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Apple Watch wearable foundation model

Apple Watch wearable foundation model

10 comments

·August 21, 2025
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brandonb

I worked on one of the first wearable foundation models in 2018. The innovation of this 2025 paper from Apple is moving up to a higher level of abstraction: instead of training on raw sensor data (PPG, accelerometer), it trains on a timeseries of behavioral biomarkers derived from that data (e.g., HRV, resting heart rate, and so on.).

They find high accuracy in detecting many conditions: diabetes (83%), heart failure (90%), sleep apnea (85%), etc.

puppymaster

reminds me of Jim Simons of Renaissance advise when it comes to data science - sort first, then regress.

dinobones

Not sort in the literal way right?

https://stats.stackexchange.com/questions/185507/what-happen...

vibecodermcswag

i love this because I build in medtech, but the big problem is no open weights, nor open data.

you can export your own apple XML data for usage and processing, but if you want to create an application and request apple XML data from users, that likely crosses into clinical research territory with data security policy requirements and de-identification needs.

pricklyprice

what is the best way for non-big tech to buy such data for research and product development?

fiduciarytemp

Has anyone seen the publishing of the weights or even an API release?

brandonb

In the paper, they say they can't release the weights due to terms of consent with study participants (this is from the Apple Heart and Movement study).

dyauspitr

Is there a way to run this on your own data? I’ve been wearing my Apple Watch for years and would love to be able to use it better.

brandonb

Not yet -- this one is just a research study. Some of their previous research has made it into product features.

For example, Apple Watch VO2Max (cardio fitness) is based on a deep neural network published in 2023: https://www.empirical.health/blog/how-apple-watch-cardio-fit...

pricklyprice

Apple was reporting VO2max for a very long time (much before 2023). I wonder what the accuracy was back then? Maybe they should the option for users to re-compute those past numbers based on the latest and greatest algorithm.