The Oura ring reviewed: is this wellness tracker helpful to cyclists?

Among cyclists, there’s an insatiable hunger for technology and data—anything that promises to make us faster, stronger, lighter and more aero. But in this relentless pursuit of peak performance, it’s easy to lose sight of the foundation that makes it all possible: our health and well-being.

I’ll admit, I’ve been guilty of prioritising saddle time at the expense of just about everything else. And over the years, I’ve made my share of poor choices—under-fueling, falling for ill-informed fad diets, skipping stretch sessions for an extra hour on the bike, riding too much and sleeping too little.

This past year, though, forced me to face a hard truth. A cycle of injuries and illnesses had me chasing fitness only to end up sidelined again and again. A brutal spiral that made me confront a broader reality: I can’t keep neglecting my health. For the first time, I’ve had to put fitness on the back burner and focus on my overall well-being in earnest.

The Oura ring has been a helpful tool in this endeavour. When I started wearing the sleek activity and wellness tracker, I wasn’t looking to count miles or watts—my smart watch and cycling head unit had that covered. What I needed was a tool to help me understand the bigger picture: how well I was recovering from illness or injury, how sleepless nights and constant travel were impacting my body, and whether my body was truly ready for the demands I was placing on it.

Turns out, it wasn’t. My body was recovering poorly, and it definitely wasn’t ready for the workload I kept throwing at it. If I’m being honest, deep down, I already knew this. But seeing the data presented so clearly—plummeting readiness scores and an out-of-balance heart rate variability (HRV)—made it difficult to ignore. That’s what makes the Oura Ring such a good companion to a sports watch or cycling computer. While the watch or computer focuses on the workouts and rides, the Oura ring captures everything else. From sleep to everyday activities like walking the dog, cleaning the house, or slogging through airports, it tracks the movements and moments that make up your whole day.

Oura Gen 3 Ring: at ouraring.sjv.io

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What is the Oura Ring?

*This review was done with the Gen 3 ring. A newer, Gen 4 ring, has just been released, but the Gen 3 continues to be available and supported with new software releases.

The Oura is a smart ring. Worn on your finger like a regular ring, the tracker collects data on over 20 biometrics to provide a holistic view of your health—day and night. It tracks heart rate, body temperature, sleep stages, menstrual cycles, and even aspects of your diet if you choose to log them in the accompanying app. The Oura app then compiles all this data into an educational and user-friendly experience, offering insights that extend far beyond sport-specific activity.

“We have a really unique perspective on activity, and a pretty inclusive one. The starting point for us is we say all movement counts,” Jason Russell, the company’s VP of Consumer Software Product, told Cycling Weekly.

“The way we approach movement is intentional exercise and daily movement collectively add up to things that impact your overall health, your metabolic health, your cardiovascular health, etc. And we passively, in the background, capture all that. Our perspective [is that], activity is really part of the overall picture of health, and we're much more of an overall health product.”

So why, then, can this ring be spotted on some of the world’s best athletes?

“Recovery and really optimising training schedules and understanding when the optimal moment to train is, how ready their body is to train, how their body's responding to yesterday's training, etc,” said Russell. “And sleep is a paramount part of that, and there, we are in a class of our own.”

What the Oura ring does

The 20+ biometrics the Oura tracks include: Heart rate and heart rate variability (HRV), body temperature, blood oxygen levels (Sp02), activity, calories burned, steps taken, sleep stages and movement during sleep and basal body temperature (to provide menstrual cycle data).

It takes this biometric data and converts it into insights such as:

Readiness Score: This is the main Oura score, which tells you how ready you are for the day ahead. A holistic picture of your health, it takes into account your sleep, recent activity, heart rate data and body temperature. This score will inform you if your body needs rest and recovery or if you're ready for a long, hard ride.

Sleep Score: How well did you sleep last night? The Sleep Score is based on how many hours you snoozed, how long you spent in each sleep cycle and key factors like movement, heart rate and body temperature. The ring can even detect your overall blood oxygen saturation levels while you sleep, measuring how efficiently your body circulates and absorbs oxygen and if there are any disturbances in your breathing.

Cardio Capacity and Cardiovascular Age (CVA): This, Russell explained, is Oura’s solution for Vo2 Max. The greater your cardio capacity, the greater your body's ability to supply oxygen to your muscles during physical activity. This is also tied to cardiovascular health and longevity.

