The $399 Apollo Neuro is the benignant of wellness gadget that inspires skepticism. In a nutshell, it’s a wearable that claims to relieve accent done interaction therapy. Apollo Neuro co-founder Dr. Dave Rabin describes it successful a video arsenic a “wearable hug for your tense system” that uses soundless vibrations to “rebalance” your fight-or-flight response. That, successful turn, is expected to marque your assemblage much resilient to accent by improving focus, expanding slumber quality, and raising your bosom complaint variability — a metric often utilized arsenic a proxy for gauging recovery.

I wouldn’t blasted you for snorting successful disbelief. My eyebrows astir flew into the stratosphere portion watching that video. Not lone is the Neuro costly for what it is, but interaction therapy itself is an alternate attraction without overmuch high-quality technological evidence to backmost up its claims.

Even knowing that, I had my reasons for giving this gadget a whirl. The past 4 years of my beingness person been spectacularly shitty. My full contiguous household died successful tragic circumstances, and it near maine a stressed, depressed mess. Mine is not a peculiarly peculiar story. Like galore people, I conscionable got worn down to the constituent wherever immoderate alleviation was welcome, nary substance however improbable the source. I besides person a batch of acquisition wading done unregulated wellness gadgets that travel with lofty, scientific-sounding claims. I figured reviewing the Apollo Neuro was a bully accidental to revisit the wellness Wild West from the position of idiosyncratic successful dire request of a break.

A wellness beeper

At a glance, the Apollo Neuro reminds maine a batch of the Whoop 4.0 — albeit a spot bigger and chunkier. Both are screenless devices, likewise shaped, and tin beryllium worn connected antithetic areas of the assemblage acknowledgment to assorted accessories. That’s astir wherever the similarities end. 

The Apollo Neuro is astir 50mm long, 35mm wide, and 14mm heavy — not excessively acold disconnected from my Apple Watch Ultra, though overmuch lighter. You tin deterioration it with a set connected your wrist oregon ankle oregon usage the clip to connect it to your waistband, garment collar, oregon bra — anyplace with tegument contact, ideally adjacent to a bony oregon joint. The backmost of the instrumentality is somewhat curved to amended acceptable the contours of your body, portion the beforehand has a metallic cage that you gaffe the clip oregon set through. On the close side, you’ll find a charging indicator and 2 buttons that power the strength of the vibrations. 

The Neuro gets a time oregon 2 of artillery life, depending connected however intimately you hew to the recommended 3 hours of usage per day. That’s not great, but it’s not the worst I’ve seen either. More upsetting is the information that it uses a Micro USB charger. Before this, the lone 2 devices successful my location that inactive utilized Micro USB were my aged Kindle Paperwhite and a mini UV lamp for curing gel nails. I conscionable traded successful that Paperwhite for a USB-C version, and the UV lamp has been collecting particulate for months. It’s a small-ish gripe, but successful 2023, this is simply a sub-par plan choice.

It’s not a beauteous device, but it’s comparatively discreet, and I admit that you tin deterioration it successful aggregate ways. Since it doesn’t really way immoderate assemblage metrics, I opted to deterioration it connected my hep oregon ankle. (As a wearables reviewer, I don’t person a ton of other wrist space.) You couldn’t truly spot it erstwhile I wore it connected the hep since the instrumentality itself goes wrong your waistband. It was much noticeable erstwhile I wore it connected my ankle. Multiple co-workers and friends said it looked similar I was wearing an ankle show — which isn’t precisely flattering. Neither placement was perfect, however. I tested the Neuro successful the autumn and winter, and I occasionally sent the Neuro flying erstwhile removing sweaters and coats. Wearing it connected the ankle was much secure, but alas, I person cankles, and the provided set was a spot excessively snug to deterioration for agelong stretches of time.

To usage the Neuro, you brace it with the Apollo app. There, you’ll find a bid of vibration profiles that you tin docket passim your day. There are 7 modes, each designed to either assistance you consciousness much relaxed oregon focused successful antithetic scenarios. Each mode tin beryllium programmed for a circumstantial magnitude of time, ranging from 5 minutes to an hour. For example, if you privation to aftermath up energized, you tin docket the “Energy and Wake Up” illustration to commencement erstwhile you get up. If you’re a wallflower, there’s a “Social and Open” illustration to “relieve accent successful societal situations.” 

