Oura is betting on social wellness. 

Thursday, the corporate known for its wellness tracking ring is launching Oura Circles, a social component to the brand’s app that permits users to share their health stats and connect with family and friends. When joining a circle, users can opt to share specific Oura metrics — sleep, activity and readiness — over a two-week period with day by day or weekly data. Members within the circle can then view each others’ data and respond with five different emojis. Oura users can join as much as 10 circles, every one capping at 20 people.

The brand new Oura feature comes on the heels of the rise of social wellness models, as consumers and types want to address the loneliness epidemic recently announced by the surgeon general. The Apple Watch, for instance, which also goals to trace health data, offers a feature where wearers get alerts when friends finish workouts, and might respond with emojis or a text.  

“Isolation fundamentally affects our mental, physical and societal health, which is why the U.S. surgeon general recently reported that chronic loneliness is a public health crisis, increasing the danger of cognitive decline by 50 percent, heart problems by 29 percent, and stroke incidence by 32 percent,” said Oura chief executive officer Tom Hale. “This recent feature is just the following step in delivering a customized experience that permits our members to attach with not only their bodies, but in addition their community.” 

Oura Circles, which has been in development since last yr, were inspired by an organic response from ring users, in accordance with the brand.

“People’s health journeys often feel like a lonely journey,” said Jason Russell, senior director of product at Oura. “We all know that’s true for our users as well. There’s a number of organic behavior for people doing the Oura journey together, especially folks like couples. They buy the ring together they usually do their very own work to check scores and find out about their health together.”

“Oura Circles is a approach to connect, share and look after your folks and family. That’s each through celebrating highs whenever you hit your activity goal a couple of days in a row, but in addition showing support for the lows, whether you’re sick or in need of rest,” Russell said. “There’s a giant social component to motivation as well. We all know that people after they share their data with others have an increased boost consistent with habits they’re attempting to construct.”

In an effort to further personalize and enhance the Oura experience, Circles is rolling out together with the official Latest Sleep Staging Algorithm, which has been in beta testing. This recent algorithm employs Oura Ring and reference polysomnography (PSG) data from sleep diagnostic testing. The brand new algorithm relies on 500 users of various “ages, genders and skin tones, and over 1,200 unique nights of information,” in accordance with the brand.