Looking for a cardio smart watch that will keep track of your heart rate? You are welcome! For health, regular checks is more economical than treatment. We had written on smart watches for diabetics but we will talk about the best heart rate monitor watches here. Don’t worry if you suffer some troubling heart problems, just pick your best smartwatch for heart problems monitoring, and you’re done.
One most important feature in a health smartwatches is a heart rate tracker. You want to stay connected without having to meet a doctor to check your heart health? A wearable heart rate device is an added advantage.
Even if you don’t have any heart related issues, you can still keep an eye on your heart performance regularly. Some people often check their heart beat when they’re doing some sort of strenuous activity.
The intensity of your activity or cardio exercise depends on how much your heart can carry and fitness level. For that reason, you’ll discover that athlete, heart patients and outdoor lovers wear their heart rate monitor watches regularly.
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Why you may need a heart rate monitor watch
Accurate pulse monitor watch can help you reduce frequency of visit to a doctor for heart related problems. By checking your heart beat continuously, you can only meet a medical expert for extreme severe cases, and heart beat variability.
Whether you are running or biking outdoors, or you are running on a high capacity Treadmill, there’re times you’ll want to push your exertion rate to limits. But you got to do that if you constantly keep taps on your heart rhythm.
Every outdoor and indoor runner would want to improve her athletic performance. You can get a good workout to challenge your heart, only if you monitor your heart beat accurately.
Stress lowers job and fitness performance. The best way to managing your stress levels and getting a beautiful start of each day is to track your heart health continuously.
A watch-style heart rate monitor is the best and convenient way to keep an eye on your heart rate all the times and everywhere.
Using a heart rate monitor during exercises is beneficial if you make use of the information it offers you. Some fitness enthusiasts train with intelligence, when they utilize the heart rate data to tweak their workouts intensity.
If you want to exercise for a prolong time, you have to put your heart rate lower during the entire workout session. This looks moderate, but it helps to burn more muscles fat when you pace yourself.
If you desire to build a lot of heart strength and stamina, you are going to need to push your heart beat higher. This mostly happens in interval training, involving short burst of exercises.
Besides, you want to get a healthy cardiovascular system; you are going to need track you basal or resting heart rate.
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Quick Glance At Our Best cardio watches that Measure Heart rate
Our best cardio smart watch that measures heart rate is Fitbit Versa 3. Fitbit Sense 3 is our best heart rate monitor watch because it will just show your heart health data on the screen, while you are working out or resting
Here is a list of the best cardio or heart rate monitor watches we evaluated. Take a quick glance and you will definitely pick the best heartbeat monitor watch that will track your heart health.
- Fitbit Versa 3 – the best heart rate monitor watch, overall
- Omeron HeartGuide – best FDA and Doctor approved heart rate tracker watch
- Garmin Vivosmart 4S – best heart rate monitor watch that measure blood oxygen saturation levels too.
- Samsung Galaxy Watch Active 2 – best Android heart rate monitor watch
- Willful Smart Watch –
- Garmin Forerunner 45S – best running cardio smart watch that measures heart beat
- Fitbit Sense – best cardio smart watch for heart patients with Afib
*** Very Important!
These cardio smartwatches aren’t intended to replace dedicated medical devices, for the diagnosis, cure, mitigation, treatment, prevention and monitoring of diseases or severe medical, health conditions. They are fitness and health monitoring tools, but they are not professional medical heart rate onitors. However, the Wearable heart rate monitor watches only give estimates of your wrist based heart rate.
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Choosing the best heart rate monitor watch
While functionality and positive users’ reviews helped us to select the best heart rate tracker watches, we picked these heart watches, purely for athletes and any person suffering from cardiac problems.
To our experience, it remains a daunting task to choose a reliable and accurate heart rate monitor watch in the market. Many brands only claim that their best health watches have accurate heart tracker sensors. The truth is, you need to be absolutely careful when it comes to these health related claims.
For smartwatches that measure your heart rate, Most of them required connection to your smartphone, since they don’t have built in heart monitor sensors. If you are on budget, go for them, but I won’t recommend such heart rate tracker watches for athletes who totally want to exercise phone-free.
