Wearable Health Sensors Patent Landscape 2026
Wearable Health Sensors Patent Landscape in 2026
WHOOP Inc leads a moderately concentrated field of 1,898 patent families, where the top five filers hold 36% of the output among the hundred largest filers. Activity plateaued near its 2021 peak and has since eased, though the United States remains the dominant filing jurisdiction by a wide margin.
WHOOP leads a field with a clear tier gap between specialists and incumbents
WHOOP Inc holds the top position with 171 patent families, followed by Medtronic with 139 and iRhythm Technologies with 109. Nippon Telegraph & Telephone ranks fourth with 101 patent families, making it the strongest non-US filer in the top tier.
The top five filers account for 36% of the combined output of the hundred largest applicants, indicating moderate concentration — significant enough that the leaders shape the technical agenda, yet open enough that challengers outside the top five hold meaningful positions. A second tier anchored by Koninklijke Philips (63) and Dexcom (50) sits noticeably below the leaders, and the field thins quickly below that.
| # | Applicant | Patent families | Share |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | WHOOP Inc | 171 | |
| 2 | Medtronic Inc | 139 | |
| 3 | iRhythm Technologies Inc | 109 | |
| 4 | NIPPON TELEGRAPH & TELEPHONE CORP | 101 | |
| 5 | Koninklijke Philips N.V. | 63 | |
| 6 | Dexcom Inc | 50 | |
| 7 | Toray Industries Inc | 49 | |
| 8 | The Regents of the University of California | 47 | |
| 9 | Cambridge Heartwear Limited | 38 | |
| 10 | Bardy Diagnostics Inc | 35 |
| # | Applicant | Patent families | Share |
|---|---|---|---|
| 11 | Masimo Corporation | 25 | |
| 12 | California Institute of Technology | 24 | |
| 13 | Verily Life Sciences LLC | 22 | |
| 14 | Massachusetts Institute of Technology | 21 | |
| 15 | MAYO FOUNDATION FOR MEDICAL EDUCATION & RESEARCH | 20 | |
| 16 | Nitto Denko Corporation | 20 | |
| 17 | AquilX Inc | 19 | |
| 18 | The Research Foundation for the State University of New York | 17 | |
| 19 | Vital Connect Inc | 16 | |
| 20 | Lotus Medicina Avancada | 16 |
The leaders’ positions reflect distinct strategic postures: WHOOP and iRhythm are pure-play wearable or cardiac-monitoring specialists, while Medtronic and Philips leverage broader medtech portfolios. This mix suggests that deep vertical focus and diversified medtech incumbency are both viable paths to the top of the ranking.
The most recent 18–24 months of filing data are subject to publication lag and will likely show upward revision as pending applications are published; observed counts for 2025–2026 should be treated as provisional. Longer-window growth, applicant concentration, and technology-route coverage are therefore more reliable signals than the latest-year bar alone.
Filing activity plateaued after a 2021 surge; A61B diagnosis dominates the technology mix
Annual filings and the IPC class breakdown together reveal a field that expanded sharply through 2021 and has since plateaued, while the technology mix remains heavily anchored in diagnostic methods with meaningful secondary activity in healthcare informatics and AI.
Annual filing trend
Filings climbed from 158 in 2017 to a peak of 296 in 2021, then eased to 194 in 2022 before recovering to 246 in 2023. The 2024 figure of 174 and the preliminary 2025 figure of 61 reflect publication lag and should not be read as a structural decline. The multi-year trajectory remains above 2017–2019 baseline levels.
↗ Hover for values · click a bar to ask EurekaTechnology composition
A61B (Diagnosis & Surgery) dominates the portfolio with 2,322 records, far ahead of the second branch G16H (Healthcare Informatics) at 589. G06N (AI models) and G06F (digital data processing) each sit near 130 records, signalling growing but still modest integration of machine-learning methods into wearable sensor patents. Branches such as A41D (garments), H04W (wireless networks), and H05K (printed circuits) reflect the multi-disciplinary engineering required to bring sensors into wearable form factors.
