Turn on cookies to sign in
Signing in saves your progress to your Curie account. We can only do that with cookies on — turn them on to continue.
The WHO has drafted a target product profile (TPP) for wrist-worn wearables designed to objectively measure physical activity and sedentary behavior in national health surveillance systems. The initiative aims to standardize device use across diverse settings, including resource-limited countries. Stakeholders worldwide are invited to submit feedback by December 6, 2026.
The WHO is calling on global stakeholders to weigh in on a draft target product profile (TPP) for wrist-worn wearable devices intended to track physical activity and sedentary behavior at the population level. The TPP sets out minimum and enhanced device specifications to ensure these tools are fit-for-purpose in national and subnational health surveillance systems — with a particular focus on making them viable in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs).
Beyond hardware specs, the draft also addresses data access, operational deployment, and the broader infrastructure needed to make wearable-based surveillance scalable and sustainable. WHO is especially keen to hear from LMICs, where wearable adoption in public health monitoring has been most limited.
Key Takeaways:
Why it matters: Physical inactivity is a leading driver of noncommunicable diseases and poor mental health worldwide. By establishing clear standards for wearable devices in surveillance systems, WHO could help countries generate more objective, comparable data on movement behaviors — ultimately informing better public health policy and interventions at scale.
