Fitness wearables

[DiehardHardwarejunkie]

Hi Guys, 

 

Just wondering if Linus or anyone has in the past made a statement around whether they would or would not review wearables like Garmin  smartwatches? I would personally find this quite useful as as the market is very confusing as there is so much they can do but it's such a wide range. 

 

Thoughts?

[Spotty]

They've featured several smart watches on their ShortCircuit channel in the past.

https://www.youtube.com/@ShortCircuit/search?query=watch

 

It doesn't look like they've covered any by Garmin. If they haven't covered something you think would be interesting you could always suggest they cover it. You can make suggestions for ShortCircuit videos here:

 

 

1 hour ago, DiehardHardwarejunkie said:

I would personally find this quite useful as as the market is very confusing as there is so much they can do but it's such a wide range. 

You can always make a post in the Phones & Tablets section on the forum and ask the community for advice about smart & fitness watches.

[Space Potato]

The market is confusing because there are several different types of devices all marketed to different groups and all using the same names. I'm going to use the watches as an example because they seem to be the most common to me

 

I split them up into three following groups, names aren't important. All of these kinds of watch will show up if you search amazon for "running watch"

Pedometers: This includes the screen-less step counters that have little more than a accelerometer and a bluetooth connection. The original fitbits fall into this category as they evolved from the ball-switch style step counters. They use the accelerometer to track activity and make a good guess about steps, distance, calories burned, etc. (Modern ones often do have screens that can show data but I'll get to that.) I'd also include other singe use trackers here, like that water bottle that tracks how much water you drink throughout the day, smart scales (but not a wearable), etc.

Heart Rate Trackers: These have all the above functionality but also usually have a heart rate monitor and O2 monitor for measuring how hard you're working, more accurately make guesses about energy burned, how effective your training is, etc. Some of these can do GPS tracking by piggybacking off your phone's GPS utilizing whatever companion app the watch uses. If your techie friend who like to exercise uses it for exercising  then it's probably here at a minimum.

Activity Trackers: These usually are designed more for tracking specific activities like running or biking but usually include all the above features as well as a in-built GPS (so many of the garmin watches sit here) and a few extra sensors ranging from sweat detection to support for external pedometers and chest strap HRMs. There are a lot of options here but most of the differences look more like software unlocks than real physical differences. (This isn't quite true but isn't quite wrong either) The associated apps for these often have a lot of stuff about training plans, VO2 max measurement, etc.

 

The thing that makes this really confusing and kind of mucks up the categories is each of these devices can have varying levels of typical smart-watch features like viewing text messages, notifications, answering calls, in-built microphones and speakers, etc. Then you have the actual smart watches that can usually do 80%-90% of what the activity trackers can to make you wonder how the $800 Garmin Epix is really worth it.

 

What I'd love to see is a more thought-out long form version of this kind of breakdown to kind of clear things up for people starting to look into this market. It can be hard to tell what is a fitness devices with some useful smart features and what's a generic smart watch with some running features added, why anyone would care about the difference, and what the difference even is at the end of the day. However I imagine the audience for that isn't huge

[FailerCH]

On 2/26/2024 at 4:40 AM, Space Potato said:

The market is confusing because there are several different types of devices all marketed to different groups and all using the same names. I'm going to use the watches as an example because they seem to be the most common to me

 

I split them up into three following groups, names aren't important. All of these kinds of watch will show up if you search amazon for "running watch"

Pedometers: This includes the screen-less step counters that have little more than a accelerometer and a bluetooth connection. The original fitbits fall into this category as they evolved from the ball-switch style step counters. They use the accelerometer to track activity and make a good guess about steps, distance, calories burned, etc. (Modern ones often do have screens that can show data but I'll get to that.) I'd also include other singe use trackers here, like that water bottle that tracks how much water you drink throughout the day, smart scales (but not a wearable), etc.

Heart Rate Trackers: These have all the above functionality but also usually have a heart rate monitor and O2 monitor for measuring how hard you're working, more accurately make guesses about energy burned, how effective your training is, etc. Some of these can do GPS tracking by piggybacking off your phone's GPS utilizing whatever companion app the watch uses. If your techie friend who like to exercise uses it for exercising  then it's probably here at a minimum.

Activity Trackers: These usually are designed more for tracking specific activities like running or biking but usually include all the above features as well as a in-built GPS (so many of the garmin watches sit here) and a few extra sensors ranging from sweat detection to support for external pedometers and chest strap HRMs. There are a lot of options here but most of the differences look more like software unlocks than real physical differences. (This isn't quite true but isn't quite wrong either) The associated apps for these often have a lot of stuff about training plans, VO2 max measurement, etc.

 

The thing that makes this really confusing and kind of mucks up the categories is each of these devices can have varying levels of typical smart-watch features like viewing text messages, notifications, answering calls, in-built microphones and speakers, etc. Then you have the actual smart watches that can usually do 80%-90% of what the activity trackers can to make you wonder how the $800 Garmin Epix is really worth it.

 

What I'd love to see is a more thought-out long form version of this kind of breakdown to kind of clear things up for people starting to look into this market. It can be hard to tell what is a fitness devices with some useful smart features and what's a generic smart watch with some running features added, why anyone would care about the difference, and what the difference even is at the end of the day. However I imagine the audience for that isn't huge

What is super important is to note the software unlocks you mentioned. I use my Garmin Solar instinct almost exclusively for when I surf (quite a niche usecase) and for that you require the surfing specific model which allows you to have the tides on the watch. Which is a lot more useful than one might think as a surf instructor.

 

Because of those niche and specific usecases it becomes very difficult to make a guide of what to buy for example because one will always mainly look at the usecase specific to them as they can't judge if the other capabilities are any good. My tip is to go to that guy/girl you know that is insane in the sport you do and ask him/her for his/her advice as they will probably have gone through a couple and usually have opinions on the ones they have used.

[Space Potato]

On 2/27/2024 at 8:11 AM, FailerCH said:

What is super important is to note the software unlocks you mentioned. I use my Garmin Solar instinct almost exclusively for when I surf (quite a niche usecase) and for that you require the surfing specific model which allows you to have the tides on the watch. Which is a lot more useful than one might think as a surf instructor.

 

Because of those niche and specific usecases it becomes very difficult to make a guide of what to buy for example because one will always mainly look at the usecase specific to them as they can't judge if the other capabilities are any good. My tip is to go to that guy/girl you know that is insane in the sport you do and ask him/her for his/her advice as they will probably have gone through a couple and usually have opinions on the ones they have used.

This is really the best way to go at it. I have a Garmin Forerunner and chose the specific model I did after talking to a bunch of other local runners about what they use, what kind of running they use it with, what they like/dislike etc. I used them to figure out what features I should care about and then worked from there. I ended up choosing the one I did because I needed to be able to run and track a marathon without carrying a phone, so the battery life (I'm a slow runner) and the ability to play music off the device pushed me to just a few specific models.

The value/$ equation is really hard to solve with these devices. The value will change dramatically depending on your use case.

 

One upside/downside to these devices is battery replacement is nearly impossible so you'll probably be able to use it for about five years at most. After your first one you'll have a lot of opinions about them to guide you to your next.