As smart textile sensors, or e-textiles, become more prominent in applications like healthcare, sports and fitness, military and safety, and fashion, the development is turning from if smart textile sensors work at all, to yes, the technology works, but how can we make it more user friendly?
And this means making these sensors:
- More durable and washable
- Lightweight with efficient power supplies
- Functional and comfortable
What is an e-textile?
E-textiles are smart fabrics packed with electronics, specifically sensors, that are built into clothing and that measure a variety of metrics depending on what the consumers desires from the smart clothing.
This smart fabric senses its environment around it and acts accordingly. In advanced smart clothing, fabric can respond to data gathered by sensors and trigger a physical change. This could be anything from adjusting temperature — heating up or cooling down a jacket — or changing color based on UV exposure or even alerting a user to chemicals in their immediate environment.
However, most e-textiles are used for traditional tasks such as:
- Measuring body temperature
- Monitoring heart and respiration rate
- Recording metrics for range of motion or muscle activity
- Monitoring vital signs or detecting injuries
- Identifying soldiers' locations
- Detecting stress or fatigue
The global smart textile market size is projected to reach $21.46 billion by 2033, growing at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 22.51%, up from $4.23 billion in 2025, according to Straits Research.
The pattern of creating smart textile sensors for smart clothing. Source: Kaunas University of Technology
Durability and washability
When it comes to clothing, it must be washable. It must last so that a user can wear it for multiple years if not longer. When it comes to sensors inside smart clothing, they must do the same.
Washability continues to be one of the main obstacles that stands in the path of wider success of e-textiles. It is paramount that these sensors withstand regular use and wash cycles without any degradation to the technology. The washability and durability of sensors inside smart clothing depends on three factors:
- Material selection
- Design
- Washing conditions
Gentle washing cycles and mild detergents can reduce the risk to smart clothing while the right materials may have a better chance to protect the electronic components inside. Design focuses on how these sensors can be integrated with as little mechanical stress as possible.
So far, e-textiles have not been robust enough to withstand repeated wash and wear and there are no standardized methods created for washing e-textiles.
According to Kaunas University of Technology, this may be changing as new advances in the robust flexible e-textiles market are becoming a focus for vendors.
The research found that washable and durable e-textiles are the key to satisfying consumer requirements for future wearable smart clothing. To reliably and consistently perform the correct functions for daily life events with comfort, the washability of e-textiles depends on the geometry of adopted textile interfaces, the Kaunas researchers said.
Researchers developed a wearable e-textile pressure sensor by weaving embedded electrospun nanofiber yarn. The device had superior stability with insignificant change against 10,000 operation cycles. The electrospun non-woven fabric made of nylon and carbon was highly washable with 100 hand wash cycles completed and could withstand different harsh environments for longer periods of time.
While these innovations are not yet mainstream, it shows where the technology is headed and could bring more advanced sensor features to smart clothing in a few years.
Schematic of a self-powered textile garment, having capabilities of harvesting different types of ambient energy and utilizing them for storing and powering different wearable and portable electronics. Source: The University of the West of England
Efficient, lightweight power
Step two toward developing advanced sensors in e-textiles is to develop these smart fabrics with a power source that is efficient, safe and lightweight enough that it doesn’t weigh the wearer down any more than a normal jacket or hoodie.
Early innovations of smart fabric used traditional batteries to power the sensors and other electronic components, but these made them highly unwashable, heavy and uncomfortable.
One potential path toward an efficient and lightweight power supply for sensors is through energy harvesting. There are a variety of types of energy harvesting materials that could be used in e-textiles, such as:
- Photovoltaic
- Thermoelectric
- Piezoelectric
- Triboelectric
Photovoltaic is direct sunlight driven energy harvesting with integrated sensors and components onto the outside of the clothing.
Piezoelectric solar cells can be woven into fabrics to provide a sustainable and lightweight power solution for integrated e-textile sensors. These energy harvesters generate electricity when subjected to mechanical stress, harvesting energy from movement or vibration in clothing.
Triboelectric materials generate electricity when rubbed or moved against other materials while thermoelectric is the conversion of ambient heat from various sources, such as human body temperature and industrial boilers, and so on, into electrical energy.
All of these technologies promise to decrease the weight and discomfort in these smart fabrics while also providing washability.
User comfort
A multi-sensor smart e-textile with LEDs and sensors that may soon be ready for mass production. Source: Messe Frankfurt
Maybe the most important aspect to the mass production of e-textiles is overall user comfort. It doesn’t matter how long something can last or how many times it can be washed if it isn’t something anyone will want to wear in the first place.
That means a balance of functionality with comfort is becoming equally important in the realm of sensors for e-textiles to increase widespread adoption.
Conclusion
One such option comes from the University of Cambridge, which just this year developed comfortable, washable smart pajamas that monitor sleep disorders such as sleep apnea without any need for patches, equipment or a visit to a sleep clinic. The lightweight embedded sensors in the PJs were trained via an AI algorithm and can identify six different sleep states with 98.6% accuracy.
This smart fabric conforms to all three fundamental challenges facing e-textiles and is an example of where e-textiles are headed in 2025 and beyond.
