Tech giant Apple is planning to notify one million people about hypertension -- a high blood pressure condition impacting about 1.3 billion adults globally -- using the alert feature on Apple Watch, said CEO Tim Cook.
The groundbreaking hypertension notifications feature -- available on Apple Watch Series 9, Series 11, and Apple Watch Ultra 2 and Ultra 3 -- alerts users if signs of chronic high blood pressure are detected.
"With our latest Apple Watch lineup, we were proud to introduce hypertension notifications, developed using large-scale machine learning models. Hypertension is one of the leading risk factors for heart attack and stroke, affecting more than one billion adults worldwide, and we expect to notify more than 1 million users of this life-threatening condition," said Cook, during the company's Q4 2025 earnings call on Thursday (US time).
"AI and advanced machine learning are at the core of powerful health features like heart rate monitoring, fall detection, crash detection, and more," he added.
Hypertension, known to be a silent condition, often remains undiagnosed because it shows no symptoms.
The hypertension notifications on Apple Watch use data from the optical heart sensor to analyse how a user's blood vessels respond to the beats of the heart. The algorithm works passively in the background, reviewing data over 30-day periods, and will notify users if it detects consistent signs of hypertension.
Cook shared that the Apple Watch will also help in improving sleep score.
"We're also excited about sleep score, a simple, intuitive way to help users better understand their sleep quality and discover ways to improve it. That's something I'm sure we can all benefit from," the Apple CEO said.
Cook informed that the company made a revenue of $9 billion in the wearables, home, and accessories segment.
"We were excited to unlock new possibilities for users with the launch of our newest Apple Watch lineup, making the world's most popular watch even better. That includes Apple Watch Ultra 3 with the largest display ever in an Apple Watch, improved battery life, and emergency SOS via satellite. Apple Watch Series 11 brings our users the most comprehensive set of health features yet. And Apple Watch SE 3 delivers advanced capabilities at an incredible value," he said.
