My second Oura ring (3rd gen) is ~3 years old and is currently collecting dust in a drawer because the battery lasts < 24 hrs, and If you forget to sync your data by opening the app (which can take a minute or longer of having the app open in the foreground) before it dies, it dumps all data collected since the last sync. Super frustrating.<p>I might be able to get it replaced if support decides to be generous, but dealing w/support is a pain, and the alternative is buying a $400 replacement every 2-3 years when the battery starts to fail.<p>I don't have to pay the monthly subscription - they had a deal where you could buy a third gen ring (at full price) and would get lifetime access without paying a monthly subscription. Despite that it still doesn't feel worth it to me to have yet another device I have to babysit (remember to sync with the app every day, remember to wear, remember to charge) and pay hundreds of $ to replace every 2-3 years. With the subscription cost, there's no way this product's value proposition makes sense for me.
I'd be to pay a premium for a device like this if I wasn't limited to the manufacturers own app for collecting and interpreting data.<p>As is? Nah...
I really like the Oura, and have had a 2nd gen which works great for nearly 7 years- battery still going strong. However the 2nd gen had no monthly subscription fee, which I really hate... I am not sure if I would be willing to upgrade, as I have a huge aversion to subscription fees.<p>Overall, I don't really like their software either- in my experience their 'sleep score' is in no way correlated with quality of sleep, just length. The main factor in my sleep score that makes it really high is having severe accumulated sleep deprivation, so I sleep longer. In my opinion factors like sleep efficiency (e.g. not waking up a lot) should be the main thing in the score. Ultimately nobody really knows what "good" sleep is- it is variable from person to person and can't be meaningfully represented as a single number.<p>I generally just pull the data into Python, and analyze it myself.<p>Probably my most interesting finding is the massive negative impact even small amounts of alcohol have on my sleep. Even a single beer 4 hours before bedtime almost completely eliminates deep sleep. I've come to the conclusion that drinking early in the day is likely actually somewhat healthier, despite being culturally unacceptable. I've also found that the humidity really affects my sleep - especially altering breath rate- but I'm not sure what to make of that.
> Oura Ring 4 starts at $349, with Oura Membership pricing at $5.99 per month or $69.99 per year.<p>Oura business team forgot they now have much more competition than they had 2 or 3 years ago.<p>Competitor that doesn’t charge a monthly fee, and competitor like Samsung that will be « good enough » for the average joe while being cheaper and without monthly fee.<p>I don’t see how they can remain profitable in the near future.
Damn, I would really like such a thing, if it was just the hardware and not the associated lock in to a third party getting their grubby hands on my internal metrics.<p>I'd pay a premium for it even, which makes you wonder just how much money Oura must be making off the data of its users... (if they weren't, there'd be an incentive to sell the hardware)
So, do I get any functionality if I just buy the ring, or do I _have to_ subscribe? I mean does the ring have any basic features that work without subscription, or do I pay monthly even for the basic features?<p>If it's the latter it's a big no.
> With scientifically validated sensing capabilities, ...<p>What does scientifically validating mean here? In my opinion, that just makes this article sound like marketing.
I'll eventually upgrade my Oura Ring 3, but I'm irked about the need for a new charger. Yeah, it comes with one, but I need a second one because of my living arrangements. So it's another $59 because they couldn't make the new ring compatible with the old charger.<p>I've had mine for over two years now, and I've been pretty happy with it. I got it as an alternative to an Apple Watch for health & fitness monitoring, and it has turned out better than I expected. I think it's better than the watch in some ways, such as the battery life being long enough, and the ring being comfortable enough that I can easily use it while sleeping.
I'd be curious to hear from Oura Ring fans what they find so useful about them beyond the initial period where you get to diagnose poor sleep patterns and maybe a low step count. What value do you get out of it long term?
I refuse to even look at devices like this anymore after they removed features and locked them behind a paywall.<p>If you want ongoing revenue from a device, don't charge up front.<p>If you want to charge up front, don't try to get ongoing revenue from me for things the device does itself already.
For those looking to the upgrade from a Gen 3 ring. I've seen some mentions that Gen 3 users might need to downsize for a Gen 4 because of less prominent sensors [1].<p>[1] <a href="https://www.reddit.com/r/ouraring/comments/1fvytqg/sizing_ki" rel="nofollow">https://www.reddit.com/r/ouraring/comments/1fvytqg/sizing_ki</a>...
Was I supposed to know what this product does before reading this page?<p>I got halfway down where they start to talk about the sensors but then goes off into "The multiple sensors inside the ring form an 18-path multi-wavelength photoplethysmography (PPG) subsystem to provide highly accurate, continuous data throughout the day and night."<p>What does this thing do and how does that improve my health/life? Nvm I don't care at this point. I must not be the target demographic to wonder such things.
$400 and a monthly subscription to a company that is known for only one product feels like a really shitty deal to me. I know people with various versions of this product and they do like it, but it's a hard sell for me to want to put that kind of money in.