Having good posture is important. Not only does it keep your back from getting misaligned and ending up with scoliosis, it will make your parents and teachers happy. Don’t you remember being told to sit up straight and not slouch when you were younger? I sure do! I remember being told not to slouch – whether it was at the dinner table or at school. I didn’t really care and felt that slouching was more comfortable, so I kept doing it.
It was not until I was older that I realized all the damage that the slouching did. Luckily, I developed a minor condition that was easy and relative cheap to treat so it does not even bother me anymore, but still the memory is there. Sitting up straight and maintaining good posture is key for getting a job because it makes you look confident and professional. You cannot expect to get a job if you show up at the interview and slouch. It just won’t happen.
When your posture is bad, you could run into all kinds of problems, like severe back pain and other joint problems. With good postures, all of your muscles, ligaments, and joints work as they were designed to and your risk of developing back problems stays low. And guess what, muscle problems are not rare at all. Roughly half of the United States population is dealing with some kind of muscle problem and those cost a lot of money to treat each year.
And it is so easy to screw up your posture and end up with muscle problems. Seriously, just positioning yourself wrong and staying in that position for as short as 15 minutes can cause serious damage and cause you to develop a condition.
About Posture Wearable Devices
Thankfully there is a huge focus on living healthy lives now in the United States. While there is still a long way to go, technology companies have been going all out trying to develop perfect products to help with various conditions. And muscle problems caused by poor posture are one of those fields where technology has us covered.
Let’s take a look at some of the best posture wearable devices that help you improve your posture by monitoring it and alerting you when your posture is poor.
1. UpRight Posture Trainer
This is a nice device that you can attach quite easily to your back. How does it work? Pretty simply actually. Once it is attached, it will start monitoring your posture to make sure you are sitting up straight in good form. If you begin slouching, the device will start vibrating to alert you to fix your posture. Constantly using a product like this will help you get adjusted to always having a good posture. I suppose that is why it is called a posture trainer.
That is not all this little gadget does either. It also comes packed with various built-in programs that can assist you in fixing your posture. It really goes out of its way to “train” your body to constantly have good posture. A regimen that I recommend is that when you first get this gadget, use it for 15 minutes a day. Soon, the muscles in your back will get stronger and you will be able to train your posture for longer periods a day until it becomes second nature to you.
2. Prana
Prana is an interesting device that monitors both your breathing and your posture. Various studies have proven that there is a connection between your breathing and your posture, and Prana seeks to capture this connection to give you the best posture training experience.
On top of fixing your posture, Prana can also help you breathe better – which in turn will help you relieve your stress and have a heightened concentration of whatever you are doing. And of course, breathing better and having better posture will also reduce any back discomfort you may be having. It is a win-win!
Prana is a really simple little device too. Its look can be really deceiving because it is just a tiny disc-shaped device that you attach to the waistband of your bottoms. I say its look is deceiving because it serves a lot of purposes and gets a lot done for being such a tiny simple-looking device. I mean, this gizmo monitors the way you breathe as well as your posture and is able to calculate scores for both and recommend ways to fix your breathing and posture.
Also, it “trains” you through developing patterns for you to follow and even conjures up some games to help you get more used to the changes in your breathing and posture.
3. Lumo Lift
Lumo Lift works like the previous two devices, but I think it deserves a mention because it is a well-made product by a great brand. Just like the others, it attaches to your back and tracks your various facets of your posture. And if begin slouching or sitting improperly, it vibrates to notify you to fix it, thus training you to sit and stand properly.
One thing that sets this device apart is that it also serves as a pedometer. It will record how many steps you have walked and how far you have walked. Another useful and unique feature of the Lumo Lift is that it also records how many calories you have burned in the process.
4. Alex
Alex slightly differs from the other devices on this list because instead of being attached to your back or your clothing, it gets placed and is set snugly on the backside of your neck. And while it differs in where it is placed, it also differs in what it monitors and how it works to fix your posture.
While the other devices on this list worked on recording the way you are sitting and standing to see if your back posture was good, this device focuses on your head and neck posture.
The Alex device is able to monitor the angle your neck is at as well as where your head is in relation to your body. This enables it to be able to indicate if you are holding your head up improperly.
Whether it be too high or too low, the Alex will alert you to fix your head and neck position to train you to have good posture. And like the other devices on this list, it has a mobile phone app which allows you to see all of the data that it records and also allows you to view the progress that you have made.
5. Darma Sit Smart Cushion
This device is the black sheep of this list, as it is nothing like anything else listed here in the sense that it doesn’t actually attach to your back. And that I think is what makes this product special. It is exactly as the name seems to indicate – a seat cushion. Not only that, but a smart seat cushion.
In a world where our household items are becoming increasingly “smart”, a seat cushion is something I never would have expected to go through that transformation. Anyways, the cushion is padded with memory foam and has built-in sensors that track your posture.
If your posture is bad, the cushion will vibrate. What’s more is that the cushion comes with a mobile phone app (this is what really makes it a SMART seat cushion), which allows the device to send a notification to your phone if your posture is bad along with the cushion vibrating.
Amazingly enough, the sensors in the cushion don’t only track and record your posture. Through the app, your levels of stress, respiration, and heart rate are recorded. And much like the Prana, the Darma Sit Smart Cushion app will recommend ways to make you breathe better if the data it records indicates breathing problems. Additionally, the app offers ways to relieve back pain by doing various stretches and other exercises.
The Darma Sit Smart Cushion runs on a rechargeable battery with a remarkable battery life. You will not need to charge it until after about 14 days of use. And this device was made with some really smart materials, such as the widely touted (by the makers) “Fiber Optical Sensor Technology” to ensure that your readings are precise enough to seem like a doctor recorded them.
Best Posture Wearables Conclusion
Whichever product you decide to purchase and use, I think you will be satisfied with the results. These posture wearable devices are all well made by very trusted companies that use start of the art technology that offer integration with mobile devices and personal computers.
I hope that this article has convinced and motivated you to actually start caring about fixing your posture. I would rather this article be your wake-up call instead of what was my wake-up call – a diagnosis of a back problem. It was not fun and caused me a lot of unnecessary stress and pain. Seriously, just take the steps to fix your posture before you develop any kind of problem.
