Apple Watch or Whoop?
This article covers the differences between an Apple Watch Ultra and Whoop 4.0, although also applies to Apple Watch 7 and above too.
The Key Differences
The Whoop is a fitness tracker that is worn on the wrist and tracks various metrics such as heart rate, sleep, and recovery. But so is the Apple Watch? Not quite.
The main difference is that the Apple Watch tracks your activity, whereas Whoop provides feedback on how activity impacts your body.
The Whoop doesn’t have a display, so it’s not a watch device. It also continuously takes more readings than the Apple Watch, and is said to be more accurate.
In short, the Apple Watch is probably the device for most people. However, Whoop is far better at producing insights for improving yourself.
“Most People”
Essentially if you are new to a fitness journey or still casually exercising, you’ll probably want to know how many steps you’ve taken, how you’re sleeping, how many calories your body is estimated to be using and want a log of your activity. This is what most people will want when looking for a fitness tracker - and the Apple Watch does all of that very well, and it looks great too. It also obviously displays the time, which the Whoop doesn’t do.
Who is Whoop for?
I’d bet that 99% of Whoop users had an Apple Watch or similar (Fitbit etc) before owning a Whoop.
When you really start to get into a health and fitness journey, there’s a point where a few things happen:
Your diet stops being a “diet plan” and just becomes what you eat
You make incredible training progress (whatever your sport) but hit a bit of a wall when it comes to physical progress
You start to enjoy health and fitness, and it becomes a real hobby for you (again, whatever your sport)
This process could take months or years, but I’d say this is where the Whoop steps in.
Whoop goes that extra distance to give you a daily recovery score every morning, based on multiple factors such as heart rate variability and sleep stages. This is then combined with a daily diary which over time shows you which lifestyle factors are impacting recovery positively or negatively.
So, Whoop is for those who have trained and refined so much that they want to truly understand what is impacting recovery, through data and insights.
What the Apple Watch does better
I’m a big fan of the Whoop, I love the recovery scores which tell me how I can perform for the day.
But the Apple Watch is a mini computer on your wrist. Non-fitness factors make it a much better all rounder if you don’t have a smart watch, hence the points above about 'most people'.
You can set timers, check calendar, ask to identify music, use as a camera remote (with display) and much more. The Whoop does have an alarm for the morning too though, which is actually one of my favourite features of both devices - being ‘tapped’ awake gently so you don’t have to wake up to a loud alarm, or wake your partner.
Summary
This is a really short article about a question I get asked a lot, due to the fact that I wear both devices daily. I hope it’s helped you make up your mind. I’ll be doing more in depth about fitness trackers in general, so let me know if you’ve got any more questions.