↗ Hover for values · click a bar to ask EurekaHighly cited patent families surfaced by the query
Citation-heavy patent families returned by the query. Use this section as citation context, not as a curated list of the most topic-specific patents.
| # | Patent | Citations |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Devices and methods for treating psychological dis… | 599 |
| 2 | Acoustic respiratory monitoring sensor having mult… | 481 |
| 3 | Medical Premonitory Event Estimation | 453 |
| 4 | Acoustic sensor with attachment portion | 436 |
| 5 | Miniature physiological monitor with interchangeab… | 429 |
| 6 | Acoustic respiratory monitoring sensor having mult… | 428 |
| 7 | Method and system for fall detection and motion an… | 422 |
| 8 | Wearable Electronic System | 367 |
Ranked by total forward citations. Citation counts favour older and broadly cited patent families, and broad or adjacent patents may appear when they match the search scope. Treat this section as citation context, not as a curated list of the most topic-specific patents.
What the portfolio structure means for R&D investment decisions
Four structural observations — maturity stage, competitive concentration, collaboration dynamics, and geographic reach — shape where new entrants and incumbents can most productively invest.
Field is at plateau following a 2021 surge
Annual filing volume has eased from its 2021 peak of 296 families, placing the field in a maturity stage where incremental improvements dominate and truly novel architectural claims are harder to establish. R&D teams entering now should expect crowded claim space in core biosignal acquisition and should target differentiated sub-areas. The multi-year baseline remains above pre-2020 levels, so the field is not contracting — it is consolidating.
Lifecycle: MatureTop five hold 36% among the hundred largest filers — moderate gatekeeping
The top-five filers’ 36% share of the hundred largest applicants’ combined output indicates that no single player exercises monopolistic control, yet the leaders — WHOOP, Medtronic, iRhythm, NTT, and Philips — collectively define the dominant technical directions. A challenger in the 6–20 rank band (Dexcom at 50 families through Bardy Diagnostics at 35) can realistically close the gap through focused portfolio building in specialist sub-segments rather than broad-front competition.
Moderate concentrationNo co-applicant clusters detected in available data
The collaboration evidence is pending — no co-applicant filing pairs are captured in the current dataset. The presence of academic institutions (University of California, MIT, Mayo Foundation, Georgia Tech, Cornell) in the ranking alongside commercial players suggests that university–industry collaboration likely occurs through licensing or sponsored research rather than joint filings, but this cannot be confirmed from available patent data alone.
Collaboration: evidence pendingUS-centric protection with selective European and PCT coverage
The United States accounts for 895 records, the largest single jurisdiction, followed by Europe (EPO) at 376 and WIPO (PCT) at 311. India at 292 records is a notable outlier, suggesting active prosecution there either for market access or cost-efficient validation filings. China records 76, well below its typical share in other medtech sectors, which may reflect applicants’ caution around IP enforcement or competitive sensitivity. Japan at 46 records aligns with NTT and Toray’s presence in the ranking.
US-dominant, selective globalGo beyond the landscape: Eureka’s TRIZ Solution agent breaks down an R&D problem and returns patented concept solutions, each with a technical approach and cited patent & literature evidence.
Co-filing pairs, ranked by the number of jointly-filed patent families.
WHOOP and Medtronic lead distinct strategic tracks in wearable sensing
The top two applicants illustrate the two dominant approaches: a pure-play wearable specialist with a concentrated A61B focus versus a diversified medtech incumbent pairing diagnostic methods with clinical informatics and electrotherapy.
WHOOP Inc
WHOOP holds 171 patent families, the largest portfolio in this landscape. Its technology emphasis is tightly concentrated in A61B 5 (diagnostic measurement, 168 records), with secondary activity in G16H healthcare informatics (20 and 18 records across sub-classes). This near-exclusive focus on physiological signal acquisition and its clinical interpretation reflects WHOOP’s product identity as a continuous biometric monitoring platform. Applicant momentum data are not available in the current evidence set.
families: 171Medtronic Inc
Medtronic holds 139 patent families and pursues a broader technical agenda than the leader: A61B 5 (129 records) anchors the portfolio, but G16H 50 healthcare informatics (58 records) and A61N 1 electrotherapy (32 records) add clinical decision-support and therapeutic delivery dimensions that pure-play wearable companies do not address. This breadth positions Medtronic to integrate wearable sensing into closed-loop therapy systems — a distinct trajectory from fitness-oriented monitoring. Momentum data are not available in the current evidence set.
families: 139Under-served branches adjacent to the core diagnostic cluster
Five IPC branches sit at low shares relative to the dominant A61B core; two carry plausible technical value and realistic entry paths for teams seeking less-crowded claim space.
