If you own an Apple watch, it might take some time to get used to all the features therein. The bright green lights that often illuminate the Apple watch’s back is one of the features that gets users confused. This article answers the question “ Why is there a green light on my apple watch”, what the green light indicates, and how you can turn it off on your Apple watch.
Why there is a green light on Apple watch
The green light on your Apple watch is an optical heart sensor, its job is to indicate your heart rate. Apple uses the green light because blood absorbs the green color easily.
The green LED lights are combined with light-sensitive photodiodes, to measure how much blood is flowing through the wrist which also helps to determine the actual heart rate If you are wearing your Apple watch properly, the green light is released to pass through the wrist hundreds of times per second, measuring blood flow and counting the number of heartbeats each minute.
The amount of heart beat is indicated in the BPM section, that is how many times your heart beats each minute (Beats Per Minute). Adults on an average have resting heart rates of 60 to 100 BPM.
A higher heart rate means more blood flow, and even a greater absorption of green light. Apple watch’s green lights flashes hundreds of times per second; the optical heart rate sensor can measure a user’s heart rate in the range of 30-210 beats per minute.
How to turn off Green Light on Apple Watch
The green light on the Apple watch is harmless to your skin. But if you are not comfortable with it, here’s how to disable it:
You can disable the green light emitting from your Apple watch using either your iPhone or the Watch.
Using Apple watch:
- Open the Settings app by pressing Digital Crown to open the Settings menu.
- Scroll down and tap privacy & security
- Then choose Health.
- Tap Heart Rate.
- Toggle the button next to Heart Rate off.
Using iPhone:
- Open the watch app.
- Click Privacy in the My Watch tab.
- Toggle Heart Rate off.
You can also temporarily turn off the Apple watch green light if you don’t want to disable it permanently. This is very simple.
- Hold off till your heart rate finishes recording
- While it is measuring your heart rate, the green light will keep on flashing.
- It goes off automatically after completion, just ignore it for a bit. It will switch off by itself
Also you can temporarily turn it off when you end a breath or reflection session:
When in a breath or reflection session, swipe right and choose “End” > This will end the session and disable the green light while turning off the heart rate.
During a workout session; Swipe right on the Apple Watch display and choose “End”. > Your workout and break heart rate monitoring will end, turning off the green light temporarily
FAQs
Why is the green light on my Apple watch not working?
The green light might not work if you mistakenly or deliberately disabled your Apple Watch’s Heart Rate functionality.
Why is the green light on my Apple watch still on when I am not wearing it?
If you notice the green light is emanating from the rear sensor even though you are not wearing; it is because an app may be active and trying to monitor your heart rate.
What are the red lights on Apple watch?
There are also red lights on the rear of the smart watch alongside the green light. The red lights indicate other health tracking features, which is to monitor blood oxygen.
The Apple Watch Series 6 and later updates can measure the wearer’s blood oxygen (SpO2) levels. The red lights also uses photodiodes to calculate the level of oxygenation in the wearer’s blood, just like the green lights.
If blood oxygen and background readings are enabled on an Apple Watch, wearers will see the red lights while they’re in bed, because the measurements are calculated while sleeping.
You can turn it off in the Settings app on your Apple watch > Tap ‘Blood Oxygen’ and then turn off ‘In Sleep Focus’ and ‘In Cinema Mode.’
Users can take a manual reading of their blood oxygen any time by opening the Blood Oxygen app and following the instructions.
What happens after you disable Heart Rate on Apple atch?
The heart rate tracking ends when you turn off the heart rate function, and also permanently turns off the green light emission.