Cardio Watches with built in GPS functions, fitness activity trackers, blood pressure and oxygen saturation monitoring are the best option, although they cost a little more hundred dollars. Electrocardiograph (ECG) features, are an added advantage for people suffering from lungs and heart problems.
If you are a lady, finding a pulse monitor smart watch with your menstrual cycle tracking ability, is an added added value. Monitoring menstrual period is a big bonus to look for when shopping to buy women’s smartwatches.
Fitbit Versa 3 – best cardio smart watch that measures heart rate
best cardio smart watch that support Phone, GPS, Heart Rate Monitor and touchscreen interfaceAlthough people still question about Fitbit Calorie accuracy, the Fitbit is still a popular smartwatch brand in fitness category, heavily packed with both fitness and health tracking abilities.
Amongst the supported applications in Fitbit Versa 3, is the 42/7 heart rate monitoring with Purepulse 2.0 feature.
With this Fitbit enhanced heart rate technology, the active zone Minutes uses you resting heart rate to gauge how many efforts you are putting into your exercise.
Moreover, the Fitbit app, included, will help you generate your historical heart rate report. This is a better way to see the trend in your heart’s performance over time.
Most athletes, use this cardio smart watch heart rate measuring function to decide if they can improve on their fitness workout intensity, or to slow down for a rest.
The heart rate tracker watch also tracks several metrics, including your number of calories burned, steps made, and your sleep patterns.
Some people complain that Versa 3 Fitbit not charging properly, but Fitbit Versa 3 is an exclusive cardio watch, with exceptional features. It
- supports GPS navigation,
- Has Alexa built in
- Can run for more than 6+ days on single battery charge
- It tells your real time pace and distance
- Has built-in microphone and Bluetooth speaker
- Can take paired phone calls hands-free
- Store and play music, podcasts, on Deezer, Pandora and Spotify
- Tops the list of many positive users’ comment and reviews
Garmin Vivosmart 4 – Best smartwatch cardio that records blood oxygen saturation levels
If you have heart problems, Garmin Vivosmart 4 is a good cardio smartwatch that can estimate your heart rate and blood oxygen saturation. You know, your heart beat decides how much oxygen gets into your uncles, tissues and cells.
The best thing not to happen for an adult person is oxygen dropping in the blood. A Garmin Vivosmart 4 is the best heart rate and blood monitoring wearable smart watch. The health watch would give warning alert when your heart beat reaches extremes or when blood oxygen is not enough.
More importantly, even if you are not undergoing medical treatment for a heart issue, there are times you want to deal with stress. The Garmin Vivosmart 4 is the best heartbeat watch that not only track your heart rate continuously every day, but it measures heart rate variiability(HRV) which indicates stress.
As a stress and heart monitor watch, it offers guided breathing exercises that can ease your lung ailment and increase your lung capacity. At the least, heart patient would have to seek attention of medical experts, for a boost or corrective measures, if this cardiac watch records a failing heart performance.
I think this is the Budget Smartwatch cardiologist could recommend for a heart patient. The Heart rate tracker cost under $300.
Omron HeartGuide – FDA approved heart rate monitor watch
Not many watches, except few smartwatches with ECG, get approval from the Food and Drug Administration. Omron HealthGuide is the best FDA approved cardio smart watch that is clinically accurate.
While it is a blood pressure tracking tool, the Omron pulse watch can track your heart rate. This heartbeat tracker watch is a great option for senior adults, as it displays heart performance data on an easy-to-read colored chart with an accompanying app.
For the elderly persons with a heart disease like Afib, Omeron is a must have FDA approved heart beat monitor watch. The continuous heart rate monitoring and graphical representation helps you to keep track of the heart performance data over a long time.
Just like battery powered sports watches, Omron HeartGuide also features sleep and activity tracking capabilities. While it tracks fitness metrics like steps, distance, and calories, you can also set goals and monitor your daily achievement if you want to gain an active lifestyle.
The piece looks pretty, with a more classic design and easy-to-use functions. Why medical experts recommend it is because it offers clinically act accurate reading, in as little as 30 seconds.
Omron HeartGuide isn’t a water-resistant smartwatch cardio. You shouldn’t wear this doctor’s recommended cardio watch while washing hands, when going into the pool, shower, or beach waters.
