Accuracy of consumer grade heart rate monitors

Last Updated on July 15, 2022 by pg@petergamma.org

The battery life was increased from the Polar OH1 with 15h to the Verity Sense with 30 h by Polar, part of it with only a firmware update. How was this done? I could not find information about a miracle battery or a miracle algorithm of the Verity Sense which could do this. Did Polar reduce the sampling rate of the Verity Sense from the Polar OH1 to th Verity Sense? This would affect it s accuracy. Unfortunately, there are no quantitative and statistical data available for the accuracy of the Verity Sense. For other sports sensors, these data are available:

1. Variable Accuracy of Wearable Heart Rate Monitors during Aerobic Exercise

https://journals.lww.com/acsm-msse/Fulltext/2017/08000/Variable_Accuracy_of_Wearable_Heart_Rate_Monitors.22.aspx

2. The Accuracy of Wrist-worn Heart Rate Monitors across a Range of Exercise Intensities

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/321362238_The_Accuracy_of_Wrist-worn_Heart_Rate_Monitors_across_a_Range_of_Exercise_Intensities

3. Accuracy of commercially available heart rate monitors in athletes: a prospective study

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6732081/

4. Validation of Polar OH1 optical heart rate sensor for moderate and high intensity physical activities

https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0217288

5. Validation of a photoplethysmographic heart rate
monitor: Polar OH1

https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-03187457/file/OH1.pdf

6. Measurement of Heart Rate Using the Polar OH1 and Fitbit Charge 3 Wearable Devices in Healthy Adults During Light, Moderate, Vigorous, and Sprint-Based Exercise: Validation Study

reference device this study: Polar H10

https://mhealth.jmir.org/2021/3/e25313/

Quantitative and statistical accuracy data for the Polar Verity Sense and also for other commercially available physiological sensors would be helpful, and also a ranking of the accuracy of sensors, and standard tests for those.

25.2.22

7. Polar Verity Sense Scientific Review (Rob ter Horst, PhD)

Polar Verity Sense Scientific Review (versus OH1+, H10)

Rob ter Horsts review about the Verity Sense was before the firmware update which increased the battery life of the sensor about a 100 %.

8. Controversy about the Polar Verity Sense firmware update:

Polar OH1 instead of Verity Sense for highly Accurate Research Applications

9. Accuracy of the optical heart rate device Polar OH1 during rest and exercise

Theresa Schweizer & Dr. rer. nat. Rahel Gilgen-Ammann, Swiss Federal Institute of Sport Magglingen SFISM, Magglingen, Switzerland

https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Thomas-Wyss/project/CISM-Sport-Science-Abstracts/attachment/5b83fb59cfe4a76455ee983e/AS:664230147657733@1535376216940/download/CISM_SSA_Schweizer_2018.PDF

ResearchGate, August 2018

9.

Gold Standard Reference Paper for not to choose the Polar H10 as a reference device for heart rate sensor accuracy validation

10. Accuracy of Firstbeat Bodyguard 2 beat-to-beat heart rate monitor:

https://assets.firstbeat.com/firstbeat/uploads/2015/10/white_paper_bodyguard2_final.pdf