Need A Sleep Study? It Could Be As Easy As Downloading An Apple Watch App Soon

Nina Raemont/ZDNET

Follow ZDNET: Add america arsenic a preferred source on Google.

ZDNET's cardinal takeaways

• A squad of researchers developed a caller slumber study app. 
• The app was developed utilizing AI and an Apple Watch Series 6. 
• BIDSleep intends to show slumber disorders without a slumber study. 

Researchers astatine nan University of Massachusetts Amherst are turning Apple Watches into precocious slumber shape monitoring devices. 

Also: The champion slumber trackers of 2025: These slumber trackers improved my sleep

Professor Joyita Dutta and her squad astatine nan Biomedical Imaging and Data Science Lab developed BIDSleep, an app that collects information for studying slumber and could service arsenic an replacement to nan costly and analyzable instrumentality and protocols associated pinch nan golden modular of slumber studies. BIDSleep uses an Apple Watch, which Dutta says nan squad included for its accessibility. 

Dutta said she envisions that researchers will yet usage this app to show group pinch slumber disorders extracurricular of a lab. 

The study for nan app was conducted pinch 47 adults who wore nan Apple Watch Series 6 and a Dreem 2 Headband complete 7 nights for slumber monitoring and shape assessment. 

Also: I tested nan e-paper smartwatch that sewage nan net buzzing - and don't want to return it off

The BIDSleep app collects instantaneous bosom complaint information arsenic a personification progresses done their slumber stages and feeds it into nan researchers' AI model. In this study, nan results mirrored those of EEG-based slumber staging -- nan golden modular -- and accurately identified nan correct slumber shape astir 70% of nan time. The AI exemplary outperformed different slumber shape prediction approaches successful nan investigation community, according to nan blog post. 

The squad did not usage nan Apple Watch Series 6's autochthonal slumber search capabilities, but they scheme to comparison those features pinch nan BIDSleep app's ain successful nan future. Dutta says her and her team's app will beryllium much meticulous because of its richer information aggregation. 

Wearables for research 

Health wearable technology, for illustration Apple Watches, smart rings for illustration Oura, and more, is perpetually being utilized successful technological investigation to either show wellness conditions aliases create devices for addressing them. These devices, which are packed pinch bosom sensors, accelerometers, gyroscopes, and ray sensors, tin seizure a wide array of biomarkers. Those are useful some to consumers aiming to way their wellness and researchers seeking nan adjacent wellness innovation. 

Also: One of nan champion Apple Watches you tin bargain isn't Apple's newest (but it's 30% off)

Sleep studies for group pinch slumber disorders are often costly and analyzable to conduct. The golden modular is conducted successful a lab, and at-home assessments require group to deterioration electrodes connected their heads arsenic they sleep. Not to mention that slumber monitoring done this process is constricted to 1 nighttime and seldom takes into relationship shorter slumber durations, for illustration naps. 

Contrast that pinch an Apple Watch, which continuously monitors slumber activity -- whether that's a nap aliases a afloat nighttime of slumber -- and is comfortable and discreet astir nan wrist. 

Also: AI agents are transforming nan healthcare and life sciences industry

"The wide readiness and round-the-clock wearability of smartwatches make them peculiarly well-suited for studying each forms of sleep," nan researchers wrote successful a blog post.