What do the symbols on a blood pressure monitor mean?
Find it by its shape. 1. Pick what you see on the monitor’s screen. 2. Match the drawing. Each symbol here is backed by the manuals of at least two different makers, and where a manual gives health advice, the page quotes it word for word.
Check your monitor’s manual — makers differ.
Tap a shape — the symbols that use it appear here.
Heart — 2 symbols
Person — 2 symbols
Arm cuff — 1 symbol
Battery — 1 symbol
Letters — 2 symbols
Coloured bar — 1 symbol
Arrows or phone — 1 symbol
Before you trust any chart, including this one
No published standard we could check defines the icons on a blood pressure monitor’s screen. The standard Omron’s manuals cite, ISO 81060-2, covers how accurately a monitor measures in a clinical test, not what its display symbols look like, so every meaning on these pages is taken from makers’ own manuals.
- Most symbols around the numbers describe the measurement, not your health: whether you moved, whether the cuff sat right, whether the pulse was uneven while the cuff was deflating.
- A plain blinking heart during the measurement is normal. The irregular-heartbeat mark is a different drawing — a heart with a line, waves or a number, or the letters IHB — shown with the result.
- The coloured bar compares the reading with a table printed in the manual, and makers use different tables: WHO (A&D; Beurer cites WHO 1999), ESH, ESC and JSH (Microlife), ACC/AHA 2017 (Omron’s US models). The same 135/85 is red on the Microlife cited and green on the Beurer BM 54.
- Every maker cited tells you not to diagnose or treat yourself from the readings. Where a manual advises seeing a doctor, the symbol’s page quotes that maker’s words and says whose they are.
Maker by maker
- Omron. Two US manuals read, the BP7250 (5 Series) and BP7450 (10 Series). The irregular-heartbeat mark carries a 2, or a 3 for three times or more; instead of a colour bar there is a High symbol at 130/80 mmHg, from the ACC/AHA 2017 guideline. The BP7450 adds TruRead, three readings averaged, with its own symbol.
- A&D. The UA-611 / UA-651 manuals read. The irregular-heartbeat mark is called I.H.B.; the bar beside the screen is a “WHO Classification Indicator”.
- Beurer. The BM 54 and BM 28 manuals read. The colour bar is a “risk indicator”, sourced to WHO 1999 in the BM 54 manual; the BM 28 adds a resting indicator that says whether you were at rest while measuring.
- Microlife. The BP B3 AFIB Advanced manual read. It has both a PAD mark for any pulse irregularity and a separate AFIB mark, a green/yellow/red traffic-light triangle from the ESH, ESC and JSH guidelines, and numbered Err codes.
- Withings. The BPM Connect has no row of icons: it writes words and numbered errors on a small screen and shows the classification as the colour of its light, following ESH outside the USA and Canada and AHA inside them, per its user guide.
- Braun. Braun publishes its ExactFit manuals on braunhealthcare.com, but the site refused our requests when we checked on 2026-09-28, so nothing on these pages is sourced to Braun. If you own one, read the manual that came in the box.
- Sanitas. Sanitas is a Beurer brand. We read no Sanitas manual, so do not assume its drawings match the Beurer ones here.
Related pages
What these pages cannot do
- They do not identify a specific blood pressure monitor model. They say what a symbol means on the makes cited (A&D, A&D Medical, Beurer, Microlife, Omron, Withings); your model’s manual gives the exact thresholds, memory sizes and codes.
- They cannot tell you what a reading means for your health. None of the makers cited says its monitor diagnoses anything; where a manual says to see a doctor, the page quotes it and names the maker.
- They cannot check your monitor’s accuracy. Microlife, for one, recommends having its monitor “tested for accuracy every 2 years or after mechanical impact (e.g. being dropped)” through its own service; ask your monitor’s maker.
- Left out: AFIB (atrial fibrillation) symbol. Only Microlife’s manual among those we read shows it: the BP B3 AFIB Advanced manual says the symbol “indicates that atrial fibrillation was detected during the measurement”, that “the device is not intended to diagnose AF”, and that “it is recommended that you visit your doctor when the device gives an AFIB signal”. Omron sells AFib models, but we could not retrieve that manual, so there is no second maker yet.
- Left out: Resting indicator (Beurer) and TruRead or MAM modes (Omron, Microlife). Each is one maker’s own feature with its own drawing: Beurer’s resting indicator, Omron’s TruRead three-reading average and Microlife’s MAM double measurement do not share a symbol.
- Left out: Date and time setting. The screen simply shows the clock; no manual cited gives it a separate symbol. After a battery change Omron and Microlife flash the year to ask you to set it again.
- Left out: Symbols printed on the case or cuff (type BF, keep dry, read the manual). They are standard medical-equipment symbols that already have their own pages on this site, linked under Related pages above, so they are not repeated here.
Sources
Every document below is a maker’s own manual or support page, fetched and read on the date shown. Each symbol page quotes what its sources show.
- Omron: Omron — Instruction manual, 5 Series upper arm blood pressure monitor BP7250 (PDF) Checked 2026-09-28.
- Omron: Omron — Instruction manual, 10 Series upper arm blood pressure monitor BP7450 (PDF) Checked 2026-09-28.
- A&D: A&D — Instruction manual, digital blood pressure monitor UA-611 / UA-651 (PDF) Checked 2026-09-28.
- Beurer: Beurer — Instructions for use, upper arm blood pressure monitor BM 54 (PDF) Checked 2026-09-28.
- Beurer: Beurer — Instructions for use, upper arm blood pressure monitor BM 28 (PDF) Checked 2026-09-28.
- Microlife: Microlife — Instruction manual, BP B3 AFIB Advanced (PDF) Checked 2026-09-28.
- A&D Medical: A&D Medical — Instruction manual, basic blood pressure monitor UA-651 (PDF) Checked 2026-09-28.
- Withings: Withings support — BPM Connect: an error message is displayed on the screen Checked 2026-09-28.
- Withings: Withings support — BPM Connect: what does the color of the LED mean? Checked 2026-09-28.
- Withings: Withings — BPM Connect user guide (PDF) Checked 2026-09-28.