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Smart watch recommendations?
My husband's birthday is coming up and I want to get him a smartwatch that syncs with his Pixel. I was gifted an Apple 3 watch which I like a lot and would like to find something with the same sort of functionality for android. I tried going through watch reviews but ended up with buyers paralysis because there's so many to choose from. What would you recommend and why?
Edit: Fitness is not the key use I'm looking for.
I went from pebble to galaxy watch to Apple Watch. If you want a fitness tracker, there are plenty of options. If you want a true smart watch, Apple Watch is the only option. Galaxy watch comes the closest, but it is a poor imitation of an Apple Watch.
I just reread your post and saw you want something for android. Like I said, galaxy watch, but it is a poor copy. Another option would be an Apple Watch with friend setup, but your husband may not like that. In case you aren’t familiar, you get an AW SE or S6 with cellular. You set it up on your iPhone for your husband. You have to buy a plan for it, and have a compatible carrier. It works as an entirely separate device. It won’t connect to his phone. It will have a separate call and text number. It wouldn’t be a very elegant solution.
I feel the same way. I went from Huwawei W1 to the Apple Watch. What I will say is that the Huwawei watch looks unbelievably nice, like an actual watch rather than a dorky looking smart watch like the Apple Watch. However, the Apple Watch has far more utility and meaning in my day to day life.
It’s stupid, but completing those rings and having my watch nag me about it has done wonders for my fitness levels. At the very least, I feel very good mentally.
The alarm function is perhaps the best alarm function I’ve seen in a device ever - it just taps your wrist without any sound, which is so effective at waking me up and keeping me awake.
Lastly, the call functionality is brilliant. I often leave my phone in another room, but being able to take phone calls with the watch and not have to hold it close to my mouth for it to recognise my voice has been so helpful that I’m completely sold on the Apple Watch.
This feels really fanboy-ey of me to say, but I honestly think it’s true. Apple reinvented what a smart watch means. Other smart watches seem to be “let’s take a watch and give it some cool features”. The AW is “If the watch never existed, and we created it today with today’s technology, what would it be?” Using an Apple Watch was the impetus for me to switch to the Apple ecosystem. There really is nothing like it on the market.
This is an interesting way to put it and probably why I went from never wearing a watch for decades to using an AppleWatch. I never really saw the benefit of a watch, especially as cellphones became ubiquitous and I always had the time on me.
It also did correlate with me becoming more serious about my lifting routines. Going from fucking around to doing program lifting around the same time I got the AppleWatch. I know there are other fitness trackers that probably would have worked just as well, but the combination of it being a fitness tracker and seamlessly integrated into my electronics (automatically syncs with my AirPods, for example) and making me use my phone much less (a victory in my book) all together really put me over the edge and I upgrade my hardware regularly now.
Meanwhile, the Microsoft Band did (as far as I can tell, I haven't yet pulled the trigger on an Apple Watch) everything the current gen Apple Watch does and more, and was released 6 months before the original Apple Watch. I still miss my Windows phone, but I miss my Band even more. But as usual, Apple made it popular, which means Apple "(re)invented" it.
When you had the galaxy watch did you also have a samsung phone? How long ago did you have one?
I never would have ended up in the apple universe if not for the gift of that watch (it also came at an opportune time since my old phone was on it's last legs, and I was going through a fuck google phase). What I like the most about it is a) that it allows my phone to stay in my purse or pocket for most things, and b) it just works.
I had a galaxy s10e and galaxy watch from about March 2019 to April 2020. I also had the galaxy buds for most of that duration.
As an android user, I always thought the “It just works” mentality was absolutely stupid. Android just works too, and can do more besides. Now that I have given Apple a fair shake, I understand what it’s all about. In the Apple ecosystem, if you think of something that should work, but wasn’t advertised as such, it will likely work. On android, it will also likely work, but you need different apps and it works with big drawbacks.
Why do you find it to be a poor copy?
In every way that I've compared mine to some watch owners, my galaxy watch has been at least as good, if not better.
