Today, Circular announced two new smart rings at IFA 2026: the Circular Ring 3 Pro and the Circular Ring 3 Slim. Both rings will enable wearers to make contactless payments with their fingers and receive haptic alerts to wake up without an alarm, as well as set health reminders.
The Circular Ring 3 Pro has FDA-cleared ECG for AFib detection, haptic vibration alerts, and NFC contactless payments. The Circular Ring 3 Slim is a more compact version of the Pro, without on-board ECG readings but with the same contactless payments and essential health monitoring.
To find out more about the two new rings, I sat down with Amaury Kosman, co-founder and CEO of Circular.
Vibrations are back
The Circular Ring 2 saw the removal of the vibrating alerts, but Kosman explains that the decision to add them back to the two new rings was due to user feedback. “At the time, we didn’t have the knowledge to combine the new ECG readings and the vibration, but with the Circular Ring 3 Pro, we’ve succeeded.”
Contactless payments are here
“Payment is something every big ring manufacturer [has been] trying to achieve, and we’re very happy to be able to combine payments and health tracking,” Kosman says. “To our knowledge, we are the first smart ring to do payment and health globally.”
Kosman confirmed that both rings will remain subscription-free; however, users will now have to opt into a subscription to use new blood pressure and glucose monitoring features.
Circular is giving users the option to choose a smaller and lighter ring
The main difference between the Circular Ring 3 Pro and the Circular Ring 3 Slim is that the latter is smaller and lighter and won’t have ECG readings. With the launch of the Oura Ring 5 earlier this year, it seems that smart ring brands have all entered a race to make their devices look more like jewelry and less like fitness trackers.
Kosman explained this decision: “We wanted to do a slimmed-down version of the Circular Ring 3 Pro because, of course, adding a lot of features to a ring makes it — I won’t say bulky, as it’s the same dimensions as the current Circular Ring 2 — but we’ve seen a move towards a slimmer shape. That’s why we came up with the Circular Ring 3 Slim. The only thing we removed is the ECG, because that’s the only feature that would make the ring bigger. It still has the vibrations, payments and other health features.”
“We wanted to do a slimmed-down version of the Circular Ring 3 Pro because, of course, adding a lot of features to a ring makes it — I won’t say bulky, as it’s the same dimensions as the current Circular Ring 2 — but we’ve seen a move towards a slimmer shape. .
The Circular Ring 3 Slim has a width of 5.9mm and a thickness of 2.35mm, weighing 1.9- 3 g depending on size. This makes it pretty similar to the Oura Ring 5, which has a width of 6.09mm and a thickness of 2.28mm.
The Circular Ring 3 Pro has a width of 6.8mm and a thickness of 2.78mm, making it pretty similar in size to the Circular Ring 2. The Circular Ring 3 Pro has a battery life of up to 12 days, whereas the Circular Ring 3 Slim will last up to 10 days. These are both improvements on the Circular Ring 2, which has a battery life of 7 days.
Both rings are expected to launch in 2027. At the time of writing, Circular hasn’t announced an exact release date or pricing for either ring, but we’ll be testing them as soon as possible, so stay tuned.
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