Apple recently announced a Health Age feature that will arrive later in 2026, along with a readiness metric and a redesigned Health app. The announcement, made at the Steve Jobs Theater, positions Apple alongside a growing list of companies that translate wearable data into a single, provocative number: your so-called health age.
Victoria Song, a senior reviewer at The Verge, has spent two years testing these features across Whoop, Oura, Withings, Garmin, a longevity mirror, and a smart mattress topper. Her conclusion is blunt: the scores are misleading, and the way they are framed raises cultural problems that go beyond mere accuracy.
A number for every device, a definition for none
The appeal of a health age is easy to grasp. It promises to compress complex physiological signals into a simple comparison: are you biologically older or younger than the years on your birth certificate? But each company answers that question differently.
Whoop offers a Whoop Age that heavily weights strength training. Oura provides a cardiovascular age metric. Withings scales report both heart age and vascular age. Garmin has a fitness age score. The longevity mirror estimates both physiological age and facial skin age, while a smart mattress topper estimates biological age.
Because the parameters and algorithms differ, the results for the same person can diverge wildly. Song, who is 38, has seen her health ages swing across a wide range over the past two years. Whoop put her at 42. Oura’s heart age has varied from seven years younger to just 1.5 years younger, and currently sits at two years younger. Withings gave her a vascular age one year older but a heart age four years younger. Garmin calculated a fitness age of 36.5. The longevity mirror estimated her facial skin age at 26 and her physiological age at 35. The smart mattress topper recently told her she was trending older at 38.7.
These numbers are not just inconsistent; they are defined in ways that make direct comparison impossible. A Whoop Age and an Oura cardiovascular age are not measuring the same thing, even if both are presented as a verdict on aging.
What the scores can and cannot see
There is a legitimate upside. Health age scores can help people visualize how lifestyle changes—better diet, more sleep, consistent exercise—might affect their physiological condition. They can identify areas for improvement, such as cardiovascular fitness or strength, that a user might otherwise overlook.
But the scores can also be gamed. Because Whoop Age heavily weights strength training, someone who focuses on heavy lifting can improve that number without addressing other aspects of health. More broadly, these metrics do not capture the full . Genetics and uncontrollable factors play significant roles in health outcomes, and no wearable algorithm can account for them.
Song’s own experience illustrates the gap between wearable verdicts and medical reality. A reader once told her about having high cholesterol despite a good Whoop Age. In Song’s case, her wearables indicated health decline until recently, even as her doctor praised her health improvements. Earlier this week, that same doctor commended her effort, while the smart mattress topper suggested she was trending older.
The discrepancy is not surprising. Wearable metrics are not comprehensive health assessments. They are proprietary calculations based on limited data, and they can conflict with actual medical test results.
The culture of younger-is-better
The deeper issue is cultural. In the West, aging is generally not viewed as a good thing. A younger health age is something to brag about; an older one can feel shameful. Apple’s Sumbul Desai, vice president of health, has said Health Age could be something users brag about—a framing that reinforces the bias.
Tech entrepreneur Bryan Johnson, who is 49, has built a public persona around longevity optimization, posting on X about aliens distinguishing him from his teenage son and sharing a chart titled “Is Bryan Johnson More 18 or 49?” Johnson has autoimmune gastritis and optimizes his diet, exercise, and sleep. His pursuit is extreme, but the underlying message—that a younger biological age is the goal—permeates the broader health tech landscape.
That message can be harmful. It implies that aging is a personal failure rather than a universal process. Time moves forward; everyone ages chronologically. Yet health age scores can pass faulty judgments, suggesting that a higher number reflects poor choices when it may simply reflect genetics, injury, or other uncontrollable factors.
Song's own contradictions
Song’s health history makes the limitations concrete. Last year, she was fitter but got injured from overtraining. This year, she is less fit but her metabolic biomarkers have improved. She has lost roughly five pounds of muscle. She cannot run a mile nonstop as she could as a teen, though she has completed multiple half-marathons in her 30s. Her bones pop more, she cannot pull all-nighters, and grays keep coming despite supplements.
Her wearables, however, have only recently begun to reflect the improvements her doctor sees. For two years, the numbers told a different story—one that often conflicted with her actual health trajectory.
What the numbers leave out
Health age scores are not standardized across companies. They use different parameters and algorithms, and they can vary widely for the same individual. They can be helpful for visualizing lifestyle changes, but they can also pass faulty judgments. They do not capture the full health , and they cannot account for genetics or uncontrollable factors.
Song’s conclusion is that chronological age is what matters. Not because aging is something to celebrate or dread, but because it is the only number that is true for everyone. The rest are approximations, shaped by proprietary formulas and cultural biases that equate youth with health and age with decline.
Apple’s Health Age will arrive later in 2026, joining a crowded field of metrics that promise to quantify something that resists quantification. Users will likely check their score, feel a flicker of pride or worry, and return to their lives. The number will change. The aging will not.
