Blood Oxygen monitoring returning to Apple Watch Series 9, Series 10, and Ultra 2

Back in December of 2023, Apple briefly halted sales of the Apple Watch 9 and Apple Watch Ultra 2 in the US over a dispute regarding the blood oxygen monitoring tech. While the company had to back down and remove the feature from said watches, blood oxygen monitoring is making a return as Apple has once again found a work around, but there’s a catch.

For those unaware, Apple introduced blood oxygen monitoring with the Series 9 smartwatch but at the time, it was involved in a long-running patent dispute with Masimo, a medical technology company known for its pulse oximeters. Masimo claimed that Apple infringed on its patents and the International Trade Commission (ITC) ruled in favor of Masimo, leading Apple to ban sales of the Apple Watch Series 9. The Cupertino giant ended up halting the sales briefly in December 2023 but by January 2024, it decided to remove the blood oxygen feature to resume sales in the US.

Now, the company has shared an update on the issue stating that the blood oxygen feature will start working again on Apple Watch Series 9, Series 10, and Ultra 2 smartwatches in the US, following a firmware update coming later today (August 14). How Apple got around the ban was by shifting the measuring and calculating of data to the iPhone. The smartwatches will only collect the necessary data and send it to the Respiratory section of the Health app, where user’s will be able to monitor their levels.

This does mean that an iPhone is required to monitor blood oxygen and the data cannot be viewed on the wrist. Users will also need to update their paired iPhone to iOS 18.6.1 and their Apple Watch to watchOS 11.6.1. This will affect only the Apple Watch models sold after January 17, 2024 and models purchased before, as well as those sold internationally, will continue to offer blood oxygen monitoring as usual.