Health Connect is Android’s built-in system for syncing health and fitness data between apps on your phone. Instead of your step-tracking app, sleep app, and nutrition app each holding separate data that can’t talk to each other, Health Connect acts as a central hub where all that information is stored, shared, and controlled from one place.
How Health Connect Works
Think of Health Connect as a shared filing cabinet that sits on your phone. When you track a run in one app, that workout data gets written to Health Connect. Your calorie-tracking app can then read that same data without needing its own direct connection to the running app. This eliminates the messy web of app-to-app integrations that Android users previously dealt with.
All data stays on your device, not in the cloud. Health Connect doesn’t require a Google account, and it doesn’t upload your health information to a server. The permissions system is centralized, meaning you control exactly which apps can read or write each type of data from a single settings screen rather than digging through individual app permissions.
Where to Find It on Your Phone
If your phone runs Android 14 or newer, Health Connect is already built into your operating system. You don’t need to download anything. To access it, open Settings, then tap Security and Privacy, then Privacy Controls, then Health Connect.
If you’re on Android 13 or older, you’ll need to download the Health Connect app from the Google Play Store. Once installed, you can find it through Settings, then Apps, then All apps, then Health Connect. If you later update to Android 14, your phone automatically migrates your data from the standalone app to the built-in system version. Once that migration is complete, you can uninstall the old app without losing anything.
What Data It Tracks
Health Connect organizes information across six main categories, covering a surprisingly wide range of health metrics.
- Activity: Steps, distance, calories burned, floors climbed, exercise sessions, cycling cadence, speed, elevation gained, VO2 max, wheelchair pushes, and training plans.
- Body measurements: Weight, height, body fat percentage, bone mass, lean body mass, waist circumference, and hip circumference.
- Cycle tracking: Menstruation, ovulation tests, cervical mucus, skin temperature, and sexual activity.
- Nutrition: Hydration and nutritional intake.
- Sleep: Sleep sessions and stages.
- Vitals: Heart rate, resting heart rate, blood pressure, blood glucose, oxygen saturation, respiratory rate, and body temperature.
Beyond these six categories, Health Connect also supports medical records, including allergies, conditions, lab results, medications, immunizations, procedures, and visit history. Medical records are only accessible through your device settings, not through the standalone Health Connect app on older Android versions.
Health Connect vs. Google Fit
Health Connect is the replacement for Google Fit, not a companion to it. Google’s Fit API is officially scheduled for end of service by the end of 2026, and Google has told all developers using Fit APIs to transition away from them.
The key differences between the two are practical. Google Fit tied your data to your Google account and stored it in the cloud. Health Connect keeps everything on-device with no account required. Google Fit also relied on its own app ecosystem, while Health Connect is designed as a platform-level feature that any Android health or fitness app can plug into. If you’ve been using Google Fit, expect the apps you rely on to gradually shift their integrations over to Health Connect.
Which Apps Work With It
Most major fitness and health apps on Android either already support Health Connect or are in the process of adding it. Apps from Samsung Health, Fitbit, MyFitnessPal, Peloton, Oura, and Withings are among the well-known names in the ecosystem. You can check whether a specific app supports Health Connect by opening Health Connect in your settings and looking at the list of connected apps, or by checking the app’s own settings for a Health Connect integration option.
When you connect an app, you choose granular permissions. You might let your fitness tracker write step and heart rate data but block it from reading your nutrition logs. Each app’s access is visible and revocable from the central Health Connect screen at any time.
Managing Your Data and Privacy
Health Connect gives you direct control over everything it stores. From the settings screen, you can view all recorded data by category, see which app wrote each entry, and delete individual records or entire categories. You can also revoke an app’s access at any point, which stops it from reading or writing new data (though it doesn’t retroactively remove data the app already copied to its own storage).
Because the data lives locally on your phone, it’s tied to that device. If you switch phones, the data doesn’t automatically transfer unless the individual apps you use have their own cloud backup. This is a tradeoff of the privacy-first, on-device design. It keeps your health information off external servers, but it also means a factory reset or lost phone could mean losing that centralized history.