How Accurate Is Apple Watch For HIIT Workout?

Apple Watch is one of the most accurate smartwatches in the world, but today’s question is: How Accurate is Apple Watch for HIIT Workout? Let’s find out.

HIIT or High-Intensity Interval Training is a popular form of interval training, and it comes with tons of health benefits.

Here is an article on my website that you must read, its about How Accurate Is Apple Watch On A Treadmill? We Checked It.

Just like most smartwatches, Apple Watch is also capable of tracking HIIT workout, but just like the others, Apple watch is also not very accurate. But is there any way to fix it? Let’s find out.

How Accurate is Apple Watch for HIIT Workout? Can I Trust It?

Apple Watch is one of the most accurate smartwatches in the world, and it has been proven on many occasions. According to a study by Stanford University, Apple watch was the most precise smartwatch in their research in terms of Heart Rate Tracking.

According to the study, the Apple watch topped the group with a median error rate of only 2% in Hear-rate monitoring, which is pretty accurate.

However, the researchers only monitored the performance of the watches for cycling and walking on the treadmill. Whereas, when it comes to HIIT, you will be doing a lot of irregular movements, which will make it difficult for the watch to accurately track your heart rate.

Apple’s official page also states that “Some of the irregular movements in HIIT workouts might prevent a heart rate measurement.” This statement clearly says that depending on the HIIT workout you are doing, it might be difficult for the Apple Watch to track your heart rate.

For example, if you are doing a HIIT workout such as Mountain Climbers, where your arms stay stationary, in this case, the watch will be able to get the accurate readings. However, if you are doing a workout such as Burpees, Jump squats, or other exercises, which involves a lot of movements, it will be difficult for the watch to track your Heart Rate.

Considering all these facts, I can conclude that the Apple Watch is not very accurate for HIIT workout.

In fact, most smartwatches aren’t reliable when it comes to HIIT because this workout involves a lot of irregular movements and sharp picks of heart rate pace, which make it difficult for the Heart-Rate sensor to track it on your wrist.

Now the question is: How to improve the accuracy of Apple Watch for HIIT workout? The answer to this question is pretty simple. If you want to make sure that your HIIT gets tracked accurately, then you will need to invest in a chest strap.

The reason why I’m recommending the chest strap is that because it sits right next to your Heart, so even if you do irregular movements, it will be easier for the Heart-rate sensor to keep track of your Heart Rate.

You can get a good Bluetooth Chest strap which is compatible with Apple Watch. There are a lot of good chest straps out there, but these are the best chest straps for Apple watch.

• Wahoo TICKR X
• Polar H10
• Polar T31
• Garmin HRM-Swim

These are some of the best Chest Straps for Apple watch, and all of them work really well with the Apple watch. You can my complete guide on this topic, where I have shared the details and everything else which you should know.

How Do I Know if HIIT is Effective?

HIIT is a very popular interval training that has numerous health benefits. HIIT gives lots of stress to the body and helps to restore the body’s energy as well as increase metabolism to burn calories. This intensive training allows for muscle building.

Moreover, HIIT works as a high consumption of oxygen during and after the workout. It is called EPOC (excess post-exercise oxygen consumption). This workout allows you to burn calories at the rate of 5 calorie consumption of oxygen per liter.

Are Apple Watch HIIT Calories Accurate?

Among various types of smartwatches, Apple is one of the best watches which gives the most accurate measurements to its users. In the sector of tracking heart rate, the Apple watch gives precise results. 

Sometimes it topped with a 2% error rate which is pretty obvious and almost can be accepted as the accurate result.

For HIIT (High-Intensity Interval Training), the official page of apple also depicts that some irregular measurements can happen in heat rate tracking.

Hence, it can be said, the accuracy sometimes depends on what types of HIIT workout you are practicing, and sometimes it can be tough to give accurate measurements to the apple watch also.

How Do You Do HIIT on Apple Watch?

Apple watch has the function of enabling HIIT. To enable this option, you will have to do just a few simple steps.

First, simply press on the HIIT icon to start the HIIT tracking. Sometimes it is going to be difficult to find out the HIIT option on the Apple watch. In the watch of watchOS6, you will get the option ‘add workout’. 

Tap this button and then scroll down a little bit to find the HIIT options. When you find the option then tap it. After that, this option will come to the main menu.

Now, you can use some of the apps that support the apple system to get precise and accurate results.

However, the best apps for the HIIT measurements that support Apple watch have given below:

• Nike + run club
• Interval pro
• Endomondo sports tracker
• Runkeeper
• Strava
• Runtastic
• Apple workout, etc.

Here is a related post that I wrote regarding the best Apple Watch running Apps for Intervals & Splits.

How Long Should HIIT Intervals Be?

There is no hard and fast rule about the intervals, so it will mainly depend on your stamina. Generally, people do the HIIT for around 45 seconds and then take 30 seconds for recovery, and they repeat this interval for a longer duration.

The ideal duration of HIIT is also not defined, but if you want to get into better shape than you should try to do 30 to 60 minutes of HIIT workout. You also don’t have to start with 30 or 60 minutes; instead, you can start with 5 or 10 minutes HIIT workout.

Once you start feeling that you can easily do 10 minutes HIIT workout, you can increase the duration and so on. This process will boost your stamina, and it will be easier for you to achieve your goals.

Conclusion

That’s all, folks. Now you know how accurate apple watch is for HIIT Workout. The reality is that most fitness trackers out there work well for tracking regular workouts.

But, when it comes to High-intensity workouts (HIIT), it becomes very challenging for them to accurately track the Heart-rate.

So, if you want to accurately track your Heart-rate in HIIT workouts, then you should invest in a good Chest Strap.

I hope that this guide helped you find the answer to your question, and if you have any further questions, please let me know in the comment section below.