Samsung’s first try at this kind of “smart” band, which shipped in 2014, launched with flaws; only worked with Samsung’s Galaxy phones; and initially only tracked a few activities — and it cost $200. In contrast, the new $170 Samsung Gear Fit2
Right now, though, there’s still a tradeoff with these things: you either go with something lightweight and simple, with a long-lasting battery, or you go for a bright, colorful display and sacrifice battery life. The Gear Fit 2 is the latter. But does the platonic form of the activity-tracking wearable even exist yet? I’d say no. And so in the world we’re currently in, where there is no fitness tracker that does it all, this is one of the best possible tradeoffs.
Samsung Gear Fit2
Samsung Gear Fit2 Product Information
Since the first thing you’ll notice will be its display, let’s cover that first. The Gear Fit 2 has a 1.5-inch Super AMOLED touchscreen. This display, with its black background and punchy colors, is glossy, rich, and responsive. It has a slight curve to it, like the first Gear Fit, but lacks the weird bezel of its predecessor.
And Samsung has opted to display all of the data vertically on the band, which means you don’t have to twist your wrist to read things like notifications.
To enjoy music, connect Gear Fit2 to Bluetooth speaker or headphones.
IP68 rating means it’s water-resistant in up to 5 feet of water for up to 30 minutes; rinse residue/dry after wet. See user manual.
Compatible with select devices using Android 4.4 and later with at least 1.5GB RAM. Supported devices may vary by carrier and device. Some features may not be available. For best results, connect with compatible Samsung Galaxy devices.
Gear Fit2 is also about the same size as the previous iteration – however it will now come in two sizes for different wrists: small (size of wrist: 125-170mm) and large (size of wrist: 155-210mm). It doesn’t sound like much but for people with smaller wrists, like me, it sounds like a chorus of Hallelujah. Generally, fitness trackers and smartwatches are now getting better at supplying us tiny wristed people with good fits, and a size small Gear Fit2 sits snug on my arm. The one button prong also fastens on like magic – quick, easy and hassle-free compared to the likes of Fitbits and Jawbones.
Despite the variations in sizes, there’s no difference in features, display size, resolution or battery, except that the large version is slightly heavier at 30 grams while the smaller is 28 grams.
There are also more colour options now as you can choose from black, blue and pink in both sizes. They aren’t the flashiest of options and while mine is black, the texture does give it an added layer to lessen the boring colours.
Activity tracking and heart rate
Keeping with the trend of auto-tracking, the Gear Fit2 can auto-detect and track steps, calories and sleep, along with being able to recognise when you’re doing squats, riding a bike, using a rowing machine or doing yoga, which it will then log accordingly. More on the fitness portion later.
Fit2 can also detect when you’re sleeping and napping. Fit2 then takes all this data and sticks it in a 24-hour log to give you a sense of what you’ve been up to. It even adds in times you didn’t have the wearable on so you’ll know when it wasn’t tracking.
It’s a neat service to see how many calories you’ve burned from each activity and when you’ve done everything. From what I can tell, it was also pretty accurate in noting my strenuous walking paces and light bouts of activity.
Water and caffeine intake are other areas you can track with Fit2. They’re basically the same app, which requires you manually record how much water or caffeine you’ve consumed – with the difference being that you’re trying to hit a target with water, and you’re trying to limit yourself with caffeine.
Fit2 also checks on your heart rate every 10 minutes, but monitoring becomes continuous once you begin tracking most activities. Some activities, like rowing and the “other workout” category in the list, don’t make use of heart rate tracking, though. You can also turn it off to conserve battery life and tag manual heart rate checks as specific activities to better keep track of each lull and spike.
For the most part, heart rate tracking has been shaky. If you’re pushing hard during more strenuous workouts, the Fit2’s heart rate measurements can be off by as much as 20 beats per minute compared to the Polar H7 heart rate sensor, which is worn on a strap around your chest, and the Garmin Fenix 3 HR.
The Fit2’s heart rate tracking is remains steady in general, with measurements often within two to 10 beats per minute from the Fenix 3 HR and Polar.
