Masimo's CEO affirmed: Apple Watch would be better without the blood oxygen measurement feature

Apple on Thursday began selling Apple Watch Series 9 and Ultra 2 models without the blood oxygen measurement feature, as the company faces a patent dispute with medical company Masimo. Amid this situation, Masimo CEO Joe Kiani said that the Apple Watch would be better off without the blood oxygen feature because he believes it is unreliable.

Masimo said the Apple Watch's blood oxygen feature is unreliable

In an interview with Bloomberg TV, Kiani criticized Apple for 'spoofing' the health feature offered on the Apple Watch as a 'reliable blood oxygen level monitor'. According to the executive, Apple's implementation is unreliable and consumers 'would be better off without it'.

"What Apple is offering consumers as a reliable, blood oxygen level monitor, it's not," he said. 'I really feel that consumers would be better off without it.' He also argued that the method of measuring blood oxygen levels 'is not useful unless it is continuously monitored'. Apple responded by saying that this feature is reliable and can save users' lives in some situations.

Blood oxygen monitoring was added in 2020 with the Apple Watch Series 6. In 2021, a study by the University of São Paulo compared the technology built into the Apple Watch with two existing oximeters on the market. The study concluded that although the Apple Watch sometimes displayed higher SpO2 values, the results were still quite accurate.

A year later, another study published in SAGE's Digital Health journal compared the pulse oximeter built into the Apple Watch with the Masimo Radical-7 and also concluded that the results were quite similar between the two devices.

The Apple Watch's blood oxygen monitoring feature requires users to open the app and wait 15 seconds to receive an estimate. Periodically, when the user is not moving, Apple Watch automatically checks blood oxygen levels in the background. This also happens when the user is sleeping.

Apple Watch ban in the US

In January 2023, a US court ruled that Apple had infringed one of Maximo's blood oxygen measurement patents for the Apple Watch. In October, the ITC agreed with the decision and upheld the court's ruling. As a result, Apple was forced to stop selling the Apple Watch Series 9 and Ultra 2 in the US last month.

To circumvent the ban, Apple has agreed to disable the pulse oxygen measurement feature on Apple Watch models sold in the US from January 18, 2024.

The only thing we know for sure at this point is that the dispute between Masimo and Apple will continue for some time.

Jessica Tanner

Update 20 January 2024