- Oura Ring’s new AI upgrade, led by CEO Tom Hale, aims to reshape healthcare interaction and wellness.
- New partnerships with Essence Health and Counsel Health connect users to AI and doctors.
- The launch follows a confidential IPO filing, with Oura’s valuation surging to $11 billion.
The Oura Ring is getting an upgrade — and its CEO Tom Hale believes it signals how technology is reshaping the way we interact with doctors and approach wellness.
Not shockingly for a company in the year 2026, the new ring is focused on embracing AI.
It pairs with a suite of new AI advisors that can escalate conversations into clinical AI chats — and from there to licensed physicians, if needed.
Hale points to Oura’s new partnership with Essence Health, an insurer and provider for Medicare Advantage patients. If the ring detects possible sleep apnea, it alerts Essence Health’s AI system, which follows up with diagnostic questions and next steps for treatment.
“From a device on your body sensing something to a treatment in an automated way without a human being having to get involved. That is transformative,” Hale said.
Oura partnered with Counsel Health, an AI-powered virtual care platform with both medical AI chatbots and board-certified physicians, for the clinical AI piece.
“They are the best in the world at being a doctor using AI,” Hale said. “Say you get one of those Symptom Radar alerts and you’re like, ‘What is going on?’ You can escalate directly into a conversation with clinical AI, and then from there, you can actually talk to a doctor.”
These services are available for an additional fee on top of the $5.99 monthly subscription all Oura users pay.
The ring itself is 40% smaller than its previous version, which makes it both easier to wear and more aesthetic. But Hale emphasizes that it’s what inside that really shines.
“What’s most exciting is the software,” he said.
The new software can detect blood-pressure signals and breathing disturbances overnight — which make its health radar that much more accurate and can help diagnose additional issues.
It also includes a GLP-1 Companion to help users understand how their body responds to the popular weight-loss drugs.
This story is part of NYNext, an indispensable insider insight into the innovations, moonshots and political chess moves that matter most to NYC’s power players (and those who aspire to be).
The timing for the new ring — which starts at $399 and can be pre-ordered now to ship June 4 — is smart. Globally, wearables have grown into a $95 billion business, with roughly 1.1 billion devices in use. At the same time, the US faces a shortage of doctors, particularly family physicians.
The launch comes just a week after the company filed for a confidential IPO, according to a Bloomberg report. Oura’s valuation has surged to $11 billion from since Hale joined as CEO in 2022 (up from $800 million in 2022). The company has sold 5.5 million rings and last year doubled its revenue to $1 billion.
A large chunk of that comes from subscriptions which provides the company with ongoing revenue in addition to the sales of new products. Oura introduced its membership model in 2021, and Hale has made the subscription central to the company’s strategy, arguing that it powers new features and updates.
While many subscription models are plagued by high churn, Oura has largely escaped that fate.
“After a year, 80% of our customers are still paid customers … that’s better than Netflix or Spotify,” Hale said. “If there’s something that you’re paying for and it doesn’t do anything for you, of course that’s fatiguing … but people look at Oura three times a day, seven days a week.”
Of course that raises the question about whether or not people are getting too obsessive with their health. Earlier this week a clip went viral when a podcaster complained drinking a glass of wine had destroyed his life for three days — and he monitored the whole thing on a Whoop.
As someone who can get a little too fixated on my own sleep score, I can relate to the anxiety of overthinking health data — and whether checking your health tech becomes psychosomatic, making you feel worse simply because the number is bad.
But Hale sees wearables as an opportunity to get feedback on your health and learn what your body is trying to tell you.
“The body doesn’t lie… the physiology is telling you something, and we call it giving your body a voice,” Hale added.
And that knowledge often leads to better habits. “We’re sort of in the behavior change business … it’s not about the metrics actually.”
And there is a flip side — sometimes finding out that you really are firing on all cylinders can help you perform that much better.
“There was an NBA player, Chris Paul,” Hale recalled. “He once got a readiness score that said ‘Bring it on’ — high 90s. That day was Game 7 of the Western Conference Finals. He scored 42 points. That is an amazing performance.”
