Smartwatch recommendation wanted

[denver.miller.3]

I've got a Samsung Gear S3 Frontier paired with my Note 8 phone. Love it. Samsung Pay on watch and phone works with any magnetic stripe CC reader, earn points for using the pay feature, will work on NFC terminals, GPS, steps can be counted on both watch and / or phone. Have had it for a year and a half - no problems. Call / text / email on watch works well. I highly recommend it. You can also find the watches for around $200

Ditto everything he said, only with a Galaxy S9+ and the Gear S3 Frontier. Stepped up from a Gear Neo. Great watches.

 

[mpeirce]

My biggest reason (besides $$) to go with Versa rather than Apple watch is I can go 4 days without recharging. The way I use them, I suspect I'd need to recharge the Apple more than once a day but even everyday would drive me bonkers.
How are others with battery use?

I’ve had mine last two days on a charge, but my routine is to charge when I sleep every night.

DS has the same model (current model) but wears his 24/7 (almost). He charges in the morning during shower and at night briefly getting ready for bed. Works for him.

 

[braumeister]

I’ve had mine last two days on a charge, but my routine is to charge when I sleep every night.

DS has the same model (current model) but wears his 24/7 (almost). He charges in the morning during shower and at night briefly getting ready for bed. Works for him.

Yes, my Apple watch needs less than half an hour to charge fully, no matter how much I've used it during the day so this works for me too. I have the Series 2 so it's more than two years old.

 

[FIYes]

OP reporting back here. I have decided to go the Samsung/Samsung route. As step one in this process I have purchased a Galaxy S9. I looked at the s9+ and the Note, but I prefer the size of the S9 and it is well rated by Consumer Reports.
I have set up the S9 and am becoming acquainted with it. I would rate it as one half step ahead of my Moto G 6. I have 14 days to decide to keep this.
Now here is the interesting part...my Versa is behaving in the same inconsistent way. The S9 is on the compatible list for Versa! I have contacted Fitbit about this. I have an escalated ticket with Fitbit and will wait to hear from them...I will not contact general customer service. I hoped the Versa would perform well with the S9 while I waited for a good sale on a Samsung Smartwatch. At least the Versa’s performance is no worse [emoji6]

 

[FIYes]

Okay, second report here. I preordered the Samsung Galaxy Active 2 and received it September 27. I have been using it since then. I love it. It works very well. I can make and receive calls/texts from my watch as long as my phone is in Bluetooth range. Samsung Pay is great. I can use my watch at contactless credit card terminals and my phone at both contactless and magnetic strip terminals. I often get the ‘we can’t do Apple Pay comment with my phone. I say oh let me try...and it works.

The Active 2 Watch works well as a fitness tracker. The ECG capabilities should be turned on next quarter and I think that will be a significant upgrade. I get 2 days battery life from my watch and three days from my phone.

Thanks for all the recommendations that I got here.

 

[steelyman]

It’s great that you found a solution that works for you. Since you started your research, the Fitbit acquisition by Google happened. An article appeared today discussing the number of people who are concerned about that (privacy concerns). While I intend to continue using my Fitbit for the time being, I’ll be watching to see what other products come to market.

 

[HFWR]

It’s great that you found a solution that works for you. Since you started your research, the Fitbit acquisition by Google happened. An article appeared today discussing the number of people who are concerned about that (privacy concerns). While I intend to continue using my Fitbit for the time being, I’ll be watching to see what other products come to market.

That’s one reason I use a cheapy bike computer rather than Map My Ride, or whatever. I’d like to casually track for $hits and giggles, but don’t want/need no stinkin’ “cloud”.

The second reason is I’d rather crash with a $20 Walmart special than my $800 phone...

 

[steelyman]

That’s one reason I use a cheapy bike computer rather than Map My Ride, or whatever. I’d like to casually track for $hits and giggles, but don’t want/need no stinkin’ “cloud”.

The second reason is I’d rather crash with a $20 Walmart special than my $800 phone...

I hear ya. “The Cloud” can get real creepy real fast but it seems like more unavoidable all the time.

 

[zinger1457]

Okay, second report here. I preordered the Samsung Galaxy Active 2 and received it September 27. I have been using it since then. I love it.

I tried the Samsung Frontier Gear S3 a couple years ago and it had some shortcomings that made me get rid of it, like the sleeker look of the Active 2, wonder if it is any better. My main issue with the S3 was when doing activities like jogging the built in heart rate monitor was very inaccurate, and they had no option to pair it with a chest strap heart rate sensor. I'd go out for a jog and the heart rate indicator would say >200bpm, then every 10 seconds or so it would tell me to slow down, my heart rate is to high. The other was the built in music player over bluetooth, again pretty useless when jogging, music would drop out all the time, and the high heart rate warnings would constantly cut in. Have you had a chance to use the Active 2 doing strenuous activity?

 

[CaliKid]

At first I read the thread title as:

Swatchwatch recommendation wanted

I was thinking to myself, "wow, I didn't know those were trendy again...." Maybe I should slow down my thread title reading a bit.

 

[FIYes]

I haven’t paid attention to the heart rate monitor. Guess I haven’t done anything too strenuous since I haven’t received any slow down warnings. I just played with the blood pressure monitor for the first time last night. I think that I need to work on calibration since it is reading higher than the blood pressure cuff that I have.

I have mostly used the watch as a pedometer and to make and receive calls and texts. I really like the ability to answer calls and texts when my phone is in another room. I don’t carry the phone with me when I am at home so I am usually not near it. I like knowing if I am getting a call. Also, when I am out, it is easier to not need to dig the phone out of my purse.

 

[steelyman]

Resurrecting this thread as the title is broad and to the point.

I received a Fitbit Charge 4 today to replace a Versa I’ve used for a couple of years. A selling point is that it has GPS, no phone tethering needed. To my knowledge, the Ionic was the only Fitbit with GPS (and pricey).

Still figuring it out. According to the specs, battery life is 7 days but 5 hours with continuous GPS use. Big difference!

 

[Alex The Great]

I use Apple watch mainly due to Apple Pay which is great and secure system with completely offline payments. Cannot comment much about other watches, but I find Apple Watch very useful in many aspects.

 

[FIYes]

I’m still happy with my Samsung Galaxy Active 2 Watch. It is much better than the Fitbit Versa that it replaced. I have a Samsung Galaxy S9 phone and the watch and phone work well together. I find Samsung Pay to be very handy, especially these days when I try to be as contactless as possible.