Read Omron HeartGuide Blood Pressure Watch Review
Garmin Forerunner 45S – Best cardio smart watch for athletic runners
Garmin Forerunner 45S is the thing for runners. Its design, and features, all provide more enhancement for athletic runners and outdoorsmen.
The 39mm case fitness running watch comes with a wide range of features including GPS navigation, Garmin coaching plans, and fitness activity tracking, in addition to heart rate monitoring.
The running smartwatch provides alerts when your heart rate gets too high or too low, while you are running, perhaps on an indoor treadmill.
This runners health monitor watch is a pure outdoor wearable. While they can check your continuous heart rate, from your wrist, the cardiac watch can even detect when you get an accident.
You won’t be lucky to find a small size GPS smartwatch that will tracking every metric for running exercises, and still estimate heart rate at the wrist. If you are skinny runner, this is your best pick GPS and heart watch.
Garmin Forerunner 45S is the good heart rate monitor watch because
- It is a lightweight heart beat tracker that is suitable on petite wrists.
- The GPS and heart rate watch are great for outdoor navigation
- The Garmin heartbeat watch Can pair with smartphone and control music.
- The running HR monitor watch can receive notifications
- waterproof rating of up to 164 feet (50 meters), good for swimming
- Battery life is 7 days, with 10 hours as charging time.
Samsung Galaxy Watch Active 2 – best heart rate monitor for cycling sports
If you are looking for the best wrist heart rate monitor that is compatible with Strava app for cycling, get this Samsung Active 2 smartwatch.
Biking outdoor or indoor on elliptical machine is one form of cardio workout, which can burn fat and challenge your heart.
Combining the continuous heart rate monitoring, and measuring your cycling metrics, makes Samsung active 2 one of the most sort after heart monitor watches for cyclists.
On the heart beat side, the health watch can display your heart rate and notify you when the detects that your heart rate is too low or too high.
Another amazing feature in this wearable heart rate monitor watch is the LTE connectivity. The Samsung Heartbeat watch can work as a android smartphone, if you pair it with your android device.
It’s battery life is impressive, but will last only Max 3 days in continuous workout monitoring, and always-on-display turned on. With a water-resistant up to 164 feet (50 meters), the Active 2 cardio smartwatch is a great wearable to train for triathlons.
Why I like it
- The Heart rate tracker watch is lightweight and comfortable
- Records accurate heart rate monitor data
- Best wrist heart rate monitor for android fans
- The Sleep tracker provides sleep analysis
- Built with aluminum, stainless steel, a variety of watch faces and bands
Samsung active 2 is the Best android smartwatch with a heart rate monitor. The cardio watch supports GPS, Bluetooth, and advanced heart rate monitoring, with long lasting battery life.
Fitbit Sense – best heart rate monitor watch for Afib
Fitbit is a reputable sport and fitness tracking watch brand. Fitbit Sense is the latest model smart fitness tracker which is heavily packed with high-tech features, including heart health tracking.
You just have to wear it on wrist, and it will do continuous,and real-time heart rate tracking throughout your entire workout session, or day. This Sport watch also works as a heart rate monitor and an electrocardiogram (ECG) scanner.
Although it is considered a fitness watch, Fitbit Sense carries many helpful medical functions. You can use it to make an ECG scan and check or detect if you’ve got early signs of poor health conditions like atrial fibrillation(Afib)
Despite being a heart rate monitor watch for afib, the Fitbit cardio watch can read how much distance you walked outdoor or indoor on treadmill. It can also record body temperature, pace, calories burned, sleep and menstrual cycle for women.
The Fitbit sense heartbeat watch also keeps tap on your water and food intake. Not all Wrist heart rate monitor watches have this features.
Fitbit sense is not only classified as a heart rate tracker watch, it has a built-in electrodermal activity (EDA) scan function. This feature is the reason why the cardio smartwatch is more suited to be used as a stress-management tool.
Fitbit app can provide your detailed health report. But I would recommend you should install the Fitbit’s premium app(may cost some dollars) which will track your health over a long time.
The Fitbit Sense health monitor watch has a good battery life, which can last up to one week and 12 hours in GPS mode. With additional waterproof rating up to 50 meters, the fitness and health watch features are impressive.
Most athletes and outdoorsmen use Fitbit Sense as a sport watch with heart rate monitor functions.
