Apple unveiled Apple Watch 10 at its September Glowtime event Along with the new S10 chip, it has all the expected performance upgrades, but the most exciting new feature is sleep apnea detection

This was widely rumored before the event and was one of the few predictions for the Apple Watch this year But there is a catch Apple has not received FDA approval for the health tracking feature, so it will not be available at launch

This may sound risky, but given that it is one of the key features announced for the newly upgraded Watch, it is reasonable to assume that the company is fairly confident about getting approval for the new tool

Sleep apnea is a common but potentially serious condition in which breathing temporarily stops during sleep

During the event, Apple repeatedly mentioned sleep apnea detection, but from the subsequent Newsroom postings about the announcement, it appears that sleep apnea notifications are actually a subset of breathing disorders

So while the company may not yet have the routine authorization required for sleep apnea, it can use its cell phone Health app to notify you of nightly breathing problems

These breathing disturbances can be affected by alcohol, medications, and sleep posture, and Watch uses these to assess overall sleep restfulness Sleep disturbances are categorized as “high” or “not high,” but detailed nightly data is not available, only trends over one month, six months, or one year

However, if sleep apnea detection is an important factor in your upgrade, you may want to wait a few months According to Apple, this feature will be enabled through a software update after FDA approval is granted

This is actually a rare case where Apple is trying to catch up with other brands; the Oura Ring has been detecting sleep apnea for some time, and so can Samsung's Galaxy Watch 7 (though this requires a Galaxy phone)

However, while Apple launched the Watch 10 without FDA approval and with only the promise that the feature would be included soon, Samsung received approval before launching its latest smartwatch earlier this year

If (and when) FDA approval is granted, the sleep apnea detection feature will be included in the Apple Watch 10, Series 9, and Watch Ultra 2

Apple may not have cleared the sleep apnea regulatory hurdle yet, but Watch 10 will install watchOS 11 and bundle many new and useful health and fitness tracking features

Improved pregnancy tracking, your new Vitals app to monitor key health indicators, and a training load score so you know when you need to recover Plus, you can pause the Activity Ring and take a day off