“It’s measuring arterial stiffness, essentially. Pulse wave velocity, the speed with which blood is coursing through your arteries, is something we can actually measure. And it's indicative of arterial aging,” Russell said.

“We know that moving more is going to lower that age to closer to or below your biological age. So it's a really unique perspective on why am I moving every day? Am I increasing the likelihood I'll chase my grandkids around the yard 30 years from now? If your CVA is below or aligned with your actual age, it's a positive indicator of your cardiovascular health today and your long-term health span.”

Heart rate: The ring monitors your heart rate 24/7. Over time, the software learns your baseline and how your body responds to your daily habits, stressors and environment. Heart Rate Variability (HRV) reflects the heart's adaptability to different situations, providing insights into potential stress or sickness levels and overall well-being.

Activity Score: Oura measures your daily activity, including intentional exercise and everyday movement.

Automatic Activity Detection: You can sync your Oura app with third parties like Garmin for activity data, but teh ring can also detect activities independently. The tracker can detect up to 40 different activities ranging from housework and walking the dog to cycling and running.

Personalized Activity Goals: Every day, Oura creates a personalised activity goal based on your Readiness Score. It takes many factors into account like your main focus, age, weight, gender and sleep.

Oura Ring Gen 3 details

• 5-7 days battery life w/ 6 weeks memory
• Waterproof
• Titanium frame
• Accelerometer, gyroscope, body temperature sensor, PPG pulse sensors, Bluetooth LE
• Designs: Profile, Balance
• Colours: Silver, rose gold, gold, brushed titanium, black, stealth
• Weight: 4-6 grams (depending on size)
• Width: 7.9mm,  ~2.7mm
• Cost: Cheapest: $249 (on sale), most expensive: $549. Subscription 12 months prepaid: $69.99 or $5.99 per month
• www.ouraring.com
  

What it doesn’t do

Activity-specific metrics: While the ring will detect cycling as an activity, it does not provide any real-time tracking or cycling-specific metrics like speed, distance, elevation, cadence, etc.

GPS: The ring is not equipped with a GPS and thus won’t track your ride.

Heart rate broadcasting: The Oura ring Gen 3 does not have the capability to broadcast your heart rate in real-time to other devices like your cycling computer or programs like Zwift.

Wearing the Oura ring

When ordering an Oura Ring, you’re encouraged to first order a sizing kit since Oura's ring sizes differ from standard sizing. For optimal performance, Oura recommends wearing the ring on your index finger, though the middle and ring fingers are also suitable options. It’s best to wear the sizing kit ring for a day or two, including overnight, to determine which size feels most comfortable, as your finger’s circumference may fluctuate slightly throughout the day and night.

Once your actual Oura device arrives, the tracker needs some time to adapt to you. It takes about two weeks to establish your personal baselines, 30 sleep periods to calculate your chronotype, and two months to populate your menstrual cycle Insights.

My first impression of the Gen 3 Oura ring was how surprisingly light it felt, despite its somewhat bulky appearance. The metal finish adds a touch of sophistication and stealth, making it far sleeker than the sports watches I’ve been used to wearing over the years. Compared to wrist-based trackers like smartwatches or the Whoop band, the ring is certainly a more unobtrusive and elegant option.

That said, I found wearing it on my index finger rather inconvenient. It gets in the way when gripping things, be it flat bar handlebars or a tennis racquet. But once I switched it to my middle finger, it felt much more comfortable, to the point where I hardly notice it at all. However, I’d still recommend removing the ring before lifting weights to protect both your hand and the ring, as its finish scuffs easily.

The Oura app

Setting up the app is straightforward enough, and the personalisation kicks in right away with tailored goal-setting. Whether your priority is improving athletic performance, staying present and focused, managing stress or improving overall health, the app tailors its reports based on your main focus.

There’s a wealth of information, experiments, reports and features to explore. Even after four months of use, I’m still uncovering new insights and tools. The more you engage with the app—tagging activities, providing feedback on your sleep, and sharing how you feel—the smarter and more accurate it becomes, delivering trends and insights unique to you.

The Oura app gives you a lot of metrics, but it does a good job of relating the data back to you in simple terms. It explains the sleep, activity and resilience scores and gives short summaries of your day and any trends it picks up on. It even offers little bits of advice like “allow yourself to unwind after an active day” or “How about treating yourself with something you like – a good book, your favorite music or a fun tv show?”

