Apple Watch loses momentum as screenless health rivals and leadership churn mount

At a glance:

• Apple Watch faces a shift in consumer demand toward screenless wearables like Oura rings and Whoop bands.
• Significant leadership turnover, including the retirement of Jeff Williams and the departure of key health executives, has stalled innovation.
• Apple is relying on rare aggressive discounting and incremental updates in watchOS 27 while betting on a long-term non-invasive glucose monitoring breakthrough.

The shift toward passive health monitoring

For over a decade, the Apple Watch has dominated the wrist, generating an estimated $100 billion in lifetime sales and defining the modern smartwatch category. However, the industry is entering a new phase where the "screen-heavy" approach is becoming a liability. A growing segment of consumers is experiencing screen fatigue, seeking devices that monitor health passively without adding another source of digital distraction to their daily lives.

This market gap has been aggressively filled by specialized competitors. Whoop, Oura, and Google—with its $100 Fitbit Air—have built multibillion-dollar businesses centered on screenless bands and rings. These devices prioritize recovery, sleep tracking, and passive health metrics over notifications and apps. While Apple provided the foundation for the wearables market, it now finds itself trailing in the transition toward invisible technology.

Software friction and the AI gap

Beyond the hardware, Apple's software ecosystem is struggling to keep pace with the actionable insights provided by rivals. The Apple Health app, despite massive investment, is frequently criticized for being clinical and cluttered. According to Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, the experience often feels more like reviewing medical charts in a waiting room than using a modern consumer platform, leaving it leagues behind the intuitive interfaces of Whoop and Oura.

Internal attempts to pivot toward AI-driven health coaching have met with mixed results. A project codenamed Mulberry, intended to provide an ambitious AI health coaching service, was scaled back after Eddy Cue took over the health group. Consequently, features from this initiative are not expected to reach users until the iOS 27 update cycle. This reflects a broader pattern of institutional risk aversion that has previously hindered Apple's response to the generative AI wave.

Leadership turbulence and brain drain

Apple is currently navigating a period of profound leadership instability within its health and hardware divisions. The retirement of former COO Jeff Williams, who long steered the company's health initiatives, created a vacuum at the top. This is compounded by the upcoming departure of CEO Tim Cook in September and the exit of Fitness+ leader Jay Blahnik following litigation related to management conduct.

The attrition extends to the marketing and engineering ranks. Health and Apple Watch marketing chief Stan Ng has retired, and senior marketing manager Eric Charles departed this month. More critically, Apple has steadily lost specialized health and hardware talent to Oura. While incoming CEO John Ternus has pledged to keep health central to the company's future through AI and hardware integration, the current "brain drain" raises questions about the company's immediate urgency.

Market signals and the glucose gamble

Signs of slowing demand are appearing in Apple's retail strategy. In a move rarely seen with its premium hardware, Apple has begun relying on aggressive promotions. Major retailers like Amazon and Best Buy have offered deep discounts, and the Apple Watch has been added to the education store with direct price cuts for the first time. These pricing shifts suggest that the current lineup is struggling to maintain its premium pull.

Apple's primary hope for a "moonshot" recovery lies in its glucose monitoring project. Conceived during the Steve Jobs era, the goal is to detect elevated blood sugar without the need for finger pricks. In a bid to accelerate progress, oversight has shifted from platform architecture chief Tim Millet to Zongjian Chen, an engineering leader known for delivery. If successful, this would provide a definitive competitive advantage that screenless rings cannot currently match.

The broader wearables landscape

While the wrist remains a battleground, the wearables market is diversifying into new form factors. Meta is currently seeing success with its Ray-Ban smart glasses, selling approximately seven million units per year. Apple is responding by testing its own smart glasses for a 2027 release, while Google and Samsung collaborate on Android XR glasses. The competition has evolved from a battle of watches to a race for the most seamless integration of AI and sensors into clothing and accessories.

Meanwhile, Oura, the Finnish smart ring pioneer that Gurman suggests Apple should have acquired years ago, has confidentially filed for a US initial public offering. As Oura prepares to go public as a formidable competitor, Apple must decide if it will continue with incremental updates—such as the stability-focused watchOS 27—or pivot toward the screenless, AI-powered future that the market is now demanding.