Sporty and smart, Samsung’s Gear Fit is aiming to appeal toall by combining smartwatch features with fitness tracking
and a heart-rate monitor to boot. But is this wrist hybrid a hero?
Well, the 1.84-inch curved AMOLED screen is certainly striking, with a selection of watch
faces available and a home button that can be assigned to take you straight to your favourite
apps. It’s arguably better looking and more functional than its pure smartwatch cousin,
the Samsung Gear 2 (review on p115).
As well as the heart-rate tracker on the screen’s rear, which measures your pulse
pretty accurately using LEDs trained at
your veins, the Fit also sports a pedometer,sleep tracker and accelerometer for total
movement analysis. Without built-in GPS,though, the latter’s uses are limited to the
basic S-Health app – want to use fitness apps like Endomondo (right) and you’ll need to keep
your phone close by for now. There is useful, if basic, smartwatch functionality, such as SMS,
calls and email alerts, plus music controls,although they only work with Samsung’s own
software, so forget controlling Spotify playlists.
The Gear Fit battery lasts a solid four days and Bluetooth 4.0 syncing is oh-so simple, but
it currently only pairs with Samsung phones,which gives you a choice of 18 Android devices
but is far from comprehensive.
Is this the perfect mix of sport and smarts? Not quite, butit’s a strong option
in the wake of FuelBand’s farewell, and a personal best for Samsung.