The vibrations are adjustable: you’re expected to acceptable it truthful you tin consciousness them without getting distracted. Fortunately, adjacent if you crank it up truly high, others won’t beryllium capable to perceive you buzzing. That’s bully since I ever had to crook up the strength to consciousness anything. 

I didn’t emotion the Apollo app for tracking. My scheduled sessions often didn’t start, adjacent if I got a reminder connected my phone. The app besides failed to accurately log my sessions. Several times, I would decorativeness a two- to three-hour league lone to find that it wasn’t logged wrong the Apollo app. 

In practice, it felt similar wearing a wellness beeper. Except erstwhile it buzzed, I wasn’t looking to spot who called. Instead, I was reaching for my phone, trying to retrieve what mode was expected to beryllium playing. As for whether utilizing the Neuro helped maine consciousness little stressed… it’s a small complicated.

The placebo effect

The institution claims that successful its studies, radical who utilized the Neuro consistently had amended slumber and accrued bosom complaint variability. Quick refresher: HRV refers to the clip betwixt heartbeats. It’s often utilized arsenic a proxy to gauge accent and however well-rested you are. Higher HRV means you’ve recovered well. Lower HRV means you whitethorn beryllium sick oregon that your assemblage needs much remainder to retrieve from accent oregon carnal exertion. These days, HRV is simply a commonly tracked metric connected dozens of wearables, of which I person plenty. 

I divided investigating into 2 phases implicit 3 months. For the first, I tried much experiential testing, wherever I wore the instrumentality for astatine slightest an hr per day. That’s little than Apollo’s 3 hours, 5 times-per-week proposal — but it was much sustainable and person to however I deliberation astir radical would truly usage this. In signifier two, I followed Apollo’s proposal to the letter. I kept way of my HRV trends and slumber information implicit the full play of clip with my Oura Ring, which I often usage arsenic a power instrumentality for sleep-tracking testing. (It’s besides what Apollo itself uses successful 1 of its objective trials for the Neuro.)

While it’d beryllium swell if I isolated the Neuro’s interaction by controlling for everything else, I’m not a objective researcher. I’m a reviewer who has to simultaneously trial different gadgets for my time job. Also, I’m a illustration size of one. I fishy my investigating is person to however the mean idiosyncratic would usage this device, but it by nary means reflects anyone else’s acquisition but my own.

After each that, I’m atrocious to accidental my last results are inconclusive. After astir 11 weeks, I person nary factual grounds that regularly utilizing the Neuro made immoderate interaction connected my accent levels — bully oregon bad. Even if I utilized it precisely arsenic prescribed.

During the trial period, my HRV sharply declined earlier spiking mode backmost up… and past down and up. The graph looks similar a wonky sine curve. My slumber scores person stayed static, with the aforesaid spikes successful the weeks my HRV trended up. I’m 99.99 percent definite that the spikes successful HRV and slumber prime are not the Neuro’s “retraining” yet kicking in. For the archetypal spike, I was tapering earlier a contention and made a conscious effort to spell to furniture 2 hours earlier each day. The 2nd was due to the fact that I caught a acold implicit the holidays and logged 10-12 hours of slumber per night. (It was glorious.) The weeks erstwhile my HRV trended down coincided with accrued half-marathon training.

If consistently utilizing the Neuro truly did retrain my tense system, I’d expect to spot immoderate gradual betterment implicit time. Instead, for overmuch of the period, my HRV notably decreased portion my slumber prime was comparatively unchanged. To me, that seems to accidental the Neuro either had nary effect oregon the effect was truthful minimal it wasn’t capable to offset my regular stressors — astatine slightest not successful immoderate quantifiable way. 

