[Jonesy53]

Peloton has announced that there will be Apple Watch integration for the original Bike, Bike Plus, and Tread.

Peloton adds Apple Watch integration to all of its machines

It just got easier for Peloton users to close their rings.

www.theverge.com

Peloton’s making it easier for Apple Watch users to close their rings. Today, the company announced a new Apple Watch integration for the original Bike, Bike Plus, and Tread.

According to a Peloton blog, the Peloton watch app will notify users any time they start a class on the Bike, Bike Plus, or Tread. It’ll also work for classes started on the app. Users can also choose to proactively start recording workouts. If enabled, the Apple Watch can also double as a heart rate monitor so you can view Peloton’s Strive Score feature. The Strive Score is a metric that tells users how much time they spend in a specific heart rate zone. It’ll also make it easier to log Peloton workouts in Apple’s Activity app.

The integration isn’t automatic, however. You have to go through a one-time setup process. First, make sure the Peloton app is on both your phone (or tablet) and the Apple Watch. From there, open the Peloton app on your phone and tap the “More” tab. Select “Apple Watch,” then “Set Up,” and “Connect to Health app.” That should then bring up the Health app. Grant whichever health permissions you’re comfortable with — keeping in mind that if you deny any metrics, it may affect how well the integration works. After that, head back to the Peloton app and hit “Done.” Finally, when the Apple Watch app asks for notification permissions, tap “Allow.”

That might seem like a lot, but it’s fairly typical for integrating a fitness app with Apple Health. This also isn’t the first time we’ve seen this sort of feature. It’s similar to how GymKit, Apple’s proprietary fitness API, allows you to record workouts on NFC-enabled exercise equipment on the Apple Watch. The ability to start recording from your wrist is also reminiscent of Apple’s own Fitness Plus service.

Previously, only the Bike Plus supported any kind of Apple Watch integration via GymKit. However, there was a dustup when Peloton removed GymKit support for its Bootcamp workouts. Technically, GymKit wasn’t able to support Bootcamp workouts as they switched between cardio and strength training. However, that was a GymKit-specific issue. Peloton says that the new integration will allow users to track all workouts on every Peloton machine.

 

[Stefon]

It's great that they finally did this - and long overdue. It was easy to set up and I tried it today on the bike and it worked well. Nice to finally be able to use the HRM that's already on my wrist vs. needing to put on a second one while I work out.

 

[GinaM]

Glad it's here now but I can't believe it took them this long. It should have been a high priority but then again maybe they wanted to sell their own monitors?

 

[PedalStomper]

I have been using my apple watch as a complement to bike rides on my bike+ for many months. I have been syncing it to the bike at the beginning of each ride, and it then monitors my heart rate and it is displayed on the bike's screen (also calculating the strive score). It's a great feature, but I don't understand what is different after this update. What am I missing?

 

[etz]

I think the deal is that previously Apple Watch functionality was purposefully not enabled on classes other than straight-up cycling….no bootcamp, strength,etc.

Also some devices were left out, such as tread+ & iphone app

 

[PedalStomper]

Oh, that would definitely be a big improvement! I have to try that out

 

[etz]

I don’t have an Apple Watch so I haven’t been paying attention too closely, but I think there’s some extra setup steps involved like enabling this and changing that setting and blah blah blah. Even then, it might be a bit dodgy to get working

 

[Marvinh]

I've used it on 3 rides. It hasn't started picking up the signal at the beginning of any of the 3 rides. It has taken 4 minutes, 4.5 minutes and today 1.5 minutes before it was recording data. Not a great start.....

 

[PelotonRunner]

Should we be able to see our pace and distance as well as our heart rate? I still only seem to be seeing my heart rate.

 

[Peloton Guru]

Should we be able to see our pace and distance as well as our heart rate? I still only seem to be seeing my heart rate.

No. Peloton simply wanted to capture your heart rate to capture in your workout on THEIR exercise equipment. They don't need any other metrics because those are already captured on the Bike and Tread.

 

[PedalStomper]

I don’t have an Apple Watch so I haven’t been paying attention too closely, but I think there’s some extra setup steps involved like enabling this and changing that setting and blah blah blah. Even then, it might be a bit dodgy to get working

Thank you for your help. Here is where things went wrong for me: I had all the settings correct, but wrongly assumed that starting to monitor non-cycling classes works the same as it does for cycling classes, where I hold up my Apple watch to the top of the screen of my bike+, and that brings up a prompt on the watch to connect and start tracking data. As it turns out the same method does not work for non-cycling classes, it just leads to an error message - something like "This is not supported by this class type".
What *does*work for non-cycling classes, is to bring up the Peloton app on my watch, and that will lead to a connection with the class I am taking.

It still doesn't make sense to me, why the first method doesn't simply work for all class types, but oh well - at least I was able to get it to work.

 

[Lks3]

I have an Apple 7 watch and worked out this morning and it disconnected in the middle of the peloton workout

 

[Peloton Guru]

I have an Apple 7 watch and worked out this morning and it disconnected in the middle of the peloton workout

I have an Apple 7 watch and worked out this morning and it disconnected in the middle of the peloton workout

Reboot your Apple Watch and iPhone. should fix it.

 

[Butterfinger]

I've already heard that Peloton is releasing an important new feature for Bike and Tread users who also have an Apple Watch. It gradually began rolling out to Peloton users today, and the company confirmed the news on its blog. The feature also expands the availability of the popular Strive Score feature to more users, as heart rate data from the Apple Watch can be used to calculate Strive Score. Having these features is just what I needed. And the price's great; there's no need to pawn your Rolex to buy the Apple Watch.

 

[Peloton Guru]

I've already heard that Peloton is releasing an important new feature for Bike and Tread users who also have an Apple Watch. The part gradually began rolling out to Peloton users today, and the company confirmed the news on its blog.

What blog?