Apple Watch Series 7(GPS + Cellular) best heart rate watch for iOS
Apple Watch Series 7 is the newest model of apple watches – richly packed with health features, including a built-in heart rate monitor.
Like the series 5, and the series 6, this newer model can measure your heart rate throughout the entire day, and during exercises.
The apple watch heart rate monitor uses an optical heart sensor comprising a green LED light, and some light‑sensitive photodiodes. The combination of these diodes help to detect how much blood is flowing past your wrist.
The analyzed heart rate information is displayed any time on an Apple Watch face, which is usefully convenient when you’re working out.
To make apple, the most accurate heart rate monitor watch, you got to ensure that the back of your Apple Watch 7 firmly, but flexibly, is touching your wrist skin.
According to Apple recommendations, you shouldn’t wear your watch too tight or too loose. It should just be enough to allow your skin breathe and so that the sensors work properly.
Why I like this smartwatch
- Apple is a smartwatch that makes calls, text messages, and sends email. Like a standalone Smartwatch, You can do without a phone.
- Apple Stream music, podcasts, and audiobooks. See more Smart watch for music lovers.
- Large Always-on Retina display screen area than Series 6.
- The most crack-resistant crystal Glass.
- It is IP6X dust resistance, and swimproof
- Can Measure your blood oxygen with a powerful sensor and app
- Records your ECG anytime and anywhere
- Tells your high and low heart rate and issues irregular heart rhythm notifications
- Supports Mindfulness app to analyze your sleep
- Can Track new tai chi and pilates workouts, yoga, swimming, and dance
Willful Smart Watch – best inexpensive heart rate monitor watch
if you;re budget tight, get even the cheapest cardio smart watch that measures heart rate . Willful is just the right smartwatch for heart rate monitoring, which does not cost up to one hundred dollars.
Although there are many hundreds of budget fitness watches under $50, in the market, this one is a unique fitness tracker with heart rate monitor and other impressive features.
The heart tracker watch has good quality, it is sleek and has earned numerous positive reviews from users and buyers,
While Willful Smart Watch can do your 24/7 heart rate monitoring, it also analyzes your sleep pattern too. Although it is a low price wearable heart rate monitor, you’ll find that it tracks sports activity, and women’s menstrual cycle.
If you love water adventures, Willful cardio smart watch is a waterproof , and safe to swim with. One thing, that doesn’t look good here is the watch can tell your heart rate as you swim, but it won’t track your stroke rate, and other swim data.
Willful Smart Watch is
- inexpensive heart monitor watch,
- The Best heart rate monitor watch under $100
- The Best heart rate monitor with excellent battery life
- Swim-proof,
- supports phone notifications and reminders
Alternative heart rate monitors
Here are some standalone heart rate monitors, which don’t look like smart watches.
Polar H9 heart rate sensor
This is a wearable, much like a band, which can serve like a heart rate monitor for beginners. It is more accurate, supports ANT+, Bluetooth connectivity, and a long battery life. Moreover, it is waterproof and has a companion app.
The Polar H9 is compatible with sports and smart watches brands like polar Garmin, Zwift, and Peloton). It works as an activity trackers, for gym equipment, Bluetooth and ANT+ devices.
Polar H10 heart rate monitor
A much more highly accurate wearable heart rate sensor than polar H9.
The Bluetooth enabled heart Rate Monitor, is a HRM Chest Strap for iPhone & Android.
With an enhanced Battery life, supporting up to 400 hours of my operation time on a user replaceable
Garmin HRM- Dual
This is a chest strap heart rate monitor that is compatible with any device or app. It has good reliability, more basic features and cheaper under $100.
Garmin HRM-Run
Whether you are running on a treadmill or running on a bad road pavement, your heart is going to pump. The HRM-Run heart rate strap works well with Garmin fitness trackers, and provides you with metrics such as oscillation and ground contact time.
Scosche Rhythm24
This arm-band heart rate tracker is an alternative to standard chest straps. Heart rate monitor HRM optical watch comes with Dual Band ANT+ and BLE Bluetooth connectivity.
It is hyperaccurate thanks to the Patented optical sensor technology that ensure nothing but highly accurate health monitoring and measurement.
It works with smartphones, tablets, smart and sport watches including exercise equipment anddevices that support Bluetooth Smart or ANT.
