This vibrating app makes you feel better just by putting your iPhone on your heart

When Dr. David Rabin told me how Apollo Sessions worked, my exact first thought was, “poppycock.” This was an app, he said, that would turn my iPhone into a healing device using the vibrations of the phone’s haptic engine. By stimulating the vagus nerve—a core component of the parasympathetic nervous system responsible for the body’s recovery and relaxation mechanisms—using certain frequencies, this iOS app would make me feel different. It works, he assured me. With trauma patients in clinical settings, he claimed. As someone who is skeptical about wundermedicine by default, I didn’t believe it. But as someone who has lived through a few years of a traumatic experience, I was curious. I wanted to try it. 

And I’m glad I did.

The science behind Apollo

For 20 years, Rabin has studied chronic stress, focusing on the effects of addiction and trauma on veterans, women, and children. Witnessing the limitations of medication in treating these conditions, he and his colleagues at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center began exploring non-drug treatments. They discovered that various techniques, such as soothing touch, music, and talk therapy could induce a state of safety learning in the body, promoting recovery and reducing stress.   

This exploration led them to experiment with vibrations as a means to trigger the body’s natural relaxation response. “Just like music can calm your body or getting a hug can calm your body, we can send soothing vibrations that are like music composed for your touch receptor system in your body to trigger the safety nervous system,” Rabin explains.

These vibrations, akin to the calming rhythm of ocean waves or a cat’s purr, activate the vagus nerve. This is a key player in regulating the autonomic nervous system, which controls involuntary bodily functions such as heart rate, digestion, and respiration. By activating the vagus nerve, Apollo’s vibrations promote a shift towards the parasympathetic branch of the autonomic nervous system, responsible for rest and recovery. This shift counteracts the effects of chronic stress, which often keeps the body in a state of heightened arousal, leading to fatigue, anxiety, and difficulty concentrating. And since the vagus nerve can affect your state in different directions, if you manipulate the frequency of the vibration, you will trigger different physical responses.

The team’s initial research focused on using this technology to help veterans cope with trauma. However, they soon realized the potential benefits for everyday stress and began testing it on themselves and others in real-world situations. The results were so remarkable that they caught them by surprise: improved sleep, better focus, increased energy, and reduced reliance on stimulants like coffee. Recognizing the transformative potential of this discovery, Rabin and his colleagues decided to keep testing and eventually founded Apollo Neuroscience, a company that packaged what they learned into Apollo Neuro, a consumer wearable that used a haptic engine and software to help anyone destress (it was a finalist in our World Changing Ideas Award 2021).

According to Rabin, Apollo Neuro’s effectiveness is backed by rigorous scientific research. He claims that they have completed eight clinical double-blind, randomized placebo-controlled crossover trials, with more than 1,700 subjects. Three of them are published and five are currently accepted for publication or under peer review for publication in 2025, he says. The company also claims it has 13 more ongoing clinical trials at different hospitals. 

One of the reviewed studies he shared with me, published in the Journal of Rheumatology, demonstrates that the Apollo wearable device led to significant improvements in fatigue, reduced instances of Raynaud phenomenon (a condition affecting blood flow to extremities), and enhanced overall quality of life, including physical function, mood, sleep, and social participation. The study, which involved participants wearing the device for a minimum of 15 minutes daily for four weeks, showed that the technology was well-tolerated and used far beyond the requested time, with no adverse effects.   

The iPhone version

Building on the success of the wearable device, the company has now launched Apollo Sessions, an iPhone app that delivers a subset of the same therapeutic vibrations without the need for the wearable. The idea of using the always-stressful iPhone vibration for good may seem nuts, but according to Rabin, “Apollo Sessions takes the very device that often makes us feel overwhelmed and transforms it into a tool for calm and clarity.”

Rabin—who is also executive director at The Board of Medicine—tells me that the company’s mission is to “create technology that heals humanity.” “We designed the wearable to prove that that was possible,” he says, “and it does [but] not everybody can afford a wearable.” 

That’s when they looked at the haptic engines in phones to see if it was possible to do the same. It worked for the iPhone, he says, but not for Android phones, because they don’t have the same level of access to the haptic capabilities of the hardware. While the Apollo Neuro device—which is worn on the wrist or ankle—has more advanced features thanks to a more powerful haptic engine with a wider range of vibration intensities and patterns, the Apollo Sessions app offers only a subset of these functions. “The iPhone Apollo Sessions app makes the core vibration technology accessible to everyone,” Rabin says. “The wearable has all these advanced AI and sleep benefits the phone does not have. The app focuses on providing daytime relaxation and stress relief, too.”

Apollo Sessions offers a range of vibration patterns. These “Vibes”—as the company calls them—are designed to ease you into different states. Whether you need a boost of energy with “Espresso Shot,” a calming embrace with “Hug,” or a moment of relaxation with “Relax,” Rabin says Apollo Sessions can do that for you. He recommended that I start with the Hug Vibe—which is free to try—by placing the phone on your chest for two to five minutes, preferably in airplane mode with “do not disturb” enabled, to fully immerse in the experience for that limited time. He also said that I could put it on my yoga mat while I meditate or on the mattress while I go to sleep.

Does it actually work?

I tried it a few times. And, despite my natural skepticism, it does work. Perhaps it was self-suggestion. Maybe it’s a placebo effect. But it did what it says it does, especially the calming vibes. So well, in fact, that I asked my own therapist and he explained to me all the science behind this and other similar therapies associated with vibration and rhythm. 

The Apollo Sessions app is free. You can try the Hug one for two minutes, which should be enough to feel an effect. Or you can subscribe for $9.99 per month to go deeper, unlocking unlimited access to sessions that offer six different Vibes. Rabin says that the plan is to keep expanding this library as their research finds out the effect of other frequencies and vibration patterns.

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