Your baby’s heart begins to form approximately three weeks after conception. Starting from the fourth week, your baby’s heartbeat can be detected transvaginally. Starting from 12th week your doctor can detect a baby’s heart beating via a Doppler device, although many doctors wait longer to use a Doppler, as it’s quite difficult to find a heartbeat at such an early gestation.
It’s physically impossible to feel your baby’s heartbeat without the use of an outside device – your baby’s heart is a tiny organ buried inside its own body, then covered by layers of amniotic fluid, amniotic sac, uterus, muscle and skin. If you can feel a regular beat, it’s much more likely that:
- It’s your own heartbeat.
- It’s baby kicks or hiccups.
- If you have an anterior placenta, you may be able to feel the placental beat, in rare cases.
As a woman’s blood flow increases to cover her baby’s developmental needs, she can feel how her own blood pulsing in her lower abdomen. She can often feel the pulsations of her own aorta through her belly, as it is pushed closer to the surface of her belly with the changes in her body.
You can test to see that these rhythmic movements aren’t your baby’s heartbeat. Your baby’s heart works faster than your own – up to 160 beats per minute. Now feel the pulse on your neck or on your wrist and compare the rate with the pulsations you feel on your lower belly.
Important Note About Home Dopplers: While home fetal Dopplers are commercially available, they can be inaccurate and potentially misleading. These devices may pick up the mother’s own heartbeat, placental blood flow, or other sounds, which can be mistaken for the baby’s heartbeat. Additionally, inability to detect a heartbeat with a home device doesn’t indicate a problem – it often simply means the baby has moved or the device isn’t positioned correctly. Finding a fetal heartbeat requires training and experience that healthcare professionals possess. If you have any concerns about your baby’s wellbeing or want to hear the heartbeat, always consult your healthcare provider who has the proper equipment and expertise to accurately monitor your baby’s health.
Susannah is a certified Birth Doula through Childbirth International and the founder of Trimester Talk. With a background in journalism and digital strategy, she combines evidence-based research with real-world knowledge to create accessible content about pregnancy and parenting. She’s a mother of two and stepmother of two more, all of them now teenagers.