New guide: Which smartwatch should I buy?

MattMattMattUK

At the moment the Galaxy 7 watches are by far the best, largely because they have the battery life to last a full day and are fully smart. The Garmin watches are great, but are really enhanced fitness trackers, the same as the higher end Fitbit offerings. 

If I were looking for a full smartwatch it would be the Galaxy 7, if I were after an enhanced Fitness tracker it would be Garmin or Fitbit, however at the moment I would probably hold off, the Galaxy 8 is expected in July and has the Ultra 2 model as well, both with better battery life (3 days from a full charge), as well as full FitBit integration for those who want it, The Pixel Watch 4 (and potentially Pixel Watch Pro) are due in August, both are predicted to extend battery life to 48 hours. There are normally improvements every generation, but this generation is looking like a huge leap, new nodes for the chips, bigger battery capacity (Samsung may well go solid state) means it is actually worth holding off. That and if you buy at that point the old models get a lot cheaper if you do not want the improvements. 

MattMattMattUK

Emmia said:

Frozen_up_north said:

Whether you buy a watch or fitness tracker, what they “all” suffer from is poor visibility in sunlight. A display using the same technology as the Kindle Paperwhite has would solve the problem… but the manufacturers seem obsessed with colour displays rather than practical displays.

I don't personally have any issue seeing the display on my Garmin, even in strong sunlight.

I agree, I have no issue with my Fitbit Sense 2 and a friend has a Forerunner, no issues at all. 

Emmia

MattMattMattUK said:

At the moment the Galaxy 7 watches are by far the best, largely because they have the battery life to last a full day and are fully smart. The Garmin watches are great, but are really enhanced fitness trackers, the same as the higher end Fitbit offerings. 

If I were looking for a full smartwatch it would be the Galaxy 7, if I were after an enhanced Fitness tracker it would be Garmin or Fitbit, however at the moment I would probably hold off, the Galaxy 8 is expected in July and has the Ultra 2 model as well, both with better battery life (3 days from a full charge), as well as full FitBit integration for those who want it, The Pixel Watch 4 (and potentially Pixel Watch Pro) are due in August, both are predicted to extend battery life to 48 hours. There are normally improvements every generation, but this generation is looking like a huge leap, new nodes for the chips, bigger battery capacity (Samsung may well go solid state) means it is actually worth holding off. That and if you buy at that point the old models get a lot cheaper if you do not want the improvements. 

What do you mean by "full smart watch"?  I don't use my watch for calls or payments (payments are possible though), but it receives notifications and I can respond to an extent (with pre written messages).

MattMattMattUK

Emmia said:

MattMattMattUK said:

At the moment the Galaxy 7 watches are by far the best, largely because they have the battery life to last a full day and are fully smart. The Garmin watches are great, but are really enhanced fitness trackers, the same as the higher end Fitbit offerings. 

If I were looking for a full smartwatch it would be the Galaxy 7, if I were after an enhanced Fitness tracker it would be Garmin or Fitbit, however at the moment I would probably hold off, the Galaxy 8 is expected in July and has the Ultra 2 model as well, both with better battery life (3 days from a full charge), as well as full FitBit integration for those who want it, The Pixel Watch 4 (and potentially Pixel Watch Pro) are due in August, both are predicted to extend battery life to 48 hours. There are normally improvements every generation, but this generation is looking like a huge leap, new nodes for the chips, bigger battery capacity (Samsung may well go solid state) means it is actually worth holding off. That and if you buy at that point the old models get a lot cheaper if you do not want the improvements. 

What do you mean by "full smart watch"?  I don't use my watch for calls or payments (payments are possible though), but it receives notifications and I can respond to an extent (with pre written messages).

So something like my Fitbit Sense 2 is an enhanced fitness tracker, it does not allow app installation, no music control, it only mirrors notifications from a phone with limited interactivity with those notifications, limited Google Wallet capability, will do calls (but I never use it for that), the same with a lot of the Garmin options. On a full smart watch one can install apps, control everything directly (full integration with most phone functions), things like music control, full Wallet integration, voice to text, keyboards to type full replies (why one would do that I do not know) etc. 

Emmia

MattMattMattUK said:

Emmia said:

MattMattMattUK said:

At the moment the Galaxy 7 watches are by far the best, largely because they have the battery life to last a full day and are fully smart. The Garmin watches are great, but are really enhanced fitness trackers, the same as the higher end Fitbit offerings. 

