Why Does My Toilet Paper Have A Heartbeat?

Some fitness tracker users are experiencing heartbeats in various inanimate objects, like toilet paper, bananas, and teddy bears (and that last one is a little creepy).

By DAVID on October 9, 2018
(Photo by Dave Kotinsky/Getty Images for Fitbit)

Oh yes, the internet delivers yet another delightfully amusing story. Toilet paper has a heartbeat. Specifically, a roll of toilet paper. Some other cylindrical objects have also shown heartbeats. This has been with some fitness trackers, like a Fitbit, Apple Watch, or other watch-style trackers.

So, someone decided they would put their fitness tracker on a roll of toilet paper one day. It happened in China with the Xiaomi Mi Band 3 in the original story. Other people have tried the same thing with Apple Watches, Android trackers, and some others. In fact, they found that a roll of toilet paper has a heartbeat of about 81 bpm. A coffee mug had a beat of about 72, and a banana 77.

Let’s break down how heartbeat readers actually work. The sensor has a green light that shines onto our skin. Our blood absorbs that green light, and flows faster when our heart beats. Thus, simply by measuring how much of that green light is “absorbed” by our blood over a period of time, the sensor can calculate how many beats per minute our heart is working. So, basically what’s happening is that the surface of random objects reflects light back into the sensor, and it’s making a reading on that light. Give it a shot, let us know what object has a heartbeat. See some more information and more in-depth explanation over here.

Around the site