A new health-related feature could allow the Apple Watch to save more lives

In addition, 9to5 Mac says that it was able to get an exclusive look at “snippets” of code from iOS 14 and discovered that the Apple Watch will soon have the ability to provide users with blood oxygen levels. Readings in the range of 95% to 100% are considered to be fine. Readings under 80% could indicate that a heart or brain problem is imminent. So Apple Watch users with a less than optimal reading, known as low blood oxygen saturation levels, will see a notification similar to the one that users with a high heart rate receive.

This is another important notification that Apple Watch users cannot simply ignore. Continued low blood oxygen saturation levels can lead to cardiac or respiratory arrest. It isn’t clear whether this new feature will require certain hardware that Apple will add to the Apple Watch 6 or whether this fall’s update to watchOS 7 will bring the blood oxygen readings to older models. The original Apple Watch reportedly has the capability of measuring this reading via the heart rate monitor. While Fitbit, which is being bought by Google, offers some of its users the ability to detect major changes in blood oxygen levels, what Apple is said to be planning is a more useful reading. It looks like the Apple Watch will have another way to save lives.

Also rumored to be coming to the next Apple Watch is a native sleep monitoring/tracking app; this is a missing feature that many have demanded from Apple. We could see the next Apple Watch unveiled in September along with the 2020 5G iPhone models.