Fitness and wellness startups raised $2 billion in 2025, with the category seeing a healthy year-over-year increase amid the rise of wearable tech, lab-testing brands and more
As consumers grow more serious about their health, wellness is climbing investors’ priority lists, and the money is flowing.
Fitness and wellness startups raised $2 billion across 44 deals in 2025, moving from the eighth-most funded digital health category last year to third, according to Rock Health’s year-end funding report.
In a winner-take-all environment, wearable maker Oura captured nearly half of that total, raising $900 million. The round marked the largest digital health funding deal Rock Health says it has tracked since it began collecting data in 2011.
The Finnish smart-ring maker’s $900 million raise valued the company at roughly $11 billion. Since launching in 2015, Oura has sold more than 5.5 million rings, with over half of those sales coming in the past year alone, the company reported in 2025.
The popularity of smart rings isn’t just marketing hype. According to Circana, smart rings now account for 75% of all fitness tracker revenue, up from 46% a year earlier, with consumers under 34 nearly twice as likely to own one.
Still, even excluding Oura, funding in the category rose 13%, Rock Health noted, with companies including longevity platform Function, virtual nutrition service Nourish and sleep tech brand Eight Sleep securing sizable rounds in 2025.
There’s also been a notable shift as investors revisit consumer health. Rock Health points to renewed activity in direct-to-consumer lab testing, with Whoop, Oura, Function, Hims and Superpower all launching D2C testing offerings in 2025.
The report attributes that renewed interest to several converging trends: wearables becoming more commonplace, younger consumers embracing preventive care and longevity, growth in HSA and FSA accounts, enabling spending power and the role of AI in delivering more personalized health insights.
Looking ahead, Rock Health said it will be watching to see whether increased competition puts downward pressure on prices for services such as lab testing, whether companies can build durable ecosystems and whether wellness platforms are able to grow through benefits adoption.
To see Athletech News’ 2025-26 fitness and wellness Startups To Watch, click here.
