Trend Views: Visualize Your Sleep, Strain, and Recovery

See your weekly and monthly trends for Sleep, Strain, and Recovery to gauge your progress, hold yourself accountable, or get extra motivation.

One of the biggest benefits of being a WHOOP member is being able to understand your personal biometric data, from the amount of time you spent in REM sleep last night to how your heart rate increased during a workout. Now, we're giving you more ways to understand your data beyond a daily view with weekly, monthly, and 6-month trend views for Sleep, Strain, and Recovery. These trend views make it easier to evaluate your progress over time and can be especially helpful if you are undertaking longer-term training cycles, or if you want to see how small, daily changes can add up over time.

Understanding progress through WHOOP data

Fitness progress tracking measures how your body adapts to training, not just what exercises you perform. WHOOP tracks physiological changes through metrics like resting heart rate, HRV, and sleep quality to show whether your training is working.

Unlike traditional workout trackers that focus on what you did, WHOOP focuses on how your body responded. This distinction matters because two people can perform the same workout and experience entirely different physiological outcomes based on their recovery state and sleep quality. By monitoring your body's internal signals rather than just external activities, you gain clarity on what's actually driving progress and what might be holding you back.

Types of progress you can track

Progress isn't one-dimensional. With WHOOP, you can monitor several areas of your health to see how your efforts are paying off:

• Cardiovascular fitness: VO₂ Max and resting heart rate improvements
• Recovery efficiency: HRV and sleep performance trends
• Training adaptation: Strain and Recovery score patterns

Cardiovascular fitness improvements show up as declining resting heart rate and increasing VO₂ Max over weeks and months. Recovery efficiency becomes visible through consistent HRV patterns and higher Recovery scores.

Training adaptation reveals itself through your ability to handle higher Strain with better subsequent Recovery, helping you identify whether you're in optimal, overreaching, or restoring training zones. Together, these dimensions provide a comprehensive view of your progress.

Trend views you can see

View weekly, monthly, and 6-month trends across Sleep, Strain, and Recovery, including in-depth views of:

Sleep

• Sleep Performance
• Hours vs. Need
• Time in Bed
• Sleep Consistency
• Restorative Sleep (%)
• Restorative Sleep (Hours)
• Efficiency
• Sleep Debt

Strain

• Day Strain
• Strength Activity Time
• Calories Burned
• Average HR
• Steps
• Heart Rate Zones (1-3)
• Heart Rate Zones (4-5)
• VO₂ Max

Recovery

• Recovery Score
• Resting Heart Rate
• Heart Rate Variability
• Respiratory Rate

Other

• Body Composition
• Weight
• Total Day Stress
• Sleep Stress
• Non-Activity Stress

How to access trend views

To see your trends, head to the Sleep, Strain, or Recovery section of the app, and scroll down to view your weekly trends.

Trends to look for in your own data

As you get fitter, you'll likely notice your resting heart rate decreasing. Key signs of improvement include:

• Lower resting heart rate: Your heart muscle pumps more blood per beat
• Improved efficiency: Your heart works less to deliver oxygen to muscles
• Better fitness: Overall cardiovascular performance increases

Changes in your heart rate variability (HRV) signal important fitness and health information:

• High HRV: Balanced nervous system, ready for strenuous activities
• Low HRV: May indicate illness, dehydration, fatigue, or overtraining
• HRV trends: Show overall improvements to fitness over time and help you make smarter training decisions

Changes to your activity Strain can be a sign of improving fitness. Strain is calculated by looking at your cardiovascular and muscular load. The higher your heart rate and the longer it stays elevated means a higher Strain. Additionally, the more muscular load you put on your body, the higher your strain. As your body adapts and your fitness improves, your Strain scores will likely decrease.

How athletes are using trends

Pro cyclist Alex Howes looks at his data trends to better understand his baselines, to optimize his training cycles, and to see how any changes he makes are affecting him both in the short term and the long term. In June 2022, Alex had his lowest Recovery ever — 1% — after the grueling Unbound Gravel race, the biggest gravel cycle event in the U.S., during which he was unknowingly fighting COVID-19. Alex had been traveling extensively before the event and didn't feel well, but decided to race anyway after taking 7 negative COVID tests.

While his daily data indicated something was amiss, when reviewing his 1-month data trends, he could see exactly when COVID hit, and how long it took for his body to fully recover after battling the illness. The combination of Alex's 1% Recovery, a low personal HRV of 21 (ms) HRV, and a high 20.7 strain knocked Alex out for almost a month before he returned to his baseline — all visible in his trend views, especially in his Recovery, with a noticeable uptick in lower-than-average yellow and red Recoveries post-race and post-illness.

Start tracking your fitness progress with WHOOP

True progress is about seeing how your daily habits compound over time. Trend Views provide the lens to connect your behaviors to your outcomes, helping you understand what works for your body. By moving beyond daily numbers and focusing on your long-term trajectory, you can make smarter decisions that lead to sustainable fitness gains.

Ready to see your progress in a new light? Join WHOOP and start turning your data into direction.

Frequently asked questions about fitness progress tracking

How long before I can see meaningful trends in my WHOOP data?

Meaningful trends emerge after a few weeks as WHOOP establishes your baseline. Trends become most powerful over several months.

What's the difference between tracking workouts and tracking physiological progress?

Workout tracking logs activities performed. Physiological progress tracking measures how your body responds and adapts to training, sleep, and daily behaviors.

Why might my Recovery stay low even when I feel stronger?

Intense training periods can temporarily suppress Recovery scores as your body works to adapt to the increased load. This can be a sign of productive training stress. As long as this is balanced with adequate rest, you will see your fitness improve over time.

How do sleep trends relate to my fitness improvements?

Sleep is when your body repairs muscle tissue and performs recovery functions. Positive sleep trends like increased restorative sleep directly support training recovery and fitness improvements.

Can I track strength training progress with WHOOP trends?

Yes. By using completing Strength Activities, you can see how your strength training habits grow over time. As a contributor of Healthspan, this helps you understand how consistently you are building strength.