Apple Unveils Three New Watches as FDA Clears Hypertension Alert

Apple unveiled three new smartwatches at its Sept. 9 product event and said one of the headline health features has already won U.S. regulatory approval. The Apple Watch Series 11, the budget Apple Watch SE 3 and the premium Apple Watch Ultra 3 are available for preorder and will ship Sept. 19, Apple said, while a new hypertension notification tool will begin rolling out with watchOS 26 next week after receiving clearance from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

Apple said the hypertension feature uses the watch's optical heart sensor to analyze how blood vessels respond to heartbeats over 30 days and will notify users if consistent signs of chronic high blood pressure are detected. The company advised that an alert is not a diagnosis and encouraged users who receive one to take daily cuff readings for seven days and share the results with a medical professional. Apple said it trained the algorithm with data from more than 100,000 people and validated it in clinical studies of over 2,000 participants, and it expects the tool to notify more than 1 million people with undiagnosed hypertension in its first year. The feature will be available on Apple Watch Series 9 and later...