Google’s Shift from Google Fit to Health Connect: What It Means for Healthcare Interoperability

Google has been winding down the Google Fit APIs in stages. On May 1, 2024, the company stopped accepting new developer signups for the Google Fit REST and Android APIs. Both APIs are scheduled for end-of-service in late 2026, with Health Connect named as the recommended Android replacement and Fitbit Web API positioned for cross-platform use cases (per Google’s official deprecation notice and Android Health migration guide). For any team still pulling data from Google Fit in 2026, the migration window is closing. As one of the most popular platforms for tracking health and fitness, Google Fit has long been a go-to for users and app developers. This decision paves the way for a more integrated and future-focused solution.

Google Health Connect is set to take the reins as the company’s primary health data platform. Designed to bridge gaps between apps, devices, and healthcare systems, it aims to make data-sharing simpler and more efficient. For users of the best fitness apps and health and wellness apps, this shift could mean greater compatibility and convenience across multiple tools and services.

This shows just how important it is for different healthcare systems to be able to talk to each other. With EHR integration and better connectivity among Health Connect partners, Google Health Connect signals a step forward in creating a unified system for managing personal health and fitness data. This evolution has the potential to benefit not only individual users but also healthcare providers who rely on accurate and accessible information.

Why Google Is Moving Away from Google Fit?

Google Fit started as a fitness-tracking platform and never evolved into the data infrastructure that healthcare needs. The deprecation timeline reflects that gap. Google Fit was not built for FHIR, was not designed around Android’s modern on-device permission model, and predated the regulatory pressure that healthcare apps now face. Health Connect is the architecture Google chose to carry forward — and the API surface healthcare teams need to design against from this point on. Its limitations in managing complex healthcare data highlighted the need for a more integrated and scalable solution. Let’s understand more about it in more detail:

Challenges in Managing Modern Healthcare Data

Google Fit has been a trusted tool for fitness tracking, yet it struggles with the growing complexity of healthcare data. With the increasing need for platforms to manage detailed medical records, patient histories, and real-time health metrics, Google Fit’s infrastructure feels outdated. It wasn’t designed to handle the intricacies of healthcare interoperability or meet the demands of EHR integration.

❗Demand for Standardized Healthcare Data Protocols

The healthcare industry embraces standardized protocols like FHIR (Fast Healthcare Interoperability Resources) to enable smoother data exchange between systems. Google Fit lacks support for these evolving standards, making it less compatible with modern health and wellness apps and platforms. This shift towards standardized solutions is crucial for ensuring data consistency and improving communication across healthcare systems.

❗Need for Stronger Interoperability Frameworks

Health Connect, Google’s new platform, is designed to meet the demands of healthcare interoperability. Unlike Google Fit, it provides a more comprehensive framework for integrating data from multiple health and fitness apps. Health Connect partners benefit from improved data sharing and connectivity, ensuring users get a more unified experience across various fitness apps and healthcare solutions.

Related Read: The Interoperability Challenge in Healthcare

❗Addressing Limitations with Health Connect’s Features

Google Fit was primarily focused on fitness tracking, which left gaps in areas like secure data sharing and advanced health monitoring. Health Connect helps fill this gap by providing a strong system that helps healthcare providers and application developers build better health and wellness apps. This transition reflects Google’s commitment to enabling smarter, more efficient health solutions.

❗Aligning with the Future of Health and Wellness

As the focus shifts from general fitness to integrated health management, Google is aligning its strategy to stay ahead. Health Connect supports healthcare interoperability and ensures compatibility with the best health apps. This makes it a better choice for managing the complex requirements of modern healthcare systems while catering to a growing demand for personalized wellness solutions.

What is Google Health Connect?

Google Health Connect is a platform designed to unify health and fitness data from various apps, allowing users to track and manage their well-being in one place. Connecting different health and fitness apps offers users an easy way to monitor progress, set goals, and gain insights from their health data. The shift from Google Fit to Health Connect improves how data is shared, managed, and used across various health platforms, making it a step forward for better health tracking and accessibility.

Key Features and Capabilities of Google Health Connect

1️⃣ Data Unification

Health Connect brings together data from a variety of apps and devices. This unification means users no longer have to juggle information across multiple platforms. Instead, all the health data—from steps to sleep patterns—is aggregated into one streamlined location, offering a clearer overview of health.

2️⃣ Enhanced Interoperability

One of the core benefits of Health Connect is its focus on interoperability. It ensures that data from different fitness apps and devices can be exchanged seamlessly, allowing for better integration with healthcare systems and ensuring a more holistic view of a user’s health.

Related Read: The Future of Interoperability in Healthcare

3️⃣ Compliance with Healthcare Standards

Health Connect has been built with privacy and security, adhering to healthcare standards HIPAA and other data protection regulations. This makes it a reliable option for users who want to ensure their data is managed according to industry best practices, establishing trust with users and health professionals.

4️⃣ Integration with EHR Systems

The platform supports integration with Electronic Health Records (EHRs), making it easy for healthcare providers to access relevant fitness and health data. This integration helps streamline workflows and offers a more comprehensive view of a patient’s health, enabling better decision-making.

5️⃣ Partnerships with Health and Wellness Apps

Health Connect partners with top fitness and wellness apps, ensuring users can access a wide range of tools that help monitor their well-being. These partnerships allow the platform to expand its reach and provide more functionalities, making it one of the best health apps available today.

6️⃣ Improved User Experience

The platform prioritizes ease of use, allowing healthcare providers and patients to navigate health data quickly and effectively. With intuitive design and user-friendly interfaces, Health Connect is optimized to help users access insights without any unnecessary complexities.

