A new Apple Watch alert tells you how fit (or unfit) you are. Here’s how to get it

The Apple Watch is about to give you an honest overview of your fitness levels. At a time when many of us are working from home or at home do not have access to gymsfitness trackers like the Apple Watch have helped us keep track of how much (or how little) we exercise every day. Now it translates that data into an assessment. By updating the watch’s software to WatchOS 7.2, which is now available, you will get a new cardio fitness score that uses your VO2 max (or maximum oxygen consumption during exercise) to measure your cardiorespiratory health or aerobic endurance.

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Cardio fitness explained

VO2 max is considered the gold standard for cardiorespiratory fitness and can be a good measure of your overall health. Elite athletes use this measure for training purposes to measure endurance, but the effects go beyond training. People with low cardio fitness are at a higher risk of chronic health problems such as heart disease, type 2 diabetes, colon and lung cancer, and early death, according to the American Heart Association. There are a number of different factors that can affect VO2 max, such as age, weight and even pregnancy, but as a general rule of thumb, the higher the number, the fitter you are.

The Apple Watch has been quietly monitoring its users’ estimated VO2 max for a few years now, but you had to dig a bit to get to it. You could find it first in the Health app on the iPhone and more recently under the Trends tab in the Fitness app. But even when you came across this number, Apple provided little context as to what it meant to you, plus it required you to take a certain number of back rides or brisk walks to populate it.

With the latest iOS 14.3 update, the Fitness app will now categorize that VO2 max number based on your fitness level: high, above average, below average, or low. This is similar to what other trackers like Fitbit and Garmin offer on some of their devices, but the Apple Watch also gives you the option to receive a notification on your watch if your cardio fitness score drops in the low range.

You don’t even have to sweat to hit your cardio fitness score. VO2 max on the Apple Watch can be calculated while you move normally throughout the day and not necessarily during a hard workout, as long as your heart is racing. It’s also backward compatible, which means you can see your score immediately after updating the watch if you already have VO2 max information in the app.

Apple expects that measuring and assessing VO2 max can motivate you to improve your fitness, just as seeing daily steps or calorie burn on your watch can encourage you to exercise more.

“The ability to measure something for some people can be very motivating to see how it’s changing,” said Dr. Sumbul Desai, Apple’s vice president of health. “That way, cardio fitness can be a really useful measure for everyone, not necessarily just someone who runs marathons.”

The more you know, the more you can improve

A laboratory test used to be required to measure your VO2 Max. Patients were put on a treadmill or exercise bike while connected to a heart rate monitor and a mask measured oxygen exchange. Having this metric readily available on your wrist or phone without stepping foot in a doctor’s office allows users to set measurable fitness goals over time.

“What’s so special about VO2 max is that you can really do something about it. And the key to that is by exercising more and by increasing your intensity, you’ll really see an improvement,” says Dr. Desai.

Adding a few extra steps a day won’t move the needle when it comes to your cardio fitness or VO2 max. To improve your cardio fitness rating, exercise for a longer period of time, whatever that you mean. If you’re on the fitter side, it could be through high-intensity interval training (aka HIIT), but if you’re just starting out, it could be anything that gets your heart rate up, like a brisk walk.

Recording VO2 max data on your wrist can be valuable for understanding your fitness levels, but as with any wearable, there are caveats. “It seems unlikely that accelerometers and PPG sensors alone [in the Apple Watch] can capture all the nuances of medical tests and therefore should not be seen as a substitute, ” says Dr. Geoff Tison, a cardiologist and assistant professor of cardiology at the University of California San Francisco. But if it has been properly validated and if enough mistakes have been made, it can be valuable to passively monitor these metrics on large numbers of people without complex equipment. “

CNET has not tested the VO2 max on the Apple Watch against the lab equivalent for accuracy and this metric should not be used for diagnostic purposes. As always, consult with a physician or other qualified health care practitioner about any health-related issues or health goals before beginning any exercise program.

The information in this article is for educational and informational purposes only and is not intended to be health or medical advice. Always consult a physician or other qualified health care practitioner if you have any questions about a medical condition or health goals.