Apple Watch wants you to close all three rings on April 24 — and there's a good reason for it

Apple Watch is not just a watch but a fitness and health companion that motivates millions of people worldwide to stay active. Using advanced sensor technology, it provides users with insights into their workouts, training, and other health aspects, including sleep, heart health, and menstrual health. For the past decade, Apple Watch's Activity rings have offered a simple, engaging, and customizable way for users to stay active throughout the day. This feature has been instrumental in promoting a healthier lifestyle among its users.

Apple has now announced a special event on April 24, known as the Global Close Your Rings Day. On this day, all Apple Watch users are encouraged to close their Activity rings to earn a limited-edition award and animated stickers for Messages.

" Watch has changed how people think about, monitor, and engage with their fitness and health. 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," said Jeff Williams, Apple's chief operating officer.

He also added that people write to Apple almost every day, sharing how Apple Watch has made a difference in their lives, from motivating them to move more throughout the day to changing the trajectory of their health.

On Global Close Your Rings Day, Apple Watch users are encouraged to do something they love, push themselves further, or try something new. Users who close all three Activity rings will earn a limited-edition award, 10 animated stickers and an animated badge for Messages.

Real world benefits

To celebrate this day, customers can obtain a special pin inspired by the award at Apple Store locations worldwide starting April 24, while supplies last. A new analysis of data contributed by more than 140,000 participants in the Apple Heart and Movement Study identified positive associations between the closure of Activity rings and aspects of sleep, heart health, and mental wellbeing. These associations were consistent across men, women, and across all age groups.

Relative to people who infrequently closed their Activity rings, people who closed their rings most of the time were 48 percent less likely to experience poor sleep quality and 73 percent less likely to experience elevated resting heart rate levels. They were also 57 percent less likely to report elevated stress, as measured by the Perceived Stress Scale-4 (PSS-4), a four-item questionnaire designed to assess an individual's perception of their stress levels.

Activity and Health on Apple Watch

The Activity app is one of the most beloved Apple Watch features, encouraging users to close their three Activity rings — Move, Exercise, and Stand — by hitting personal daily goals for active calories burned, minutes of brisk activity completed, and number of hours when they stand up for at least a minute. Users can customize their goals to fit their lifestyle, even by the day of the week, and Activity rings can be paused if a user needs a rest day.

Finally, Apple's fitness and health features put users' privacy at the center, offering protections like transparency and control over their personal data. When  and iPad are locked with a passcode, Touch ID, or Face ID, all fitness and health data in the Health app — other than Medical ID — is encrypted, and any health data synced to iCloud is encrypted both in transit and on Apple servers.