The author, Bill Schiffmiller with his wearables, the Apple Watch, the Resound Vivia headphones and Oura Ring 5.
De’Andre Smith / @eyesofdeael
I’m starting a new experiment in how I use personal technology. The Oura Ring 5 reveals sleep, stress, activity and recovery patterns. I’m looking forward to the ReSound Sensia hearing aids, designed to automatically respond to changing sound environments. The Apple Watch watches my body’s signals, while the iPhone takes these products to a familiar place.
We are curious about our health because much of what happens inside us remains invisible. We notice when we feel rested, exhausted, focused, or restless, but we don’t always understand why. Some questions never make it to a doctor’s appointment because we feel uncomfortable asking them, we have trouble describing what we are experiencing, or we don’t know what to ask.
Wearables do not make us doctors.
They can make us better observers of ourselves, armed with enough knowledge to ask questions that would otherwise never be asked.
Each device promises a personalized experience and connects to my iPhone in some way. Will they continue to be products that know different parts of me or can they converge into a more complete understanding of my hearing and my health?
For business leaders, the biggest opportunity is to make personal technology smart for the whole person.
Before wearables found the wrist
In 2006, Nike CEO Mark Parker and Apple CEO Steve Jobs introduced the Nike+iPod sports kit, which wirelessly connected a shoe sensor to an iPod nano.
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I’ve seen many health trackers come and go, getting selective about which ones deserve a place on my body and in my routine. During my years at Apple, I became familiar with the Nike+iPod Sport Kit, released in 2006, a sensor under the insole of Nike+ shoes that communicated with a receiver connected to an iPod nano. Do you remember the iPod nano? Apple and Nike had placed the tracker under their feet.
I also remember Jawbone UP and Nike FuelBand on the Apple Store shelves. Jawbone tracked activity and sleep, while Nike converted movement into NikeFuel points. Apple stopped selling both in March 2015 as the Apple Watch approached. Apple also sold Fitbit trackers. I was drawn to Withings because their well-designed connected scales and blood pressure monitors made home health monitoring accessible.
The first wrist tracker I used was the Misfit Shine. It looked like minimalist jewelry, with twelve small lights showing progress and approximating time. I appreciated its visual restraint, but I had to learn the dot patterns and resort to the phone for details. Shine asked me to adapt their design rather than make their information naturally useful. In the end I was disappointed.
Together, these products demonstrate that attractive hardware and capable sensors do not guarantee a lasting relationship with the consumer.
Why ŌURA earned my attention
ŌURA seems to have learned from that history. The Oura Ring 5 is an eye-catcher inside and out. Its titanium exterior comes in six finishes, allowing it to function as a fashion accessory. Inside, the visible sensors are equally fascinating, reminding me that this little object is continually observing my body’s signals.
The appeal isn’t simply that ŌURA has made small, attractive sensors. Interpret sleep, stress, activity and recovery through scores and trends. A ring can remain present without constantly asking for attention. I’m attracted to it because it combines fashion with the opportunity to learn about my health.
That relationship is producing business results. According to company figures, ŌURA had sold more than 5.5 million rings by September 2025 and reported more than $500 million in revenue in 2024. It subsequently raised more than $900 million at a valuation of around $11 billion, suggesting a scale that eluded many previous wearable businesses.
The iPhone in the center
The Oura Ring 5 is part of a larger personal technology ecosystem. The question is what it can contribute alongside technologies that already have a place in my life.
The Apple Watch is the most powerful overall health tracker in my ecosystem. Monitor activity, heart rate, sleep, and other health signals while staying closely connected to iPhone.
Your understanding of my listening experience is more limited. The Noise app measures ambient sound levels and exposure duration. You can tell me that a room is loud, but you can’t know whether I followed the conversation, how much effort it took to listen, or whether that effort contributed to how I felt later.
Sensia hearing aids approach the same environment from a different direction. ReSound says it uses automatic sound classification and deep neural network noise reduction to adapt to changes in the listening environment and help me follow the speech I want to hear. However, it doesn’t capture the broader health patterns that the Apple Watch observes. Oura Ring adds another insight when interpreting sleep, preparation, stress and recovery. Each one understands a different part of the same person.
Frankly, take away a lot of the technologies I regularly use and take for granted, but don’t take away my hearing aids. Today I rely on ReSound Vivia and soon I will rely on Sensia in a way that I don’t rely on my other devices. Without my hearing aids, for all intents and purposes, I would be out of service socially and professionally.
The Oura Ring and Apple Watch help me observe my life. My Resound hearing aids help me live it.
The iPhone sits between my hearing aids, Apple Watch, Oura Ring, health information, communications, and daily decisions. It’s where I check on them, review them, and try to understand them.
Oura Ring shares select data with Apple Health, but not your insights into preparedness, daytime stress, or resilience. Apple Health also doesn’t capture Sensia’s settings, listening effort, or fatigue. The iPhone connects these products, but not their meaning.
An Oura score may suggest I’m well-rested, but several meetings or dinners at a noisy restaurant can leave me exhausted. Apple Watch can recognize the sound level, Sensia can adjust it, and Oura Ring can detect stress later. I’m still the only one who knows that listening connects those experiences.
Personalization is not convergence
A product can be highly personalized while remaining isolated. Apple Watch can understand more about my overall health, Sensia more about the sound environment that affects my hearing, and Oura Ring more about stress and recovery patterns. None create a unified understanding of me.
True convergence requires more than moving data into a common repository. Data must travel with permission, intelligence must interpret relationships between signals, and the system must explain what it sees while allowing me to decide what happens next.
Trust becomes a competitive issue. As companies combine hearing and health information, consumers will need understandable controls and confidence that the technology is in their best interests.
Wearable competition has focused on shape, battery life, sensor accuracy and measurement counts. The next source of value is context.
Can a system connect a day of demanding listening to stress or recovery, distinguish loud sound from difficult conversation, and offer useful observations without overstepping the consumer’s boundaries?
Apple has an advantage because the iPhone connects devices, applications, communications, health information and daily decisions. Its greatest value would be in helping me understand how those signals are related.
I still don’t know what the Oura Ring 5, ReSound Sensia hearing aids, Apple Watch and iPhone will reveal together. I’m about to find out if they feel like several smart products competing for my attention or like an ecosystem that helps me understand myself.
For now, I’m still the only one who understands how the parts are related. Convergence has not arrived. The opportunity is clearly visible.
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