We’ve all had those health moments when we’re just feeling… meh. Nothing’s exactly wrong, but you know you’re not feeling your best and that you can do better – you just can’t find the gumption to do so.
That was me after a recent bout of the flu completely ruined my routine. I wasn’t eating great, I’d stopped reading as much as I’d like to, and I found myself choosing to stay up late rather than doing the smart thing and heading to bed. This, of course, created a snowball effect where I’d then be too tired to get up early to walk the dog or make a proper lunch.
I needed a little help and, in my experience, there are few better motivators than spending money. That was the reason I bought my first fitness tracker (the Fitbit Flex 2, back in 2017), which put me on a journey of smartwatches and trackers that eventually landed me with the Apple Watch SE in 2023.
But, after not too long, my SE was starting to feel stale. I’m not too taken by the smartwatch features on offer, I don’t love the ‘ring’ fitness system and I’ve found myself increasingly annoyed with daily charging. And, personally, I can’t wear a regular timepiece on one wrist and my Apple Watch on the other.
I was intrigued, then, when I discovered the Whoop band, which looked like it would address a lot of those gripes quite specifically. It’s a screen-free, low-profile device that focuses on health and fitness, and has a multi-day battery. It also comes with a month-long free trial of its Peak membership which includes the Whoop 5.0 device itself (with a 14-day battery) and advanced tracking like Healthspan – which calculates the age your body is performing at (compared to your actual age) and gives you the data you need to improve.
I was slightly intimidated, because this class of fitness device is also usually attached to multi-million-dollar athletes and Olympians. But if you don’t love the device during this trial period, all you have to do is pay the shipping cost to return it; which I had little doubt I’d be doing.
Whoop’s states its mission is “to unlock human performance and healthspan”, so it’s for athletes like Virgil Van Dyke, James Tedesco, Michael Phelps, Rory McIlroy and Cristiano Ronaldo trying to maximize their potential – not me.
But then I strapped one on my wrist.
The real cost of a personal trainer
Other than thinking it was too health and fitness focused for me, one of the biggest reasons I thought Whoop wasn’t for me is its price. Whoop is a subscription service and without an active membership the band itself is useless.
You can subscribe to any of three different subscription options – One, Peak and Life. If you’re on the fence about whether Whoop is for you (don’t worry, I certainly was), you can get a 1-month free trial of the Peak plan when buying direct from Whoop – which is what I did.
The Peak membership includes all the benefits of the more basic One tier. This includes the Whoop 5.0 band – which now boasts an improved 14+ day battery over the Whoop 4.0 – sleep/strain/recovery insights, personalized coaching, heart-rate tracking and women’s hormonal insights, plus advanced features like Healthspan and a Real-Time Stress Monitor that analyzes how much you’ve been stressed based on your heart rate outside of physical activity and offers reasons why.
You also have the option to pick up Whoop on Amazon – starting at $199 / £169 / AU$299 – where you can buy the device and a 12-month membership.
So, after a month of testing, what convinced me to continue?
I’d love to proclaim a Rocky-esque training montage, but nothing much changed initially, despite the Whoop app recommending I do so – and therein lies the rub.
As popular fitness influencer and personal trainer (PT) James Smith once said, PTs should be a short-term answer that provide their clients with the tools to continue their fitness journey on their own.
That’s how I came to view my Whoop band. While its yearly cost is steep, I can honestly say the Whoop made me look at my performance in a way that no previous fitness tracker has. And I think the way I now view my activity and sleep will continue even once I unsubscribe.
That’s because, where Apple’s fitness features revolve around rings, Whoop is all about Strain.
Whoop’s Strain is a measurement of cardiovascular and muscular exertion that quantifies the level of both physical and mental stress you’re putting on your body. It’s tracked on a 0-21 scale, where light levels are for active recovery and high scores are where you make your fitness gains.
The crucial difference is that the score is completely individualized based on heart rate, meaning a 90-minute hike might give me a strain of 11, while someone fitter might get only five. It’s about how hard my body– and mind – is working. Not just hitting numeric markers.
More Z’s, less straining, better training
To consistently reach a high level of strain and nail your recovery, sleep is also of the utmost importance – and Whoop thankfully excels at sleep tracking.
While I’ll admit that I often ignore its advice, I can’t deny that Whoop has made me think about, and consider, my sleep more than ever before. Sure, it’s resulted in some self-induced stress as I change my routine to prioritize my sleep over a morning walk with the pooch, but at least I’m making considered choices.
That’s because Whoop’s Sleep score sits alongside Recovery and Strain, and the three are intrinsically linked. If you sleep poorly, your recovery is impacted and your recommended amount of strain will be lower, as you aren’t prepared to perform your best. Conversely, if you sleep well, you’ll recover better and be prepared to hit the day with full gusto.
The sleep tracking doesn’t just amount to ‘sleep good, sleep bad’. It breaks it down by hours slept versus hours needed, sleep efficiency, consistency and stress. On top of that, the Whoop Coach, an AI tool powered by OpenAI tech (which I actually found to be one of the better uses of AI I’ve come across) provides daily recommendations and summaries of your performance. For example, today it told me I recovered well, lowered my recent resting heart rate and had a pretty average night sleep, reminding me of my step goal and recommending an additional workout.
Plus, when you set an alarm within the app, you can set a sleep goal, whether it’s hitting a certain percentage of your sleep need, or waking up only once you’ve hit ‘the green’ in recovery.
There’s a lot of data on offer, and you can go as deep or shallow as you like. But the fact that the data is there, subtly influencing your decisions, is the point. I’m constantly checking in with my Whoop app, and that habit alone is nudging me towards healthier habits.
The Round-the-Clock Personal Trainer
For many iPhone owners, an Apple Watch is probably the default (and easy) fitness tracker they’ll consider – and I’ll admit its seamless phone integration and the ability to answer calls is handy. But personally, those aren’t the important features I’m looking for. I want a fitness tracker that… tracks my fitness.
Having upgraded to a Peak subscription after my free trial period, the Whoop Band 5.0 lasts 15 days without charging, which, in combination with Whoop’s slide-on charger that lets you charge while wearing it – and is itself waterproof – means it never has to leave my wrist, and it hasn’t.
While I came into my trial convinced that Whoop wasn’t for me, the complete opposite turned out to be true. Like a memory foam pillow, the data offered by Whoop is unique to each wrist it sits on – making it suitable to a very broad range of users.
Or at least anyone who’s vaguely fitness-minded and is open to wearing a face-less, strange-looking little tracker on their wrist.
While I’m no athlete, I remain excited to see the changes it can help me make over the next 12 months, even if it is just to nudge me towards a more consistent (currently lacking at 74% consistency!) sleep schedule. I’m unsure if I’ll be signing up for another 12 months once my current subscription ends, but I also didn’t think I’d last more than a few weeks with it initially, so we’ll have to wait and see. One thing’s for sure, though – I won’t be going back to my Apple Watch SE.