We may earn a commission from links on this page.
Did you know you can customize Google to filter out garbage? Take these steps for better search results, including adding my work at Lifehacker as a preferred source.
When the Powerbeats Pro 2 came out earlier this year, with their in-ear heart rate sensors, I had a hard time getting them to read my heart rate accurately from my ears. Now, with iOS 26, Apple and Beats are introducing some new fitness features that make these headphones work better as heart rate sensors. They also apply to the new AirPods Pro 3, which also measure heart rate. I tested the new features, and found that the experience is much improved—but still has serious problems.
The heart rate feature now works on iPhones without third-party apps
This is the biggest improvement, and it’s unquestionably a good thing. In iOS 26, Apple has turned the Fitness app into a real workout-tracking app, not just a viewer for Apple Watch data. And it can pull heart rate data from Powerbeats or AirPods with heart rate sensors.
Just tap the Workout tab, check the heart rate icon in the upper right corner to make sure your Powerbeats are paired, and hit the start button on the activity you want to do. It’s easy and simple—as it should have been in the first place.
Previously, iPhones could only read heart rate data from the Powerbeats Pro 2 through certain third-party apps. These apps included a few popular premium and specialty apps, like Runna and Peloton, but there was no basic option. Now, with the updates to the Fitness app, you can log a workout that is just a native Apple workout, without having to create an account on a new app.
None of this was ever an issue for Android users, by the way: They were always able to pair the Powerbeats Pro 2 as a Bluetooth heart rate sensor the way you would a chest strap, and can still do that. Unfortunately, iPhone users still don’t have that kind of freedom. Only some apps are supported—16 of them so far, which are listed here—but at least the main Fitness app is one of them.
You can now use a single earbud (sort of)
At first, the Powerbeats Pro 2 could only read your heart rate if you had both earbuds in. With the changes in iOS 26, you can now get heart rate readings with just a single earbud. I tried this out, with mixed results.
On the bright side, it’s true—the Fitness app gives me heart rate data even with only one earbud in. But the downside is that accuracy is diminished. The earbuds already have an accuracy issue, as I’ll discuss below, so they lose data points when the fit isn’t perfect. Remove one earbud, and you’re taking away half your data.
This is good news for people who get a good fit and good accuracy; they can choose between one and two earbuds and get a heart rate reading either way. But for those of us who can’t get a good enough fit to get good data (like me), this just gives us worse data.
The algorithm is better, but maybe not good enough
Credit: Beth Skwarecki
Apple has said that its new heart-rate-sensing algorithm is able to sample data points faster, which should help accuracy. It can also combine data from the headphones and from your Apple Watch, rather than choosing one or the other. (Previously, if you were wearing your Apple Watch, heart rate data from your earbuds would be ignored).
I took the earbuds for a few test runs (without the Apple Watch) to try the new algorithm. I do think the accuracy is a little bit improved! It’s still not great, but as long as I had both earbuds in, I can at least see the similarity between my chest strap data and what I was getting from the Powerbeats.
It still tended to read high for me, though—often riding above the peaks of my intervals and never dropping down very far. This isn’t good enough to follow heart rate zone training very closely, and would likely skew heart-rate-based metrics such as estimated VO2max. But it does seem to be an improvement.
My single-earbud readings were awful, though, as you can see. To Apple’s credit, I did get a poor fit notification after both the runs that produced the graphs above.
New fit notification
A new feature in iOS 26 is that you’ll get a notification to check the fit of your earbuds if the data seemed to be poor. That’s a helpful feature, because otherwise you wouldn’t know whether you’re getting good data or not. (I sit down at my computer and compare new devices to chest strap data, but it’s not fair to expect everyone to do that.)
Based on my experience, the Powerbeats’ issue with heart rate accuracy seems to be tied to the way they fit in your ears. The optical heart rate sensor is built into the hard plastic component, and it needs to be in close contact with your skin to be able to detect your pulse.
The earbuds come with different silicone tips to adjust the fit, and an “ear tip fit test” you can do in Settings to ensure that you get a good seal between your tip and your ears. If you get the notification telling you to check your fit, it directs you to this test and its associated advice about getting a good fit.
But there’s still a big problem here. Apple assumes that a good fit for sound is the same as a good fit for heart rate. That’s not always the case, as my own testing showed. When I passed the fit test, I got terrible heart rate data. If I turned the earbuds backward so the ear hooks were vertical, I got good heart rate data but terrible sound quality—and failed the fit test.
So these notifications can tell you that you have a problem, but they can’t solve your problem. I suspect it’s not really solvable. The plastic component only comes in one size, and if your ears are a different size or shape than what it was designed for, there’s no way to put the sensor in closer contact with your ears.
iPhone users still can’t play music while broadcasting heart rate to gym equipment
I almost feel embarrassed for Apple on this one. The Powerbeats Pro 2 can broadcast your heart rate data to gym equipment, but not while playing music. This still feels half-baked and I hope Apple is working on a fix for this. For now, here’s what you can expect:
-
Android users can play music from their phone while broadcasting to gym equipment.
-
Gym equipment that plays sound over bluetooth can play to your Powerbeats while you broadcast heart rate to that same gym equipment.
-
iPhone users cannot play music from their iPhone while broadcasting to gym equipment.
Overall, I’m pleased to see the changes Apple has made to improve the usefulness and accuracy of the Powerbeats Pro 2’s heart rate monitoring feature, but I’m still disappointed in some of the ways it fails to live up to its promises. These are expensive headphones to buy without knowing whether they’ll fit your ears well enough to get reliable heart rate data. The missing music when broadcasting to gym equipment is especially disappointing. But the fit notifications are a great addition so that at least people know when they’re having accuracy issues, and I appreciate the more accurate data sampling—even if the result isn’t perfect.
