diagnosis?
No, you cannot take these measurements as a Medical Diagnosis or evaluate the medical conditions. Google developed these features for improving Day to Day activity tracking and have an idea of your heart rate.
But still, it could be a life-saving feature for many you can use it as an emergency tool. For example, if any person is feeling uneasy or feeling his heart rate is spiking up. Then as an emergency tool, they can use this feature and seek the Doctor for medication.
How does it work?
Google’s heart rate algorithm is based on approximating blood flow from color changes in someone’s fingertip. It has to account for the following factors such as lighting, skin tone, age, and more to work for everyone. They have developed these features to work for most people in the real world.
How to measure the Heart rate on Google Fit?
- Open your Google Fit app and now scroll down to the Home Menu.
- Now Find check your heart rate and click on get started.
- Now you just need to place your finger on the lens of your rear Camera to measure your Heart rate. Turn the flashlight on for better results.
- Your heart rate will be monitored.
Once you made the measurements, you can choose them to be saved in the app to monitor trends over time and can note if there’s any significant change in them. You can save them alongside other health and wellness information.
This is one of the most useful features in our day-to-day usage and it is amazing to see this feature working Good and that too using a Smartphone. but sadly, this feature is available only on Pixel devices and you can get it by installing Pixel-based ROMs on your device. Google said it will also coming to other android devices and I request Google should soon bring its support to other devices too.
Thank you for reading the article. Hope you guys found it helpful.