I’ve gotten in the habit of checking the app first thing in the morning, eager to see my readiness and sleep scores. On groggy mornings, the low scores feel validating, while high scores paired with motivational messages like “Seize the day!” or “How about a hard workout?” are genuinely encouraging.

Over time, trends emerge, helping you connect lifestyle choices to their effects—like how late-in-the-day workouts or alcohol may elevate your resting heart rate and negatively impact your sleep. Or how doing house and yard work will impact your readiness score the same way a long ride might.

Activity tracking

At the end of each day, the Oura app prompts you to confirm your activities. I’ve found that Auto Activity Detection only does an okay job in recognising the types of activity (cycling and walking, in my case). And it doesn’t detect indoor cycling at all. For more accurate tracking of cycling activities, I recommend pairing Oura with Garmin or Apple Health.

While the Oura ring does track activities, it’s really not a replacement for a dedicated sports watch or cycling computer. However, it’s nice to leave the bulky smartwatch behind for an evening out while still capturing your health metrics. The ring is also excellent for nighttime use, freeing up your wrist and allowing you to charge your smartwatch while the ring unobtrusively monitors your sleep.

Battery life and charging

The Gen 3 Oura Ring has a claimed battery life of 5–7 days, though I find it to be closer to 5. Still, this is better than an Apple Watch, and the newer Gen 4 model is said to extend battery life to 8 days. Charging is quick —anywhere from 20 to 80 minutes for a full charge.

When asked about the best time to interrupt the continuous tracking in order to charge the ring, Russell suggested throwing the ring on the charger while showering. This habit means you rarely drain the battery completely. I should note here that you do not have to remove your ring while showering. It’s water-resistant up to 100 meters, making it safe to wear in the shower, pool or even a hot tub.

How the Oura ring served me

In my four months of wearing the Oura ring, I’ve had to confront some truths I’d been happy to ignore: I need to prioritise recovery—not just after bike rides but in every aspect of life. Stress, illness and injury weigh on the body just as much, if not more, than a hard training session. Ignoring your body’s needs only prolongs the vicious cycle.

My Readiness Score and HRV balance have become my guide to getting out of this injury cycle. They remind me when to take it easy, when I can go harder, and, most importantly, to listen to my body —a lesson that’s been long overdue.

For me, the Oura ring has been an insightful tool. Much like how power data can inform your training sessions and make you faster and fitter on the bike, the Oura Ring provides detailed recovery metrics that guide your rest, recovery and overall well-being.

But ultimately, the Oura ring is a wellness tool, not a coach. It’s up to you to dive into the data, connect the dots, and use it to implement meaningful change. But by tracking trends over time, it helps you understand how your habits and empowers you with data to make informed decisions.

Value and Verdict

While the Oura ring does track activity, its limited exercise-specific metrics make it better suited as a complementary tool to your smartwatch or cycling computer rather than a standalone solution. In fact, I’d argue it’s not so much an activity tracker as it is a health monitor.

Where it truly shines is in helping you optimise rest, recovery and overall well-being. And for women looking for insights into their menstrual cycle and fertility, the Oura app is more in-depth than any other wearable I've tried.

That said, it’s a significant investment*. Starting at $249, plus a monthly subscription fee, the Oura ring and app aren’t cheap. By comparison, once you purchase a Garmin watch, you gain free access to its app, which offers comparable features such as Body Battery (Garmin’s version of a Readiness Score), Sleep Score, activity tracking, VO2 Max, and menstrual cycle tracking. On top of that, Garmin watches include a suite of sport-specific metrics and features that the Oura ring lacks.

Ultimately, it comes down to your priorities—wellness versus fitness—and whether you prefer a tracker on your wrist or your finger. If you’re looking for an all-in-one device, I’d recommend starting with a smartwatch. If you're already using a cycling computer or watch and want to take a deep dive into your wellness metrics, the Oura ring is worth considering.

*For U.S.-based readers, there’s a silver lining: the Oura Ring is eligible for purchase with FSA (Flexible Spending Account) or HSA (Health Savings Account) funds, as it qualifies as a health monitoring device under IRS guidelines. This can help offset the cost and make the ring more accessible.