Galaxy watch has 4gb, AW has 16 or 32. Transferring music is about the same difficulty on each, but 2 gb of music is not much. There are no podcast apps on galaxy watch, and if there were, 2gb of podcasts is nothing.
Controlling HomeKit devices on AW is flawless. Controlling SmartThings devices on a galaxy watch with a Samsung phone is difficult.
Honestly, I never tried bixby, but Siri is quite useful on AW. Just as useful for what I use it for as google assistant.
Heart rate and gps tracking is inconsistent on GW, rock solid on AW.
Connecting bluetooth headphones (galaxy buds) to galaxy watch is a headache. AirPods to AW is seamless and automatic.
I had an issue where my phone battery suddenly became crap. I finally tracked it down to a companion app to a watch face I wasn’t actively using. Apps cannot kill battery life on Apple devices.
Apps actually support AW. Very few apps support tizen.
When you compare feature to feature, GW seems fine. When you use both, the difference is clear.
Edit: AW will keep your MacBook unlocked when you are nearby. Samsung hasn’t even thought of that.
That's a great answer, thanks. I think we've had wildly different experiences or use cases. To be clear, I am not using my watch as a phone replacement; I always have my phone with me in addition to the watch. If that's someone's use case, then they may have an experience more like mine. If you want to go somewhere without your phone and still have your watch function the same, then Apple Watch is probably the only really viable choice on the market.
I don't particularly use the GPS tracking (I use the phone instead), but my heart rate tracker works perfectly. I review the data for activity and sleep every day, and I've never had any issues. It's actually been interesting to see things like "Oh, I'm stressed and my heart rate went up as a result" in real time.
I use the watch in the general ecosystem of Galaxy Phone, Galaxy Buds, Galaxy Watch, Vehicle. It is absolutely seamless. If I'm out for a run, my phone never leaves it's secure spot, and I do all the controls I need from the watch, including the galaxy buds.
Now I haven't had an apple watch, but two of my coworkers have one. One of them uses it similarly to how I use my watch, and he's much less satisfied than I am. He was originally using it more like what I'm presuming you are doing (phone replacement) but was supremely dissatisfied with those results. In his (and my) opinion, it's not a strong enough device to be used other than as a loose connection to a phone.
I'm definitely not saying that you're wrong - this is something that I think is almost entirely subjective - but I do think that you're looking at things through a particular lens, and have made some claims that aren't backed up, like the heart rate tracking being inconsistent, or the headphones being difficult to sync.
My experience has been the complete opposite to yours, and add in the fact that my watch gets significantly better life between charges than the apple watch of either of my coworkers, and I think that there's definitely an argument to be made that the Galaxy Watch is not just a weak copy; it's different but it's not really a copy at all.
For what it’s worth, I never remember my GW being bad, and I don’t even regret the purchase. I loved it when I had it. But I used an AW for a few days before I decided it was worth dealing with an iOS phone for (though now I quite like iOS, especially since 14).
I had most issues with GW while swimming. I would have to tighten it to where it was almost cutting off circulation for it to record the whole time. And it had weird software limitations like no AOD in water lock mode. My first big workout with my used AW S3 cellular was a bike ride up to a lake, open water swim, and bike back down. I did this with my watch only, no phone, listening to podcasts the whole way (I think on my galaxy buds). HR tracking never missed a recording, and I didn’t have to tighten the band down. GPS was spot on, including some fairly accurate estimates when the watch was underwater for breast stroke. It even estimated what strokes I did for what distance pretty accurately.
The experiences of your coworkers are unfortunate. Nobody who spends this sort of money should have a bad experience, no matter who they buy from.
Enjoy your GW. It is a great product in its own right. It also has that wonderful spinning bezel. I quite like the AW Digital Crown, but it’s not the same as that awesome bezel. Also, the GW makes for a better formal watch since it doesn’t look like a glass slab on your wrist.
Which version of the Galaxy Watch did you have? I would guess just from this conversation that one of the issues with Galaxy Watch might be consistently, just because some of the things that you've listed as being problems are things that I specifically would list as non-problems that I love about it. For example, one of the things I enjoy is the high quality and accurate readings while swimming, which I did a ton of this summer.