The Role of Interoperability in Modern Healthcare

Healthcare interoperability enables different health systems and platforms to share and use patient data seamlessly. Data from EHRs, wearables, and fitness apps must integrate smoothly to improve patient care and streamline healthcare delivery.

Platforms like Health Connect and HealthConnect CoPilot advance interoperability by connecting wearables and health-tracking apps with clinical systems. This integration gives healthcare providers a complete view of a patient’s health, enabling informed care decisions and better health management.

For providers, interoperability reduces manual data entry, allowing more focus on patient care. Patients benefit from personalized treatment, improved care outcomes, and fewer errors through data-driven decisions.

Migrating From Google Fit to Health Connect: The Actual Steps

Migration is not a flag-flip. Google’s own guidance is explicit: “Don’t ask users to disconnect from Google Fit.” Instead, you offer Health Connect as a parallel option, prompt the user to grant permissions, and read from Health Connect going forward. There is no automatic data transfer between the two platforms.

Five concrete steps for an Android team:

1. Confirm your platform baseline.

Health Connect ships as a system component on Android 14 (API 34) and above. On Android 9 through 13, Health Connect is available as a separate APK from the Play Store — your app needs to handle the “Health Connect not installed” case. Plan for both paths if your install base spans both.

2. Add the Jetpack dependency.

dependencies {
implementation "androidx.health.connect:connect-client:1.1.0-alpha07"
}

(Use the current stable version from the Jetpack Health Connect release notes at publish time.)

3. Replace OAuth scopes with Android manifest permissions.

Google Fit used OAuth scopes for data access. Health Connect uses Android manifest permissions plus an on-device permission flow handled by the Health Connect PermissionController. Declare each data type you need in your manifest:

<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.health.READ_STEPS" />
<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.health.READ_HEART_RATE" />
<uses-permission android:name="android.permission.health.READ_SLEEP" />

There is no OAuth round-trip. Permissions are granted by the user inside the Health Connect app on-device, which is a meaningful privacy and friction improvement.

4. Map your existing Fit reads to Health Connect record types.

• Google Fit API → Health Connect Equivalent
• Recording API (steps) → StepsRecord
• History API (aggregates) → HealthConnectClient.aggregate()
• Session API (workouts) → ExerciseSessionRecord
• Sleep tracking → SleepSessionRecord
• Heart rate samples → HeartRateRecord
• SpO2 → OxygenSaturationRecord
• Body weight → WeightRecord
• Sensor API (real-time) → Android SensorManager + FusedLocationProviderClient

Note: There is no direct Health Connect equivalent to Fit’s Sensor API for real-time sensor streaming. For RPM use cases that require live data, you will route through the Android sensor framework (or a wearable SDK like the device manufacturer’s) and write summarized records to Health Connect for persistence.

5. Initialize the client and request permissions.

val healthConnectClient = HealthConnectClient.getOrCreate(context)

val permissions = setOf(
HealthPermission.getReadPermission(StepsRecord::class),
HealthPermission.getReadPermission(HeartRateRecord::class)
)

val granted = healthConnectClient.permissionController
.getGrantedPermissions()

if (!granted.containsAll(permissions)) {
// Launch permission request via PermissionController
}

For end-to-end implementation, Google’s Health Connect migration guide and the Health Connect codelab are the authoritative references and are kept current with the deprecation timeline.

What This Means for Remote Patient Monitoring (RPM) Apps

Any Remote Patient Monitoring platform that has been ingesting steps, heart rate, sleep, or weight from Google Fit needs a migration plan in production well before the late-2026 cutoff. The patient-facing app changes are not large in lines of code, but the user-experience flow does change: instead of a single OAuth consent screen at signup, your patients will be routed into the Health Connect app to grant permissions. Onboarding scripts and support documentation need to reflect that.

For a deeper dive on the wearable-app side of the build, see our wearable app development guide and the security expectations in our RPM data security guide. Teams already pulling Fit data continuously should also revisit our older Fetch Google Fit Data Continuously walkthrough because that pattern now needs replanning around Health Connect’s record-based model.

How HealthConnect CoPilot Simplifies the Transition?

HealthConnect CoPilot is a healthcare interoperability solution that simplifies data exchange across diverse systems, ensuring seamless integration between EHRs, wearable devices, and health and wellness apps. With support for FHIR APIs, HL7 standards, and advanced data synchronization capabilities, it enables real-time sharing of patient information while maintaining HIPAA compliance. It provides healthcare providers, payers, and patients a unified platform to access, manage, and utilize critical health data, bridging gaps between systems for better care coordination and enhanced operational efficiency.

✅ FHIR-Compliant Repository and R4 Format Support

HealthConnect CoPilot will prioritize compatibility with healthcare standards like FHIR, specifically the R4 format. This ensures that data shared between systems adheres to universal healthcare interoperability standards, making it integrate easily with existing EHR systems. This functionality will support healthcare providers, app developers, and Health Connect CoPilot partners in creating applications that can seamlessly communicate with EHR systems and other health and wellness apps.

✅ Conversion of Non-FHIR Formats to FHIR

To address the complexities of healthcare data, HealthConnect CoPilot plans to include tools for converting non-FHIR data formats into FHIR-compliant ones. This feature will help bridge gaps between legacy systems and modern platforms like Health Connect, ensuring a smoother data-sharing process. By automating this conversion, developers and healthcare organizations can save time and effort, reducing errors while maintaining data consistency.

✅ Complementary Solution to Google Health Connect

HealthConnect CoPilot can design solutions for those adopting Google Health Connect. It will serve as a middleware tool, streamlining the integration process for healthcare interoperability and fitness app developers. This approach ensures users can fully benefit from Google’s transition from Google Fit to Health Connect without losing data compatibility or functionality. With features improving data sharing across health and wellness apps, the tool will help organizations create better-connected ecosystems that meet modern healthcare needs.