Apple Watch Update: Blood Oxygen Monitoring Feature Disabled in U.S.

Speaking of legal nightmares, with the Apple Watch salesman back, Apple has decided to sell its latest smartwatches without blood oxygen monitoring in the United States

The tweaked Apple Watch Series 9 and Apple Watch Ultra 2 models go on sale today across the company's online and retail stores

This all stems from this patent dispute they've had with Massimo, and I think the other name of the company Cherkacore or something like that

they claim that Apple broke you know in fring upon their patents

for blood oxygen monitoring and court ruled with them or not the court

it was like the FTC the Federal Trade Commission you did TMG of something like that anyway

so they agreed with them and they banned it and so what is Apple

Apple's not making any hardware changes to these watches instead it's just going to turn off

the blood oxygen sensor feature through software. Basically, you buy the phone and

or sorry, the watch and the blood, what's it called, the blood oxygen app, doesn't work

They're just deleting the app. Doesn't work. Well, I think it's on there, but it just doesn't work

I thought they were actually deleting the app entirely. Like, it's just not even going to be there, and the functionality won't be there

in any of the software that you use either. All I know is that on Apple's site now

it says Apple Watch Series 9 and Ultra 2 no longer include the blood oxygen feature It here on the show notes These units will still ship with the blood oxygen app However opening it will show the following message The blood oxygen app is no longer available

Learn more in the health app on your phone. So it's on there, but it's not on there

It's not available. But it is available to everyone who already owns the Apple Watches

Oh, man. If you already got one, you can check your blood oxygen level right now

I mean, I don't think I've ever done it. So I, you know, whatever

Let's see. Let's see how we're doing. Oh, no, 74% too complicated

Are my lips blue? I mean, you do have COVID. Maybe you should be checking

I did check it once. It was okay. Let's see. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait

So I want to make this crystal clear because I think this is going to be a question that many people have

And Gern from the chat saying, I'm in Canada. So next software update, I lose the blood oxygen

No. If you have it, you have it. It's not going away for anyone that has it

in a software update. Although, that could change. And also if you're in Canada, none of this applies to you

Oh, that's a good point. It's only in the U.S. You might want to turn off

auto updates if this app is super important to you. However, my blood oxygen is 99

That's good. Wow. No wonder your cheeks are so rosy red. Wow

Let's see. It's not completely over Apple's appealing this. Apple spokes person Nikki Rothberg told the verge quote Apple appeal is ongoing and we believe the U Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit should reverse the U ITC decision We strongly disagree with the U ITC decision in resulting orders

So, anyway, U.S. ITC, that's the thing I could remember. U.S. International Trade Council? I don't know. Anyway, it's what a crazy couple of weeks this has been between the Apple Watch and

the app store and all this. It's just like legal things that change one day, the next day

Oh, my God. And so many appeals and temporary stays and this and that

Oh, my. It's just enough to drive you mad. Yeah, but it is, I'm glad they were covering this

because I think there's been a lot of confusion over whether or not this dispute was going to boil over

into people who already own the watch. And I'm actually surprised that's not seemingly the case at this point

so it only affects new sales of Apple watches. I thought what was going to happen is

oh, you're violating our patent. You need to shut this off for literally everybody who has the watch

And I'm surprised it didn't actually happen that way. Why wouldn't it? I mean, if you're violating their patent

you're violating their patent. I guess maybe because the money has already been made on those sales

So that doesn't matter anymore. Yeah, and I mean, this is technically a sales and import ban

into the United States. You know, so they can't They can make them in China and send them here They can sell them with that working It I mean I don know The whole thing is just completely nuts I can honestly I can believe it got this far

I can't believe that we're at the point where they're selling gimp to Apple Watches

Just weird. Bring out the gimp. Anybody? No, okay. Well, I guess we'll see how this plays out

You said that they had a pending, day, right? They're waiting for a federal court. They're appealing. Okay, they're appealing

They're a federal court. Okay. So it is possible that this feature will return or gets, or the

verdict gets stayed while they appeal, but who knows? But in the meantime, I don't know. I don't

know how many people care about oxygen levels in their blood. I imagine most people probably don't

care. But you are getting one less feature now when you buy the Apple Watch and, of course

the price isn't changing, only the feature set. So that could be something that people might want to think about before buying the Apple Watch Series 9 or the Apple Watch Ultra 2

You know, for once not, you know, quoting German on his reporting, he had a funny little thing

He said just include a little $10 blood oxymeter in it with every watch

I just include like the one that you put on your finger. Yeah, yeah. And you connect it with a wire

to your Apple Watch so it shows on the Apple Watch screen. There you go. Problem solved

Steve Jobs would have loved that solution