4 Things We Want to See From a Potential Apple Ring

There’s been a lot of talk about the yet-to-be-released Samsung Galaxy Ring of late, which begs the question – are Smart Rings the next wearable frontier? Eyes are on Apple now to see whether the tech giant will developer a rival product and while there isn’t much news in this space right now we thought we’d put together a wishlist of what we’d like to see in a hypothetical Apple Ring.

Is Apple developing a Smart Ring?

Let’s start with what we know about the development of an Apple smart ring.

There’s not really much to say here. Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman (via MacRumors) claims Apple has explored the idea of a Smart Ring in the past, which would have a particular focus on health features like the Oura Ring.

Another report from South Korean outlet ET News (via ZDNET) claims that an Apple Ring is “imminent”. Time will tell!

Features we want from the Apple Ring

Regardless of whether or not an Apple smart ring is released or not, we’ve been thinking about what nifty applications the wearable device could have. Here are some of our dream features:

Health tracking

Health tracking is the most obvious and most likely application of a smart ring. The Apple Watch is currently capable of gathering all kinds of health data including heart rate, sleep quality and blood oxygen levels and it would be great to see the hypothetical ring do the same.

The issue here is some people want to track their health metrics but don’t like the design of the Apple Watch – which is something a ring design could eliminate. Equally, slipping a ring on while sleeping has the potential to be far more comfortable than sleeping with a watch, so design-wise an Apple Ring already has multiple benefits.

Payment

I remember working the cashier in retail years ago and seeing a man come up and pay for his products with a tap of his ring. It was simultaneously the coolest and most unnecessary thing I’d ever seen. I want it.

Apple already allows contactless payments via its Watch and iPhone range, so adding these features to a smart ring seems plausible. It would be a lot more convenient than fiddling around with credit cards or inputting passcodes on your phone.

Remote features

One patent for Apple’s proposed smart ring listed controller-like applications for the device. Essentially this design would mean that gestures on your smart ring (like swiping, tapping or twisting) could be used to control other connected devices around your house.

It’s hard to say exactly how useful this application would be until there’s more detail on what exactly it can do, but it would no doubt make you feel incredibly powerful.

Colour changing

This may be a long shot, but wouldn’t it be nice to be able to colour or change the design of your ring as you need it?

Ideally for this feature to work the Apple Ring would have a built-in display under a layer of tempered glass that connects to your phone, allowing you to change colours and designs at will. I have no idea if the technology for that is even possible right now, but if mood rings can change colour why not smart ones!

This means you could change the colour of your jewellery to match your outfit, or shift the design into pop culture references – like the One Ring! The possibilities are endless.

What do you want to see from a hypothetical Apple smart ring? Drop your ideas in the comments!

Lead Image Credit: Apple/Getty Images