You can easily customize and very Change HR zones and modes in the RhythmSync app.
Scosche Rhythm+
This is another arm-band wearable that would collect your heart performance data, so you can exercise without need for chest strap. This one works beautifully with ANT+ and Bluetooth compatible devices. The wrist wearable heart beat monitor is reliable and inexpensive.
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Smartwatch cardio workouts benefits
What is the Benefit of the heart rate monitor during workout? During a cardio exercise, like running, your heart rate rises. That increase in heart rate serves as a good measurement of how hard you’re working out your body.
When you add your pace and working rate, your heart pumps more, to circulate blood oxygen and nutrients into your muscles.
Experts recommend you should train at 50 to 85 percent of your maximum heart beat. Which means you must wear your pulse monitoring device to track how fast you are challenging your heart.
Having such data guides your training, if the heart rate dips, you have to increase your pace and when the heart rhythm gets too high, you would want to slow down.
A short burst of high intensity cardio workout can drive your heart to beat faster, to deliver fresh blood oxygen to your muscles. At exceedingly higher heart rhythm, your body can’t burn fat quickly, as a result, the body looks fortifier rent ready-to-use energy source – carbohydrate.
So , by checking your heart rate during a workout, you can vary which energy source is used up. If you are seriously fat, overweight or obese, you definitely want to lose several pounds of weight.
As a result, you have to exercise in such a way as to keep your heart rhythm moderate, and for a long time. You just got to match your energy output with your heart rate fat burning level. The longer the workout session, the higher the duration to burn belly fat, thigh fat, and those around your waistline.
When planning on your cardiovascular training, your got to determines the intensity of the cardio workout. You will get optimal calorific expenditure, fat burning and carbohydrate utilization depending on your current heart rate zone and workout intensity.
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Electrical vs optical heart rate sensors
Would you like an electrical heart rate monitor that uses electric pulse or an optical technology device to check your heart beat? Standard chest straps use electrical pulses to determine your heart rate. They simply detect a small electrical signal produced by your body, to constrict your heart.
Optical heart rate sensors is a light-dependent technology mostly used by Apple Watch, and Fitbit. They use sensors at the back of the watch, which send light rays into your skin, and use your blood flow to determine your heart rate.
When the light gets scattered by your blood blow in veins and arteries, some get reflected outside the skin. The wrist-watch styled receiver then measures the reflected light, translating it into pulses.
Some wrist based fitness trackers in the market utilize this light dependent heart rate measurement. Surprisingly, you will find optical heart measurement too in sport headphones used to read heart rate through the inner ear.
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ANT+ or Bluetooth heart rate monitor watches
To share health information, both ANT and bluetooth heart rate trackers easily pair with other devices. The ANT and Bluetooth are both wireless technology, but ANT+ is common in sports equipment like bicycle, and treadmills and Bluetooth is popular in watches.
You are going to need an adapter before you connect your ANT+ compatible HRM to your phone, but a Bluetooth enabled heart rate monitor provinces direct connection with smartphones.
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Comfort and convenience – the advantage of wrist based wearable HRM
While you are exercising, a chest strap is no where, when you consider the comfort and convenience of use. You won’t readily see, on the go, the reading of a chest strap. This means you got to halt your workout before you check its reading.
What if the strap slide down from your chest?
Armband heart rate trackers provide more comfort and convenience. You can easily wear them on your lower forearm, or wrist, all day. They are quick to adjust, and some of them with LEDs offer visual data analysis by blinking different colors of light for a different heart rate zone.
Besides, heart rate monitor watches are fashionable, then chest strap. One unfortunate thing is that some chest strap heart rate trackers require a reliable connection on a fitness tracker, to display your heart health.
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Which heart rate monitoring technology is better?
Electrical heart rate tracking technology, as used in chest straps is more accurate than the optical. Since humans swing their arms when exercising or walking, heart rate measurement is a bit difficult, and less accurate from the arm or wrist.
For that reason, most companies manufacturing heart rate tracking wearable devices are shifting towards in-ear optical heart rate tracking technology.
Placing the optical sensor inside the ear gives better results without much data noise, than wrist based measurements. This is because the ear does not move like the wrist.
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How accurate are heart Rate monitor watches?
