Wearable Tech Evolution: Google Integrates Heart Rate Monitoring into ANC Earbuds

It has been made clear by Google that they have made rapid progress in developing technology that will allow users to make a significant upgrade to their existing true wireless earbuds. Wireless earbuds might be able to integrate heart rate monitoring with just a software update, so there will be no additional hardware requirements when upgrading to wireless earbuds. Since they are going to use a similar method as noise cancellation to work, the earbuds, earphones or headphones in question must have active noise cancellation. 

The wrist-worn devices that can provide reliable heart rate data are available from almost every major manufacturer. A companion application such as Google Fit crunches the data over time for you to be able to see patterns and irregularities in your health that may indicate something serious is wrong. 

Even though the system seems to work well, Google researchers recently published two technical papers that describe an alternative method for monitoring cardiac activity called Audioplethysmography (APG), which is used to measure heart rate. It is clear from the name that this method utilizes audio equipment like earbuds, as the market trends show that earbuds have proven to be a far more popular wearable in comparison to fitness trackers and smartwatches for wristwear. 

As a result of the deformation of blood vessels in the user’s ear canal, Google notes that the

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