There were a fistful of instances wherever the Neuro had a mildly affirmative interaction connected my well-being — anecdotally speaking, of course. I’ve been having mild limb symptom from training, and erstwhile I deterioration the Neuro connected my near ankle, it seems to help. The alleviation is temporary, but I don’t cognize what other to accidental different than a 30-minute league erstwhile I’m achy seems to bash the trick. When I aftermath up successful the mediate of the night, starting up a “Sleep and Renew” league sometimes helps maine autumn backmost asleep. Sometimes it doesn’t. I tried the “Social and Open” illustration portion making a fewer lawsuit work calls — thing I abhor with each fibre of my being — and it was someway easier. 

Is this the placebo effect? Almost certainly. I enactment connected a buzzy lil gadget, and my lizard encephalon tricked itself into calming down. There’s immoderate information to vibrations having a calming effect. Fun fact: the frequence of a cat’s purr is thought to person healing effects, and it’s wherefore cats purr erstwhile stressed oregon injured. And, I mean, who doesn’t consciousness much chill erstwhile a feline is purring adjacent to them? There are besides babe rockers that vibrate to calm infants. Even if determination isn’t a full batch of factual technological grounds for interaction therapy, does that substance if it delivers the desired result? That’s a much analyzable question.

This full acquisition reminds maine of my aunt. A fewer years ago, she started suffering from severe, chronic fatigue. Nothing seemed to work, and her doctors were stumped. One day, she started going to acupuncture, and my full household of doctors and nurses teased her for believing successful that hokey pokey baloney. The acupuncture worked, my aunt told america each to worldly it, and present she’s fine. 

I’m definite that for immoderate people, the Apollo Neuro could relieve accent successful the aforesaid mode that acupuncture helped my aunt. As acold arsenic I tin tell, the Neuro isn’t going to harm thing different than your wallet. It’s conscionable not for me.

A technological veneer

The wellness manufacture has ever been a perfidious one, but my main beef with wellness gadgets is however they usage “science” successful marketing. The Apollo Neuro is nary exception.

Credit wherever recognition is due, Apollo Neuro’s science and research sites are immoderate of the amended ones I’ve seen. Spend immoderate clip determination and you’ll travel crossed respective presumption similar “clinical trials,” “clinically validated,” and “preliminary results.” There are links out to research, arsenic good arsenic easy-to-read summaries of completed trials. Many of the “learn more” pages person bibliographies linking to studies hosted connected PubMed. There’s a scientific advisory board with a batch of credentialed psychiatrists and neuroscientists. To the layperson, this looks beauteous legit. 

But nary of it is definitive impervious that the Apollo Neuro is efficacious oregon “backed by science.” As this Harvard Health blog points out, galore of the cited studies connected Apollo Neuro’s tract are not really astir the instrumentality itself. Also, preliminary results are not the aforesaid happening arsenic final, published, peer-reviewed results. Even peer-reviewed studies don’t automatically mean a product’s claims are 100 percent kosher either, particularly erstwhile truthful galore database the co-founder arsenic an author. Ideally, you’d person much independently tally assessments, though this is a situation for galore wearable startup companies. 

A much trustworthy decision for experimental wellness products tends to beryllium on the lines of “Here are immoderate promising results; much probe needs to beryllium done.” It’s a reddish emblem erstwhile the bulk of your grounds is small-scale trials with overwhelmingly affirmative results that are past spun arsenic objective validation, particularly erstwhile you’re not talking astir an FDA-regulated product. Technically, thing successful Apollo Neuro’s selling is illegal, and there’s small to bespeak its founders don’t judge their merchandise could assistance people. I’ve seen companies bash a batch worse.

But astir radical hopeless for alleviation are not going to walk clip clicking done each link, speechmaking done abstracts, and critically analyzing the illustration size and methodologies of each objective trial. They’re going to look astatine the wealthiness of links connected a neatly designed tract and think, “Oh, well, there’s subject down this.” And that’s a slippery slope. It’s comparatively harmless successful the lawsuit of the Neuro, but for different products, it precise good whitethorn not be. 

I can’t urge this $400 accent alleviation wearable because, for me, it did not unrecorded up to its claims. That’s it. But portion penning this review, I’ve go much convinced than ever that thing has to alteration astir however subject is utilized successful wellness gadget marketing. Scientific honesty whitethorn not beryllium profitable, but if your merchandise is genuinely good, it won’t request to trust connected gimmicks, either.