Nap detection not working on Oura Ring? Check these tips

The Oura ring is the only popular smart ring with a nap detection feature. High-end smartwatches from Apple and Samsung still do not support the feature for nap detection.

The feature works consistently for many users, but there are times when the Oura ring does not detect your naps. Here are some tips that help you get this nifty feature working on your Oura Ring.

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Nap detection on your Oura Ring

The Nap detection feature on the Oura Ring helps users to obtain a more holistic picture of their lifestyle by accounting for any daytime naps.

Furthermore, not everyone sleeps the same, and not necessarily only at night. With the ring, you do not have to set up a sleep schedule or sleep focus to track naps. 

In addition, Oura made some changes when they released their Nap Detection feature.

Now, with Nap Detection, you have the opportunity for your Sleep and Readiness Scores to be updated throughout the day.

This is super useful for someone who is used to taking a long nap during the day before working out hard during the evenings or nights.

And Yes. Naps can dramatically change your readiness scores.

• Nap Duration is an important factor: the ring automatically picks up your naps if the continuous sleep duration of the nap is greater than fifteen minutes and under 3 hours.
• The other important factor is that your body must fall into at least one sleep stage (e.g., light, deep, or REM) during that time for the algorithms to detect that nap.

When you nap for longer than three hours, Oura labels this a sleep period rather than a nap.

Also, Oura’s Sleep Day tracks sleep in a 24-hour window from 6 pm to 6 pm rather than midnight to midnight. So if your nap begins or ends anytime after 6 pm, your Sleep and Readiness Scores won’t update until the following day.

Oura Ring Nap Detection not working?

If your nap duration was over 15 minutes and less than three hours and you completed your nap before 6 pm, the system should automatically detect it, and you see a confirmation at the top of your Home tab. Tap the Confirm button to log the nap.

Once you confirm a nap, you cannot adjust or delete it. Confirmed naps also change your readiness and sleep scores.

If you don’t confirm a nap, Oura automatically categorizes it as a restful or restorative period. Unconfirmed naps labeled as restful or restorative DO NOT affect your readiness or sleep scores.

If you don’t see the prompt to confirm your naps, try the following suggestions

Check your ring’s position and fit

• Your Oura ring sensors work best when the ring is snug on your finger. Oura also recommends wearing the ring on your dominant hand’s index or middle finger. You may need to switch which finger wears the ring since fingers change size throughout the day. It’s okay to wear the ring on different fingers when sleeping or during the day.
• Sleep in a position that doesn’t reduce blood circulation to your hand (your hand should not tingle or feel numb.)
• Check that the ring’s sensors are facing inwards, on your finger’s palm side (underside). Look for a notch on the ring to let you know which side should face your palm.

Clean your ring

• If the sensors get clogged or obstructed with dust, grease, or skin cells, they cannot accurately read your data.
• Try cleaning the ring’s infrared LED sensors (the three small bumps) on the interior of your Oura Ring with a dry microfiber cloth or eyeglass cleaning cloth.
• You can also rinse your ring with water and a drop or two of dish soap.

Make sure the ring’s Rest mode is off

If you’ve turned on Rest mode by choice or accident, you want to turn it off.

1. To turn it off, tap the Menu button at the top left (the icon looks like three horizontal lines.)
2. Choose Rest Mode, and turn it off. If Rest Mode was on by accident, turn it off and delete all the tags.

Force quit the Oura app

One of the easiest things to do is to force quit the Oura app on your phone. When you force quit the app a few times, it seems to be able to detect naps for some users.

1. To force quit, swipe up on your phone from the bottom and let go when you see your apps as smaller preview versions on the screen hold.
2. Locate the Oura app and swipe the Oura app preview off the top of your screen to close it.

Toggle Airplane mode on

Airplane Mode turns off your ring’s Bluetooth and WiFi connections so it cannot connect to the Oura app.

1. To turn on Airplane Mode, tap the ring icon in the upper right-hand corner of the Home tab (it looks like a circle.) Then, toggle on Ring airplane mode and confirm you want to turn Airplane mode on.
2. Wait 20-30 seconds with Airplane mode on.
3. To turn Airplane mode off, connect your ring to its charger and wait for it to re-connect with the Oura app. Once re-connected, Airplane mode automatically turns off.

Try the new Sleep beta

If you haven’t already tried it, look for a notification in the Oura app or a toggle in the Sleep section about the Sleep beta and turn it on. 

This sleep staging beta updates Oura’s sleep algorithm for enhanced sensitivity, and some users find it helps recognize naps.

If you can’t find the New Sleep Staging Beta, find it here:

1. Tap the Sleep tab at the bottom of the Oura app.
2. Scroll down past your current sleep details, and under Details, look for the toggle New Sleep Staging Beta and toggle it on.
3. When you nap, check if it applied the New Sleep Staging Beta to your nap.

Backup and soft reset

If the approaches mentioned above did not do the trick, back up your Oura Ring data. And then, perform a soft reset, which is basically a device reboot.

A soft reset won’t delete data and won’t unpair your ring from your phone. 

• You can complete the data backup by tapping the menu on the Home tab > Settings > Back up all data. Wait for the app to finish backing up.

Once your data has been backed up, perform a soft reset

1. To perform a soft reset that helps reset the ring’s sensors, begin by tapping the ring icon in the upper right-hand corner of the Home tab. The icon looks like a bullseye (or Target store logo.)
2. Swipe left on the screen to get to the second page.
3. Under My Oura Ring, scroll down to Tools and tap Soft reset.
4. Confirm you wish to reset the ring. Remember, soft resetting is like restarting–it does not erase any data or disconnect it from the phone and Oura app.

Try adding a nap tag

Another suggestion is to manually add a nap tag with the date and the time to indicate any nap that was not recognized. 

Tags help you personalize your Oura experience and track things that your Oura Ring doesn’t yet recognize that also impact your sleep and readiness.

Currently, Oura does not allow you to add your own tags. Instead, you search from their list. These include things like getting a vaccine, drinking coffee, beer, or other alcohol, feeling sick with a headache or fever, taking medicine or supplements, or even getting a massage or acupuncture treatment. And there’s also a nap tag.

1. To add a tag, go to Home and tap the + icon near the bottom of your screen.
2. Choose to Add a tag.
3. Under search tags, scroll down the list of other tags for nap or type in “nap” in the search area.
4. Select Nap and then tap Date and time and choose the time you started or ended your nap.
5. In the comment, add the length of the nap.
6. Tap Done to save the tag.

Once added, you find your day’s tags under Home > Activities.

To see any previously added nap tags, go to your Home tab and choose the date at the top of the Oura app, just underneath the Oura logo. Then scroll to Activities to see any tags from that day.

Currently, tags do not carry over to multiple days. So you need to add a nap tag for each time a nap isn’t recognized.

Final thoughts

Unfortunately, there is no way for you to tell the system when you start a nap, like when you want to start an unguided meditation session with your Oura Ring. 

According to Oura technical support, the most common cause of missed naps occurs when “time-in-bed” exceeds the time threshold, but the sleep stage minutes are less than the required amount, which is 15 minutes.

Additionally, your heart rate may stay elevated during your nap due to everyday things like caffeine, alcohol, medications or supplements, food, recent workouts, or stress. Those things can elevate your heart rate during a nap and consequently impact how well Oura recognizes you are actually napping.

We hope that Oura provides a better nap detection algorithm in later releases, as this feature has been pretty inconsistent for many users for quite some time now.