The ‘Natural Cycles’ App Now Has a Smart Band to Track Your Temperature and Fertility
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Tracking your menstrual cycle symptoms can be surprisingly effective to identify when you are likely to become pregnant. One of the best metrics to track is body temperature, which wearable devices can detect. The Natural Cycles app already works with your Apple Watch or Oura Ring, but now the company is launching its own smart bracelet.
As I noted in my Roundup of fitness trends at CESsmart groups have fun. Cry It used to be the only tracking group without a major screen, but now we have Amazon, Polarand could soon see fitness bands Luna and Speediance. Garmin has a sleep tracking band. And now this group from Natural Cycles is using the same form factor for the simpler temperature tracking job.
What the Natural Cycles group does
Natural Cycles is a subscription-based app ($149.99/year) that uses temperature to estimate where you are in your monthly cycle. The concept is similar to other period tracking apps, but the temperature data makes it a method of fertility awareness, unlike the old “rhythm method” which was so error-prone.
Temperature tracking is not unique to this application; I remember using the same idea many years ago when I was trying to get pregnant. I had to wake up at the same time every day and take my temperature first thing in the morning with a thermometer that had extra decimal accuracy compared to standard drugstore thermometers. From there, I would write down my temperature on graph paper, and when my temperature rose about half a degree (and stayed there), I could identify the day I was most likely to ovulate.
Wearable devices automatically track temperature data, as you’ve noticed if you wear an Oura ring or other wearable device with a temperature sensor. Natural Cycles already has partnerships with both Oura And Apple Watch. Whoop, meanwhile, can track the temperature with his own group and provide ovulation estimates.
Natural Cycles previously offered a Bluetooth-compatible thermometer ($39.99) for people who don’t have an Oura Ring or Apple Watch. Now it’s introducing its own wearable bracelet, in purple, priced at $129.99.
What do you think of it so far?
However, most users will get it at a lower cost. Natural Cycles includes the band for free with its $149.99 annual membership, and current members can add the band to their existing membership at a 25% discount, or $97.49. The company describes them as limited-time offers. Anyone adding the group to a monthly subscription would pay the full $129.99.
Natural Cycles is subscription-based, like Whoop, so after your first year of using the device ends, you’ll still need to pay to renew your subscription. The device appears to be intended only to capture the nighttime temperature, so you won’t need to wear it during the day. The downside is that it doesn’t capture fitness or other data, so it can’t replace a fitness tracker.
If you want the most affordable device that does it all, consider an Apple Watch Series 8 ($178 refurbished) or more recent, or a Apple Watch SE3 ($239.99): Both have a temperature sensor and can work with Natural Cycles, but they are both more expensive than the Natural Cycles subscription itself.
