Welcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: Product Endorsement: Apollo Neuro, published by Elizabeth on May 8, 2023 on LessWrong.

Short version: This $310 vibrating bracelet dramatically improved my sleep and moderately improved my emotional regulation. The return policy is pretty liberal so if this seems at all appealing I recommend trying it, or one of the cheaper alternatives I haven’t investigated. Between now and Mothers’ Day they are $300.

[note: the link I use here is an affiliate link that gives you a $40 discount and me a $40 Amazon gift card, but I think it won’t apply for either of us if you buy during the sale]

Backstory

I have a pretty liberal threshold for trying shit Facebook advertises to me. Most of it is crap, but every once in a while there is something amazing that justifies all the work and return fees. Previous purchases include resistance band clips that measure force applied, sleep-safe headphones that claimed to measure your HRV, and an infrared heat massage. But when I first looked at the Apollo Neuro’s website, it was too dumb even for me. The explanation for how it worked was a mix of absent and stupid, and the rush to provide scientific evidence was somehow worse than nothing. I only tried it because a friend raved about it. He had also thought it sounded deeply stupid and only bought it because his friend raved about it, and I can only assume she also thought it was stupid until someone raved about it to her, in a great circle of life. Now it is your turn to be told it sounds stupid but it works.

[For some people. My sample size is only three people.]

Benefits to me

My sleep improved a lot. I don’t have precise metrics for this because fitbit is stupid, but 1-3 times a week I wake up feeling drugged (positive valence) because my muscles are so relaxed. This never happened before the neuro unless I took actual drugs. I also estimate my number of remembered wake-ups has been ~halved.

The Neuro has about 8 hours of battery. When I started using it I always woke up with the battery drained, meaning I’d activated it repeatedly. I now wake up with it at 70-90% charge, partially because I wake up less and thus am not turning it back on, and partially because I use less intense vibration.

[TBF I regularly take supplements for sleep, so what I really mean here is “unless I took more drugs than baseline”]

My emotional regulation improved as well. There were a number of stressful things I handled better than my baseline. Some of this is subjective, but there are a few things with obvious before-pictures. Most notably:I have pretty bad medical anxiety, due most notably to dental malpratice leaving me with painful nerve damage, but also some other stuff. Last fall I had a doctor’s appointment on Friday, followed by friend’s child’s medical emergency on Saturday that, due to their newness to the country, I needed to be in charge for. I did it, but I was wrecked for at least a day afterwards, possibly more, and my partner had to put in a lot of emotional energy helping me recover. ~4 weeks into using the Apollo Neuro I had a dentist appointment in the afternoon, followed 8 hours later by a friend’s medical emergency requiring my attention and eventually a 3AM field trip to the ER for which I was the only available driver.

I did have a little freak out once I was home, but I recovered to normal faster than I did from the incident in the fall despite that having been a less intense day with more help.

I also found myself more decisively liking and disliking things, and noticing when things shifted. At parties the transition from “I’m enjoying this” to “I’m done” is clearer, without a lot of “maybe I should hold out and it will get better”.

Mechanics

The website is stupid, so let me tell you how it really works. The Neuro is shaped like a watch with a large rectangular face. You can wear it around...