It’s worth noting that inconsistent heart rate is an ongoing issue with most wearables using optical sensors, as we’ve widely reported. However, our testing of Garmin and Fitbit devices have seen fairly decent reporting of heart rate (between 2-5bpm) until you push heavy interval loads where longer lag times kick in. With discrepancies of up to 10bpm in normal ranges, the Samsung Gear Fit2 doesn’t hit that standard, and will certainly fall below par for some users. That said, all optical heart rate sensors are imperfect, and choosing a device requires honesty about how you will use that data.
Fitness tracking
Though there’s no altimeter, Samsung says the Gear Fit2 can still detect when you walk up stairs. The other sensors packed inside include GPS, heart rate monitor, gyroscope, barometer and accelerometer.
Again, the GPS is completely built-in so you don’t have to carry your phone around during outdoor workouts. You can also see a map of your running or biking route (along with running pace) all displayed on the screen.
As mentioned, Gear Fit2 can auto-detect workouts, or you can manually choose one. After you select a type of workout, you can pick a goal for that workout. The goals vary but examples include target pace, duration, distance or calories – or you can choose to have no goal at all. The Gear Fit2 can even read status updates to your connected headphones at various intervals.
The Gear Fit2’s auto-tracking was fairly accurate and it was able to calculate when I started walking at a ‘good pace’ until the time I stopped. Walking around my neighbourhood and walking hurriedly to appointments at E3 would trigger the Gear Fit2. It would vibrate, tell me I was keeping up the pace and showed a timer that had started tracking several minutes before which reassured me it was logging everything accordingly.
When you manually start your workout, the Gear Fit2 gives a 3-second countdown before the timer begins. As mentioned, for my runs the Gear Fit2 is able to track my GPS location, the distance, calories burned, pace, run speed and heart rate.
The Gear Fit2’s fitness tracking performance may look impressive to enthusiasts looking to get into shape, but if you’re already wearing a dedicated fitness watch, you may not be so easily swayed. Aesthetically, the difference between the two devices is like comparing a Kindle e-reader to a sleek tablet.
Additionally, swiping through the touchscreen is cumbersome when you’re active and moving. The UI is fine if you’re stationary, but pushing a button to get your workout stats is far easier than having to precisely swipe on such a small surface. Half the time, I felt like if I wanted to do this much work with hitting a button to turn on the display and figuring out where to swipe, I might as well reach into my pocket and pull out my Galaxy S7 to check my workout on Samsung’s own S Health application.
Notifications and apps
Notifications include text, calls, email, apps and calendar. Double tapping on notifications changes the font and makes them bigger to read, while double tapping again shrinks the font. Similar to most smartwatches and the Band 2, you can also send pre-written quick replies and emoticons to anyone who calls or messages you – with a slight caveat.
Only the native Samsung messenger app and Facebook Messages allow actions. Other apps, like Instagram and Messenger for SMS texting, only let you open the notification on your phone to reply there. There’s also no microphone to send your own clipped messages.
The app for the Gear Fit2 is as bare-bones as you can get, however it does come with S Health. If you’ve used any other Samsung wearable, you’ll get the gist of it. Your steps, sleep and more are kept in one place so you can access whatever you want. Then there’s the Gear manager app which holds the key to watch faces, specific apps and settings for the Gear Fit2.
Battery and compatibility
According to Samsung, the Gear Fit2’s 200 mAh battery should last up to three to four days, or five if you’re generous with usage. My time spent using the Fit2 involved a screen brightness of six, receiving and sending text messages, getting calendar, call, app and social notifications plus using it during exercise. With all that running, the Fit2 only lasted two days at most.
Charging requires about an hour or so depending on how dead the Gear Fit2 is. It comes with a proprietary USB cradle that can sit on your nightstand or desk.
Gear Fit2 isn’t the mess Gear S was in terms of compatibility, yet it’s still sorely lacking in this area since it will only work with handsets running Android 4.4 and above. Most Android Wear devices have limited capabilities with iOS but nonetheless, it is still an available option. I’m hoping round three will let Apple users enjoy Samsung’s devices too.
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