One of the differences may be that I do have a third party watch band; I really did not like the one that came with the GW, and I had it on for about 10 minutes when I purchased another band.
I think that if you're looking for cellular connection, then the AW is 100% the way to go. If you want to leave your phone at home and have the watch as the hub to connect to things, the Galaxy Watch is not as good as the Apple Watch.
I do love the bezel, and I have worn it to a formal occasion and it looks good, though I think that an Apple Watch is also a really slick looking device.
I had the smaller GW with cellular.
Yeah, the AW can look good, but it doesn’t look like a traditional watch. I got the Milanese loop band and it looks spectacular.
Edit: I just saw someone else’s post about a GW 3. If there are new versions, I haven’t heard of them. Mine was just called the Galaxy Watch.
I'm a huge fan of the Withings Steel HR (and its subsequent model the "Scanwatch", which isn't fully released yet).
It's not a "smart watch", it's a watch which happens to be able to sync via bluetooth. It also tracks your sleep, which is the primary reason I bought it. I love its sober, professional look and long (multi-week) battery life.
I think a watch I have to take off every day to charge is just … annoying.
Thanks for this recommendation. I've been looking for something exactly like this.
I recommend getting a scanwatch in that case: https://www.withings.com/be/en/scanwatch - it's a different model, but truthfully it's more of an evolution of the HR. :)
I love the look of it! Is there any word on when it may be coming to the US?
It was just released in Europe last month (I got mine off a beta program), and is pending FDA approval for release in the US. "Before the holidays" is what they said they're expecting.
Thanks! I'll keep my eyes out for it!
It's fairly basic, but a lot of the Pebble folks are moving to the Amazfit Bip
I'm still a big Pebble fan, though. The Rebble project is slowly keeping things alive. The Pebbles aren't nearly as flashy as some other watches, though.
I've been using the Galaxy Watch for a while, it's really nice. Not sure what kinds of functionality are unique to Samsung phones like mine, but I don't think it's much.
I also have Galaxy watch. It's great; I've tweaked the settings enough that I get 6 or 7 days on each charge. There are loads of great apps, and it's waterproof. I find it tracks fitness / activity / sleep really well, and Galaxy Wear is pretty intuitive. I've replaced the stock watch band with a metal one from spigen, which I find more comfortable.
It is comparable in most ways to the Apple watch, at least as far as I've been able to compare.
Which iteration do you have, and do you use it mostly for fitness?
I have an SM-R800 which is the most current model, without mobile connectivity.
I do use it for fitness, though this was a less fitness oriented summer for me than the last few, and it was my first summer with this watch, so I didn't get quite as much out of it as I wanted. Notably through the summer I tracked a lot of things while swimming, but I also use it for jogging, step counting, and other activities. It was great at tracking distances, activity, heart rate, etc. I experienced no problems in any of these, and it synced really easily with Strava.
I use it for calendaring / scheduling extensively. I use the personal briefing feature every morning so I get an idea of what I'm going to be facing in the morning. The integration with Google Calendar is flawless. I also use it for time tracking / time management; I have a general outline for how I structure my day in Google Calendar, and I get very polite wrist buzzes when it's time for me to refocus.
I use it for calls and music management. If I'm out and about, I'll often have my phone in my pocket, my (Galaxy Bud) headphones in, and my wrist watch on. It lets me deal with the music easily, take or make calls, or do other activities which require some kind of tactile interaction (ie. not a voice command) but don't quite require me to get out my phone. If I don't have my headphones in, I can use it to do voice commands. It's all very seamless.
I use it as an indicator of whether a notification from my phone is important; I've gone through on my phone and indicated which notifications should be passed to my watch and which shouldn't. If a notification rings on my phone while I'm doing something, I may ignore it, but if it causes a notification on phone and watch, I will not.
I use it for monitoring my sleep quality and quantity, and I use it to gently wake me up in the morning. I find the vibration sensation to be much more effective at waking me than an aural alarm.
I've used it to clean up my phone's home screen - I no longer have a weather widget or pressure widget on my home screen on my phone.
