I lost 100 pounds in 7 months: How a smart scale and an Apple Watch helped track my progress

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Close Home Health I lost 100 pounds in 7 months: How a smart scale and an Apple Watch helped track my progress While my iPhone and Apple Watch were core to my weight loss journey, I also have Android recommendations. Written by Adrian Kingsley-Hughes, Senior Contributing EditorSenior Contributing Editor July 22, 2026 at 12:24 p.m.

PT Written by Adrian Kingsley-Hughes, Senior Contributing EditorSenior Contributing Editor July 22, 2026 at 12:24 p.m. PT I went on a weight loss journey before going on a real journey.

Adrian Kingsley-Hughes/ZDNET Follow ZDNET: Add us as a preferred source on Google.ZDNET's key takeawaysMy Apple Watch and a $110 scale did the real work.I found a lot of apps useful, and some that weren't.

My scales helped me keep an eye out for muscle loss.Last year, on April 1 of all days, I started a weight-loss journey. I needed to shed over 100 pounds.

Part of the reason was health -- I'm a 50+ year-old man who wanted to keep doing the things I enjoy without various parts of me complaining too much. Part of it was pride -- I'd promised a friend I'd walk a section of the Camino Francés, from Sarria to Santiago de Compostela, with them that November.While my work involves a fair bit of sitting, I'm an avid hiker who spends a lot of my spare time outdoors, but covering about 80 miles in a week would be a lot easier without 100 extra pounds of timber strapped to my frame.

Also: Best blood pressure watches: I tested the top models that actually workWhen it came to the weight loss itself, I chose the GLP-1 Mounjaro route. (Technically, Mounjaro is a dual GIP/GLP-1 receptor agonist, not a pure GLP-1 semaglutide like Ozempic and Wegovy, but even medical professionals call it a GLP-1.) The relatively constant side effects of that -- from indigestion, nausea, and gastric upsets to lethargy and weird things that I'd never heard of before, like allodynia -- meant that it wasn't a particularly easy route.

However, it was incredibly efficient and allowed me to shift the bulk of the weight in 7 months at about 14 pounds per month. I'll leave discussion related to the specifics of GLP-1 medications out of this -- that's a conversation for you and your doctor -- but I will say that I'm glad I did it, and I'd do it again if I had to.I am going to talk about the gadgets and apps I used to monitor this weight-loss process, and to keep an eye on other metrics, and watch them change.

Apple Watch Ultra (and Android alternatives) For me, the Apple Watch Ultra was a cornerstone to my health and fitness plan. Adrian Kingsley-Hughes/ZDNET So, what gadgets did I use? Core to everything for me was my iPhone 17 Pro and Apple Watch Ultra.

I found the Apple Watch to be amazing at collecting not only workout data -- I'm a bit of a nerd and love looking back over hikes -- but it also collected a huge number of health metrics, including:VO2Max: This is the maximum amount of oxygen your body can use during exercise and is one of the strongest predictors of cardiovascular fitness and long-term mortality risk, with higher VO2max correlating with lower all-cause death rates in studies. A 2018 study by Mandsager et al., looking at cardiorespiratory fitness and mortality among 122,000+ patients, supports this claim.

Higher numbers are better.HRV (Heart rate variability): The variation in time between consecutive heartbeats, reflecting autonomic nervous system balance