You already read that optical heart rate monitors do lag behind in detecting rapid heart rate variability. One thing is, accuracy does not seem to matter when it comes to heart recovery after exercises. Chest straps are very reliable for measuring how fast your heart rate changes( decreases after workout)
So, if you’re looking for the most accurate heart rate monitor, to accurately tell your heart health conditions, a chest monitor is better option. All you need is place the device straps on your chest, which produces a much more precise reading than a smartwatch.
It is not uncommon to doubting health tracking capacity of Smart watches nowadays. While we agree that Fitbit watches are super reliable for fitness purposes, many fans still question the how accurate is Fitbit calorie counter.
What is your normal heart rate?
Normal Heart rate vary from adults to adults, but it remains within the range 60 to 100 beats per minute, while at rest. At the extremes, if your heart rate measurement falls under 60 beats per minute, you got a slow heart (Bradycardia) and a heart that beats over 100 beats per minute is a fast heart(tachycardia ).
If you are healthy, sleep pattern or some kind of medication can slow down your heart rare. However, a very slow heart could be indicating troubles of heart diseases, high potassium in blood, under-active thyroid or infections.
Fast heart beat occurs when you are exercising Or doing cardio. It can also be due to nervous Or excited feelings, stimulant or pregnancy. Fast heart beat could result to lower potassium in blood, fever, cardiac problems, overactive thyroid, anemia, asthma and lung breathing problems.
You can detect most of these, issues, by tracking your heart rate, analyzing the pattern and the trend.
Related: Is Cardio Everyday Safe? How Much Cardio should you do.
Maximum heart rate calculation
Your Max heart rate is the number of beats it can Ake,to sustain you during a cardiovascular workout. It is simple to calculate maximum heart rate. We will use it to find out how to determine your resting heart rate and fat burning heart rate zones.
Max heart rate = 220 – your age
The older you get, the lower, your maximum heart rate drops.
Athletic target heart rate calculation
Target heart rate is your exercise heart rate, which depends much on your activity level or cardio training intensity and Max heart rate.
Target heart rate = 50-70% of your Max heart rate
Most athletes have a target heart rate training between 50 to 70% of their Max heart rate.
A 40 year old marathon runner, would have a Max heart rate of 180bmp and a target heart rate training zone of between 90 to 126bmp. That is why fitness enthusiasts need to keep track of their heart beat during exercises.
This value will hit 70 to 85 percent of your maximum heart rate if you are doing a vigorous training or activity.
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Resting heart rate calculator
We have seen that most athletes have resting heart rate under 40bpm, which is lower than the average for every person. Low resting heart means you are absolutely fit, but that is not true for everyone.
So you ought to measure your resting heart rate, and simply checking your pulse every morning can give you an estimated heart beat per minute.
How to check your heart rate with fingers
If you don’t have a heart rate monitoring watch, there is an old-school method to check your pulse by using fingers, placed at your wrist, or neck.
On your left wrist, exactly under the beast off your thumb, press the index and the middle fingers of your right hands.
If you chooses your neck, just below your jaw bone, place your finger there
Use a regular seconds counter watch and count the number o heart hearts made in 15 minutes.
Make multiple measurement, every 15 minutes and calculate the average. This will reduce errors and give accurate reading.
Take precautions
- Don’t measure your heart rate with hands, within 2 hours after you ended your exercise training. Remember, when you do strenuous, you get elevated heart rate, so wait until after 120 minutes.
- Some kind of foods pump up your heart rate, like caffeine. So after consuming it, wait after one hour before checking your heart rate.
- Prolong siting or standing can affect your heart rate. If you are going to use manual heart rate monitoring, do it after so minutes of changing your position.
- Your heart rate is the number of beats in 15 minutes, multiplied by 4
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Hear Rate Fat Burning Zone
Fat burning occurs in muscles when you do weight loss exercises at 50-70% of your maximum heart rate.
Hear rate fat burning zone = 50-60% of your Max heart rate
That is almost same as the recommended range for target hear rate, according to American Heart Association. This is good for beginners, and for moderately intense exercise
Heart rate Training zones
Here are the five different zones based on your maximum heart rate:
- Zone 1: 50 – 60 % of maximum heart rate
- Zone 2: 60 – 70 %of maximum heart rate
- Zone 3: 70 – 80 % of maximum heart rate
- Zone 4: 80 – 90 % of maximum heart rate
- Zone 5: 90 – 100 %®of maximum heart rate
It just depends on your ability, and on your goals. If you are working out intelligently, you should take time to train in different heart rate zones.