If I were looking for a full smartwatch it would be the Galaxy 7, if I were after an enhanced Fitness tracker it would be Garmin or Fitbit, however at the moment I would probably hold off, the Galaxy 8 is expected in July and has the Ultra 2 model as well, both with better battery life (3 days from a full charge), as well as full FitBit integration for those who want it, The Pixel Watch 4 (and potentially Pixel Watch Pro) are due in August, both are predicted to extend battery life to 48 hours. There are normally improvements every generation, but this generation is looking like a huge leap, new nodes for the chips, bigger battery capacity (Samsung may well go solid state) means it is actually worth holding off. That and if you buy at that point the old models get a lot cheaper if you do not want the improvements. 

What do you mean by "full smart watch"?  I don't use my watch for calls or payments (payments are possible though), but it receives notifications and I can respond to an extent (with pre written messages).

So something like my Fitbit Sense 2 is an enhanced fitness tracker, it does not allow app installation, no music control, it only mirrors notifications from a phone with limited interactivity with those notifications, limited Google Wallet capability, will do calls (but I never use it for that), the same with a lot of the Garmin options. On a full smart watch one can install apps, control everything directly (full integration with most phone functions), things like music control, full Wallet integration, voice to text, keyboards to type full replies (why one would do that I do not know) etc. 

My Fenix has app installation, watchface customisation and music controls (and I can upload music playlists on Spotify or Deezer and listen to them on Bluetooth headphones). I find the idea of voice to text a bit odd generally, and shouting at your watch to tell your better half you'll be late for dinner, isn't high on my list of desires.

Agree on the typing - the screen will always be too small/fiddly. Garmin has payments as an option but only supports limited banks (or curve) but I don't bank with the supported banks and decided having tried it with curve that I didn't need payments on my watch after all!

Grumpy_chap

Emmia said:

I was thinking of the Vivosmart 5 - the reason I've not bought it,  is because I was,/am allergic to the silicone strap that came with my Fenix 6s, which got replaced (expensively) with one of the metal straps Garmin do.

The Vivosmart 5 packs a lot of features into a small and competitively priced device.  Current High Street price is around £130, but I bought mine in John Lewis as an "open box" device and it was a bargain £45.

The Vivosmart 5 does not have NFC so no Garmin Pay, no built-in GPS and no stairs counter.  There is "connected GPS" which means it maps your activity by using the GPS from the phone.  This is OK but a bit less reliable than proper built-in GPS (and requires you to carry the phone with you which I do not always do if running).  Maybe not a concern if only using as a second device as I do and it sounds like you propose to do.

The Vivosmart 5 does have some features that my Vivoactive 3 does not have - sleep tracker, body battery, menstrual cycle tracking (not useful for everyone, obviously), pulse-ox.

One of the "features" of the Vivosmart 5 is that the actual functional part can pop out of the standard band and there are a range of "fashion" bands available.  It is really simple to do, but I just kept the standard band.  As you noted, there is not a massive choice of replacement bands that are not silicone.  A major online auction site does show some nylon options when I looked a few moments ago and that could be a viable option as an alternative to silicon.

The Vivosmart 5 is relatively unobtrusive and I do wear it on my right wrist with regular watch on the left wrist.  It is still a bit bulky (11 mm thick) so does make some shirt cuffs feel tight.

No trouble reading the display outside in bright light, but sometimes I find the small font a struggle.  Difficult to get a large font on a small screen.

I like the fact the screen goes totally blank unless reading it.  This helps battery life and also makes the device unobtrusive.

finbaar

born_again said:

The longer the battery life the better.
One that has Battery Life quoted in hours is pretty pointless, if you want activity & sleep tracking.

Personally run a Huawei GT3 Pro. Over 2 years old & still lasts between 1 to 2 weeks. Average 50K a week walking.

Would have thought below would have been a better section. Than Phone & TV🤷‍♀️
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/categories/techie-stuff

I had Huawei GT Runner, which is very similar to the GT3 and that was a cracking device. I much much preferred it to all of the Garmin devices I had (a lot). I would have stuck with Huawei but I really wanted to pay using my watch and that's not possible in the UK with a Huawei watch. So I switched to the Ticwatch 5. It was OK. But I'm now on to the OnePlus Watch 2r. It's a good smart watch and decent fitness tracker. The battery life is decent for a full smart watch - four days with a couple of runs is no problem.