Almost a Year With the Whoop. Here’s Why I Abandoned It.

I bought the Whoop because I wanted to get serious about my health. Not training for a marathon, not optimizing my VO2 max. Just genuinely understanding how my body was holding up while running a few businesses and trying not to burn out.

Sounds reasonable. It was not the right tool for the job.

Two wearables, double the confusion

I already had an Oura Ring. It was already tracking my sleep, HRV, resting heart rate, and recovery. Every morning, I’d wake up, check my Oura score, then check my Whoop score, and they’d disagree.

So instead of having clarity, I had two devices arguing with each other on my body. I’d spend more time trying to figure out which one was right than actually doing anything with the information. That’s not optimizing your health. That’s just adding noise.

My wrist never got a break.

I tried multiple bands, thinking that was the issue. It was not the band. It was the sensor sitting against my skin 24/7 with no recovery time. I ended up with a constant rash and itch right at the contact points. Not something that ever fully went away.

On top of that, I still wanted to wear a watch. So now I’ve got something on my wrist and something on my finger, and I’m uncomfortable everywhere. The Oura just disappears. I forgot it’s there. It works at meetings, at the gym, and while sleeping. A wristband never gave me that.

I’m not an athlete, and that matters

The Whoop is built around strain and performance. It’s a great product if you’re training hard and want to know if your body is ready to push again. That is not me. I care about sleep quality, stress levels, and whether I’m running myself into the ground. The Oura handles all of that without the subscription or the bulk.

I was paying for a product designed to solve a problem I didn’t have.

A broken collarbone made the decision easy

Last year, I broke my collarbone. Taking the Whoop off made sense. When I recovered, putting it back on just never happened. I didn’t miss it. That told me everything.

The pricing issue

Whoop promised existing members hardware upgrades when new devices launched. Then the Whoop 5.0 came out, and they quietly changed what “upgrade” meant. If you followed that rollout, you know exactly what happened.

That kind of thing sticks with you. Paying monthly with the expectation of loyalty in return, only to watch the goalposts move, is a good way to lose a customer.

Where I landed

Oura only. One ring. No rash. No conflicting data. No subscription drama.

If you’re an athlete or someone who trains seriously, the Whoop probably makes sense. But if you want a clear, honest picture of your health without the wrist commitment and the extra cost, you likely already have what you need.