What happened at the Fat burning zone?
At this point, you are getting 80-85% of the burned calories from stored fat. One would expect to use up more fat at 70-80% of maximum heart rate, which is not true.
Rather, the more you push your heart up, the faster your heart beats, and the faster, calories needs to be burned to sustain your activity. Fat cannot be burned so fast at that heart rate, so carbohydrate is used up.
Research shoes that at About 70-85% of your maximum heart rate, less than 50 percent of the calories burnt come from fat.
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Other heart rate calculators
Smartphones have apps that can scan your finger through its Camera lens. This kind of heart monitor app relies on the color change on your finger, whenever your heart beats.
Another simple way to compute your maximum heart rate is to simply subtract your number of years from 220. If you are 50 years old, your maximum heart rate is calculated to be 220-50(170 beats per minute)
Fitness equipment like treadmills, elliptical sometimes come with handgrip heart rate monitors. As you hold the handrails during exercises, the sensor Cavan detect electrical signal or pulse due to your heart beat. This uses a little sweat on your hand, or palms. This method of measuring heart rate is very unreliable and experts didn’t recommend it.
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Why Do Athletes Have a Lower Resting Heart Rate?
Heart rate is the number of beats it makes per minute and it is measured in beats per minute (bmp). Your resting heart rate is measured when you are doing nothing, but sleeping, lying down, resting or you are in calm state(very peaceful mode)
According to HeartOrg encyclopedia, an average resting heart rate of human is 60-80 bpm. Any number of heart beats under this range is considered lower, especially, if the heart only beats 30-40 times in one minute.
Most athletes, like those who train for Olympic Games, have low heart rate. What is widely accepted about athletes is that they exercise too often, and you know, fitness exercises drive up heart rate up to 180bmp to even 200 bpm. So Why do athletes have a lower resting heart rates?
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Athletes resting heart rate explained
When some people have low heart rate, they feel ill, dizzy, and tired, but other people just look healthy, and in good shape. Olympic athletes have lower resting heart rate because frequent exercises have strengthened their heart muscles and in each heartbeat, it pumps a greater amount of blood. Their one single heat beat can deliver more oxygen to muscles, than it is with people who exercise for fun.
This means, heart beats faster when muscles seriously need oxygen for respiration. If the volume of fresh blood oxygen being supplied to the body is already enough every minute, the heart would just need to beat fewer times in 60 seconds.
Factors affecting resting heart rate
- Your age
- Fitness level
- Intensity of physical activity
- Air temperature(Heat beat faster on hot days)
- Your emotions – anxiety, stress, fear, excitement
- Medication – thyroid medication can lower heart beat
Symptom of lower resting heart rate
If you are an athlete, go for medical check up, if your slow heart rate causes these signs. Here are the symptoms of low resting heart rate
- Fatigue
- Dizziness
- Weakness
- Chest pain
Some experts suggest that an endurance athlete with low heart rate, will likely experience regular heart pattern in his lifetime. Some athletes have been known to have had electronic pacemaker implanted as a result.
Does athletic heart syndrome matter?
Athletic heart syndrome is a heart condition that is rather harmless, very common if you constantly train everyday for more than one hour. There is always no need to diagnose it since it is not a serious health problem.
Again, active athletes, with a lower resting heart beat rate under 50 bpm maya suffer irregular heart rhythm called arrhythmia.
If you fain during fitness exercise, that is possibly because you have got a heart problem. Elect a doctor to check if you have an underlying heart condition like a congenital heart disease and when you register irregular heart patterns for some days.
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High heart rate effects
Driving tour heart to pump at High heart rate can cause some problems including risk for cardiac like arrhythmias, chest paint and discomfort. Please back off to a more comfortable pace when you notice this high heart rate.
Wrap up
Overall, wrist based heart rate monitor watches might not give very precise heart rate reading, but they give you a real-time snapshot of your heart health status. With those wrist based cardiac watches, you can take immediate action to contact health professional when you see an unusually high or low resting heart rate recorded.