G06N · AI-driven inference on sensor streams
G06N (Computing based on AI models) holds 130 records and a 3% share of the total branch distribution — sparse relative to the 2,322-record A61B anchor. Wearable sensors generate continuous, noisy physiological streams that are well-suited to on-device or edge AI inference for anomaly detection, fatigue prediction, or early disease flagging. Entry paths include novel neural-network architectures optimised for low-power embedded processors, federated learning across sensor networks, and uncertainty quantification for clinical-grade outputs. Teams with ML depth but limited hardware background can contribute meaningfully here without competing directly in the saturated biosignal-acquisition space.
Search this in Eureka →A61N · Closed-loop electrotherapy integrated with wearables
A61N (Electrotherapy and radiation therapy) shows 87 records and a 2% share, suggesting that the link between continuous wearable sensing and feedback-driven therapy delivery remains underdeveloped in the patent record. Medtronic is the clearest incumbent here (32 A61N 1 records), but the space is otherwise sparse. A plausible entry path is wearable systems that detect a physiological event — arrhythmia, seizure, pain episode — and trigger a localised electrical or neuromodulation response without requiring clinical intervention. This requires cross-disciplinary expertise in sensing hardware, signal processing, and biocompatible electrode design.
Search this in Eureka →How leading applicants differ across technology routes
Strength of each leader across the main technology routes.
| Player | A61B 5 · Diagnosis & surgery | G16H 50 · Healthcare informatics | G16H 40 · Healthcare informatics | G16H 20 · Healthcare informatics | G16H 10 · Healthcare informatics |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| WHOOP Inc | Strong · 168 | Emerging · 18 | Emerging · 14 | Emerging · 19 | Absent |
| Medtronic Inc | Strong · 129 | Moderate · 58 | Emerging · 10 | Absent | Emerging · 6 |
| iRhythm Technologies Inc | Strong · 109 | Emerging · 12 | Moderate · 29 | Absent | Absent |
| Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation | Strong · 111 | Absent | Absent | Absent | Absent |
| Koninklijke Philips N.V. | Strong · 61 | Emerging · 12 | Moderate · 13 | Emerging · 5 | Absent |
| Toray Industries Inc | Strong · 72 | Absent | Absent | Absent | Absent |
| Cambridge Heartwear Limited | Strong · 38 | Moderate · 13 | Emerging · 7 | Absent | Absent |
Frequently asked questions
The analysis covers 1,898 patent families. This is the total corpus on which all rankings, trend charts, and technology composition figures are based.
WHOOP Inc holds the largest portfolio with 171 patent families, ahead of Medtronic (139), iRhythm Technologies (109), and Nippon Telegraph & Telephone (101).
Annual filing volume peaked at 296 in 2021 and has since eased, placing the field in a maturity stage. The multi-year baseline remains above 2017–2019 levels. The 2024 and 2025 figures should be treated as provisional due to patent publication lag.
The United States leads with 895 records, followed by Europe (EPO) at 376, WIPO (PCT) at 311, and India at 292. China records 76, notably lower than its share in many other medtech sectors.
A61B (Diagnosis and Surgery) dominates with 2,322 records. G16H (Healthcare Informatics) is a distant second at 589. G06N (AI models) and G06F (digital data processing) each sit near 130 records, reflecting growing but still modest AI integration.
The most under-served adjacent branches relative to the A61B core are G06N (AI-driven inference, 130 records, 3% share), G06F (digital data processing), G01N (material analysis for novel sensing chemistries), A61N (closed-loop electrotherapy, 87 records), and A61M (fluid delivery coupled with monitoring). These represent areas where claim density is lower and differentiated entry may be more achievable.
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Disclaimer. This page is generated from PatSnap Eureka data drawn from a limited snapshot of global patent and scientific-literature records, and is provided for general information and reference only.
Patent data carries inherent limitations: recent filings (typically the most recent 18–24 months) are under-counted due to standard publication lag; counts may be reported at either a patent-family or a patent-record basis and are not always directly comparable; classification, applicant-name, and citation data may contain errors, duplicates, or omissions; and the underlying search query defines and constrains the scope shown. As a result, the analysis may be incomplete or inaccurate and may not reflect the full technology landscape.
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