Global Close Your Rings Day on Thursday (April 24) gives Apple Watch owners the chance to participate in a special fitness event offering both digital and physical rewards. The day marks a decade of Apple Watch Activity rings helping keep users active for their health.
“Apple Watch has changed the way people think about, monitor and engage with their fitness and health,” said Jeff Williams, Apple’s chief operating officer, in a press release Monday. “A decade ago, we introduced Activity rings — and since then, Apple Watch has grown to offer an extensive set of features designed to empower every user. People write to us almost every day sharing how Apple Watch has made a difference in their life, from motivating them to move more throughout the day, to changing the trajectory of their health.”
Update: Now that Global Close Your Rings Day is here, it’s time close ’em and get the digital and physical awards outlined below. Oh, and also for your health and fitness, of course.
Global Close Your Rings Day marks 10th anniversary of Apple Watch Activity rings
From the Apple Watch debut in 2015 to the latest Apple Watch Series 10, the smartwatch continues to evolve, with health- and fitness-oriented features like heart rate monitoring and sleep tracking. The watch’s novel Activity rings feature — which challenges wearers to close their Move, Exercise and Stand rings every day — serves as both a motivational tool and an easy way to monitor daily activities.
On April 24, Apple Watch users around the world can earn a limited-edition award by closing all three of their Activity rings. Apple encourages participants to “do something they love, push themselves further or try something new” and then share their achievements on social media using the hashtag #CloseYourRings.
Those who successfully close their Move, Exercise and Stand rings on Global Close Your Rings Day will receive a limited-edition digital award, along with 10 animated stickers and an animated badge for Messages.
Close your Activity rings on April 24 to earn this reward, among others.
Photo: Apple
Apple is also bringing the celebration into the physical world. Apple Watch users can visit Apple Store locations worldwide on April 24 to collect a special pin inspired by the digital award, while supplies last.
New research highlights health benefits of closing Activity rings
Activity Rings are Apple Watch’s way of measuring how active you are against your daily goals.
Photo: Apple
Alongside the announcement of Global Close Your Rings Day, Apple released findings from a new analysis of the Apple Heart and Movement Study. Based on data from more than 140,000 participants, the research revealed significant associations between regularly closing Activity rings and various aspects of health and wellness.
According to the study, people who consistently closed their Activity rings were 48% less likely to experience poor sleep quality, defined as waking up frequently during the night. These same individuals were also 73% less likely to experience elevated resting heart rates, which can be an important indicator of overall fitness and cardiovascular health.
Perhaps most striking was the finding that regular ring-closers were 57% less likely to report elevated stress levels, as measured by the Perceived Stress Scale-4 (PSS-4), a standard questionnaire used to assess stress perception.
The Apple Heart and Movement Study, conducted in collaboration with Brigham and Women’s Hospital and the American Heart Association, now includes more than 200,000 participants across the United States.
A decade of fitness and health innovation
Keep track of your metrics during workouts.
Photo: Apple
Since its introduction a decade ago, the Activity app has become one of the most popular Apple Watch features. The simple yet powerful visualization uses three concentric rings to represent daily activity: Move (active calories burned), Exercise (minutes of brisk activity), and Stand (hours in which users stand for at least one minute).
Users can customize their daily goals to match their lifestyle and fitness level, with the ability to set different targets for different days of the week. The app even allows users to pause their rings when they need a rest day.
Beyond Activity rings, Apple Watch offers a comprehensive suite of fitness and health features, including:
Based on scientific research, with privacy and secure data assured
The Vitals app will tell you about unusual activity overnight.
Photo: Apple
Apple emphasizes that all these features are grounded in scientific research and developed with rigorous accuracy standards. The company recently published a validation summary detailing the methodologies and technologies behind Apple Watch’s measurement capabilities. It noted machine learning models developed using “data from hundreds of thousands of hours of studies involving thousands of participants from diverse populations.”
Privacy remains central to Apple’s health and fitness features. The company notes that when devices are locked with a passcode, Touch ID or Face ID, all health data in the Health app (except Medical ID information) is encrypted. Health data synced to iCloud is encrypted both during transmission and while stored on Apple’s servers. With recent operating system versions and two-factor authentication enabled, health and activity data is stored in a way that even Apple cannot access it.
Source: Apple
This article first published on April 14, 2025. We updated it on Global Close Your Rings Day, April 24, 2025.