I also use it as a watch! And that rounds out all the use cases I have for it.
I had the Fitbit versa for close to a year. I really enjoyed it. I have an Apple Watch now (I have an iPhone now too)
The versa had great battery life, was waterproof (i think) and had a heartrate Monitor and step counter. I think it also tracked sleep (it’s been a while :D)
My only issue was that it stopped synching with my phone after a year... other than that it was great.
I've enjoyed my Fitbit Versa 2, and preordered a Sense, but ended up returning it.
Not only was the preorder late, so I'd have gotten it much sooner if I'd just not preordered it and gone to the store, but the product flat out breaks most of its marketing promises.
SpO2 sensor? Just kidding. It's not even integrated into the OS. It's a feature of one specific watch face, cannot take on-demand readings, and only fudges up general trends while you're sleeping. Want to use a different watch face design on your smart watch? Well too bad, that sensor is just dead now. I can scarce believe they baked device driver code into a UI component, but that's what it looks like.
Integrated GPS? That actually works! You can go for a run now and not carry your phone! Oh, but they also removed the ability to load your music onto your watch now... so uh, go back and grab your phone. So basically the GPS chip is just a pointless battery drainer.
Google Assistant? ECG? Oh, ya, those aren't done yet. They'll be in some later software update, promise.
The hardware is really nicely done. It's really a top-class design. The watch software is just a train wreck, though. I just decided to stick with my Versa 2 until it dies. It disappoints me less.
WearOS doesn't have the best reputation at the moment due to its bugs and performance - but the Ticwatch Pro 3 looks to change that. It's the first watch with the new Snapdragon Wear 4100 processor and like most recent watches has 1GB of RAM. According to that review I linked above it works a lot better than previous generations. It's got another layer on top of the display too so you can use that for ambient mode to extend battery life to several days.
Overall I think WearOS is a better ecosystem choice than Fitbit, Tizen or anything else. Personally I think it's more well rounded than those with more choice for third party apps and watch faces. I quite like this one.
Or if you want something worse as a smartwatch but that you'll never have to charge take a look at this: https://youtu.be/g6ZmlqZaNoM
That Ticwatch Pro 3 review really got me interested. Do you have a watch that uses WearOs?
I used to have a WearOS watch, the Huwawei W1. I still miss it as it's the most fanciest looking watch I've ever owned, and it doubled up as a way to get notifications from my phone as well as being able to text back quickly (text, Whatsapp, etc - as long as the notification in Android supports replying back within the notification, you're good).
Bit late here. But yes I do. It's a Ticwatch E, an older, cheaper watch with half the RAM this has and a much worse CPU. It's not great, Google Assistant barely works, it's quite slow. I get a few random reboots and GPS fails to lock every now and then. But you can see in the video the Pro 3 is more than fast and reliable enough, completely different to my watch. The hardware has improved a lot in the last few years.
As for Wear OS itself, it'll be very similar to what I'm using and like the hardware it has improved a lot over time. So lots of choice of apps and watch faces, and using a site like FaceRepo and a supported app like this one there are many more user made ones. Personally I use Marine Commander - very information dense but in a nice way.
To the left of your watch face is shortcuts to calendar events and a few suggested actions. To the right are widgets, I have weather, heart rate and a hand wash timer. You can have a timer too, or agenda, fitness or news headlines. Below are notifications and above, quick settings.
You can reply from the watch if you get the Reply option in the notification on your phone. Most apps support it. You can use voice or the on screen keyboard.
For health related things you will have Google Fit and Mobvoi's apps as well so you can choose what to use. Sleep as Android can do sleep tracking.
And as for battery life, bear in mind the watch you're looking at has the extra low power display on top so you can extend battery life by using that, and if you really need to by turning off WearOS completely and using it as a regular watch. I think they say it lasts over a month like that.
Hopefully that answers some questions!
I'm very happy with my Samsung Galaxy Watch 3, which is paired with my Pixel 3. For much, much more see my review:
https://www.zdnet.com/article/review-samsung-galaxy-watch-3-finally-a-great-smartwatch-from-someone-other-than-apple/