Reading the Body: How WHOOP Is Rethinking Women’s Health

“Historically, the menstrual cycle was often treated as a source of variability that made research harder to control, rather than as a signal worth understanding,” explains Emily Capodilupo, SVP of Research, Algorithms and Data at WHOOP. For her, this reflects a much wider gap in the study of female physiology.

WHOOP’s approach begins with a simple shift in perspective: the menstrual cycle is not only relevant to fertility. It is closely connected to sleep, metabolism, cardiovascular response, stress and recovery. By observing these factors together over time, users can begin to recognise patterns that might otherwise seem random.

A familiar workout may suddenly create more strain. Sleep can feel less restorative despite lasting the same number of hours. Recovery may repeatedly drop at a certain point in the cycle. “The cycle can be a meaningful window into overall physiological resilience and how the body is adapting day to day,” says Capodilupo.

WHOOP’s Menstrual Cycle Insights are designed to make these connections more visible. Biometric data including resting heart rate, heart rate variability, skin temperature and respiratory rate is considered alongside personal cycle information. The platform can also anticipate more than 30 symptoms, from cramps and fatigue to mood changes and brain fog, based on individual patterns.

The aim is not to build life around a rigid cycle schedule. Bodies are too individual for universal rules about when women should train, rest or perform. Instead, the technology offers additional context. As Capodilupo explains, it can help users recognise “when to push, when to prioritise sleep, when to adjust intensity, and when their body may be asking for more recovery.”

Looking at cycle data together with sleep, stress and training can also change the questions we ask about our bodies. A low recovery score does not exist in isolation. It may relate to training load, elevated stress, disrupted sleep or a particular phase of the cycle. Connecting those signals shifts the focus from “What happened today?” to “How is my body responding, and what factors are influencing that response?”

The recent integration of Natural Cycles expands this approach into reproductive health. With compatible WHOOP devices, overnight skin temperature can be transferred automatically to the Natural Cycles app, where it contributes to personalised fertility insights. This allows users to view reproductive health alongside the data they already receive about recovery, activity and sleep. With the new Meridian band, WHOOP is also translating this approach into a more jewellery-like design, allowing the wearable to sit more naturally alongside everyday looks.

Ultimately, WHOOP’s growing focus on women’s health is about more than adding cycle tracking to a fitness platform. It reflects a broader change in how hormonal fluctuations are understood.

“Hormonal fluctuations are not simply a problem to manage; they are information,” Capodilupo says. “For too long, women have been asked to normalise discomfort or work around their physiology without being given tools to understand it.”

By making individual patterns more visible, WHOOP offers women a more informed relationship with their bodies. Not through generic advice or fixed expectations, but through data grounded in their own physiology. The cycle becomes neither an inconvenience nor something to overcome. It becomes part of the information the body has been communicating all along.