Smartwatch Buying Guide And Types
We all know that different people have different needs and therefore a good smartwatch for me might not be a good smartwatch for you. There is no one size that fits all kind of smartwatch. There are tons of smartwatches available in the market with tons of features and functionalities available.
Some smartwatches comes with basic features while the advanced (expensive) ones have really good features to make your life easier. Some of these basic and advanced features are:
- Notifications on your wrist (Emails, SMS, Whatsapp, Calls etc.)
- Step Count Tracking (Pedometer)
- Heart Rate
- SPO2 (Oxygen Level)
- Calories Burned
- Water intake (Hydration level)
- Stress Tracking
- Sleep Tracking
- Weather
- GPS (For Runners and Biker Riders)
- Music Playback
- Cadence
- Pace
- Vo2 Max
- Rep Count (for Weight Training)
- Incident Detection & Assistance (for Emergency)
How to choose the Best Smartwatch in India – buying Guide
Battery Life
The long battery life is a necessary feature for a good smartwatch. Smartwatches have a number of features like GPS, notifications, Bluetooth, Wifi etc. that consumes a lot of battery. If you’ve to charge your battery twice a day or even once a day it becomes a bit of a hassle even using a smartwatch.
When you already have other gadgets that you need to charge like phone, wireless headphones or airpods, Laptops, having one more thing like a smartwatch that you’ve to charge on a daily basis makes life even difficult. That’s why its very important to buy a smartwatch with a good enough battery life.
Usually smartwatches with a touch screen have a low battery life versus a smartwatch like Garmin Forerunner that doesn’t have touchscreen. There are some hybrid smartwatches in the market with the traditional dial look like the Fossil Collider that have the longest battery life.
An decent smartwatch with average features comes in the range of 15K – 20K therefore it is quite important to understand your requirements before going ahead with your purchase.
It is therefore important to buy a smartwatch with the long battery life.
Our research suggests that the best smartwatch with a long battery life is Huami Amazfit Bip. It has a superb battery life of 15-20 days. If you are a Runner we suggest you check out Garmin Forerunner 245 Music that has an average battery life of 5-7 days.
Compatibility
Check if the smartwatch you’re going to buy is compatible with the phone you’re using. Although most smartwatches are compatible with both Android and iOS but its always good to check if the watch is compatible with the operating system that you’re using
If you’re using an Android phone then don’t go for the Apple Watch.
Display
Most of the smartwatches comes with touch screen but there are few smartwatches without touch screen. You need to decide if you want a touch screen smartwatch or a smartwatch without touchscreen. Personally I like a smartwatch without the touch screen but its for you to decide.
Apps
There are a number of apps that can be synced to the smartwatches. For example Nike Run and Strava for runners. For music lovers some smartwatches can sync with Spotify so that you can stream music directly from the watch to your headphones if you’ve a premium spotify account.
If you use some apps on a daily basis like these and would want to sync data of these apps with your smartphone then look out for this feature on the smartwatch you are planning to purchase.
Calling Feature
There are few smartwatches in the market that have this feature where you can make and answer calls using just the smartwatch. You don’t need to carry phone with you everywhere. For example the Huawei Watch GT 2 sport has this feature where you can talk to the other person by using the watch’s speaker and microphone (even when you’re not carrying your phone but you’re connected with your phone via bluetooth).
Other Features and Personalization
There are some other things you also have to keep in mind before buying a new smartwatch like GPS, music playback, color display, colors, alarms, accurate heart rate tracking, sleep analysis, accurate GPS and detailed metrics for runners alarm and availability and option to change the straps.
You should look at all these features before making your purchase.
