My honest opinion of the Samsung Galaxy Watch

[Drew Steven]

First off, I've had this watch for about five days and I'm returning it.

There are so many things wrong with this watch, and a few awesome things.

Let's get the awesome things out of the way first;
- It looks amazing, very sleek, it actually does look like a real watch
- Feels nice on your wrist
- The click bezel sound is very satisfying
- Step tracking seems to be pretty accurate

Other than that, this watch has so many issues I'm not even sure where to begin!

- Firstly, the heart rate monitor is WAY off. It had me clocked at 140+ and kept checking me and kept saying my heart rate was that high when I could literally just feel my heart rate and tell it was way lower. My phone clocked me at 70. It also just doesn't always check, it'll just stop once in a while, which isn't what 'continuous' means at all
- The sleep tracking is awful and barely works, ever. Its a hassle for it to even track when you're asleep and every day it's managed to track my sleep (3/5 days) it's been way off. Saying I'm getting like 3 hours sleep total when I'm actually getting at least 6.
- Almost all the apps are completely terrible, they either don't work or barely work. Developers don't care to make good apps for this small market and it shows
- The battery life is a joke. It lasts for about a day and a half if you're lucky, with moderate use. I know it will never last as long as they say but I put it on at the start of the day before work and at around 7pm I was at 45% and I barely used it, then by the morning it's at like 20-30% and will die mid-day
- You have to basically turn off everything to extend that battery life, no always on display, no continuous hr, no always wifi, close all apps, which basically make the watch pointless
- Even just little things like "do these five stretches because you've been inactive" is a very cool feature but then how does it have so much difficulty tracking if I'm moving my hands above my head!? It says it can track when they're done, but it takes doing it 15-20 times to register 5

Honestly, if you're thinking about buying this $520+ watch after taxes (in Canada), I'd just hold off until this thing is out of beta testing with the general public. It has so many issues, and at the price point, it's insane this thing is even being sold. I'd buy it if it was $200 CAD max just for an extension of my phone to see texts without taking it out my pocket. My $129 FitBit did everything better, it just didn't have a screen.

 

[Greymire]

Heart rate has messed up on me twice after charging but a restart fixed it. It needs to be on so it doesn't slip. I found that out from playing. Same with sleep tracking. Sleep tracking does well with my sleep with constant heart rate on with I e exception. It never detects deep sleep. My Fitbit Ionic did all of the above great but there were tons of issues like syncing, lack of phone support, messages wouldn't work with my phone and many more. If the Garmin my son has wasn't so expensive I would have went with it. If Apple was smart they would off an android app for their watch. They would sell a ton to guys like me that hate their phones but line the watches.

 

[Drew Steven]

I agree, Apple needs to offer an easy way to make the Apple Watch fully compatible with Android phones. The Apple Watch 4 seems superior but it doesn't look as nice in my opinion, the square look is geeky.

 

[anon(20964)]

I agree, Apple needs to offer an easy way to make the Apple Watch fully compatible with Android phones. The Apple Watch 4 seems superior but it doesn't look as nice in my opinion, the square look is geeky.

Agreed, an Apple Watch 4 LTE that was fully compatible with Android would be mine without hesitation.

 

[EMGSM]

First off, I've had this watch for about five days and I'm returning it.

There are so many things wrong with this watch, and a few awesome things.

Let's get the awesome things out of the way first;
- It looks amazing, very sleek, it actually does look like a real watch
- Feels nice on your wrist
- The click bezel sound is very satisfying
- Step tracking seems to be pretty accurate

Other than that, this watch has so many issues I'm not even sure where to begin!

- Firstly, the heart rate monitor is WAY off. It had me clocked at 140+ and kept checking me and kept saying my heart rate was that high when I could literally just feel my heart rate and tell it was way lower. My phone clocked me at 70. It also just doesn't always check, it'll just stop once in a while, which isn't what 'continuous' means at all
- The sleep tracking is awful and barely works, ever. Its a hassle for it to even track when you're asleep and every day it's managed to track my sleep (3/5 days) it's been way off. Saying I'm getting like 3 hours sleep total when I'm actually getting at least 6.
- Almost all the apps are completely terrible, they either don't work or barely work. Developers don't care to make good apps for this small market and it shows
- The battery life is a joke. It lasts for about a day and a half if you're lucky, with moderate use. I know it will never last as long as they say but I put it on at the start of the day before work and at around 7pm I was at 45% and I barely used it, then by the morning it's at like 20-30% and will die mid-day
- You have to basically turn off everything to extend that battery life, no always on display, no continuous hr, no always wifi, close all apps, which basically make the watch pointless
- Even just little things like "do these five stretches because you've been inactive" is a very cool feature but then how does it have so much difficulty tracking if I'm moving my hands above my head!? It says it can track when they're done, but it takes doing it 15-20 times to register 5

Honestly, if you're thinking about buying this $520+ watch after taxes (in Canada), I'd just hold off until this thing is out of beta testing with the general public. It has so many issues, and at the price point, it's insane this thing is even being sold. I'd buy it if it was $200 CAD max just for an extension of my phone to see texts without taking it out my pocket. My $129 FitBit did everything better, it just didn't have a screen.

I had mine for a little over a week and I just returned it today for basically the same reasons you pointed out.

 

[arunma]

Dang, 45% by 7 pm!? I can't blame you for returning your watch if that's how it was functioning! Fortunately this hasn't been my experience. Even if I have AOD on continously, my watch goes down to only 75-80% over nine hours. And without AOD on, I am at about 85% after the same length of time. Sounds like you got a defective watch. But I can't blame you for not wanting to give it a second chance after all the issues you've had.

Regarding the other things you mentioned, my sleep tracking is actually quite accurate, and after the latest update I've even been able to get more consistent registering of deep sleep. Heart rate readings are also fairly consistent. I get upper 50s to low 60s when at rest (same as my Note 9's readings), and in the 140 to 170 range when jogging.

As for the apps...yeah, that's been an issue since the Gear S2. Samsung's pre-installed apps are great, but there are very few third party apps and they all suck.

Anyway, sorry you got a lemon. Yours is actually the most negative review of the Galaxy Watch that I've read anywhere. It sounds like Samsung needs to do a better job with quality control.

 

[Greymire]

I want to believe these great battery reports but I find it hard to since in the setups under battery in the watch itself with it set to default it says 1d 21hr 53 minutes(this may be an average of what I am getting since I think it said one day 15 hours yesterday) . Power saving gives you the 4 days but shuts a lot off and gives you a grayscale display. It is almost deceptive advertising. Almost two days I can deal with but it's far from the hype.

 

[Rodney Holinger]

Sounds strange. I got 5 days without problem

 

[anon(20964)]

Sounds strange. I got 5 days without problem

That's awesome. I've had my LTE version for 4days now - I'm seeing more like 2days. But I charge once a day usually at about 50% when i put it on charger.

AOD off, BT On, Wifi auto, LTE on only when out of range of phone, music streaming during workout, sleep tracking at night using Android sleep app.

 

[Greymire]

That's awesome. I've had my LTE version for 4days now - I'm seeing more like 2days. But I charge once a day usually at about 50% when i put it on charger.

AOD off, BT On, Wifi auto, LTE on only when out of range of phone, music streaming during workout, sleep tracking at night using Android sleep app.

Nearly identical to what I get. I might me able to get two days but I end up charging it because I need it at night. Heart Rate and sleep are needed because of health issues (hopefully they improve these with updates). I wonder if widgets sap power too.

 

[Greymire]

I will add something interesting though. I read a post by a Samsung support tech that said if your battery life is poor to try a factory reset. I did that this morning. Right now it seems to be draining much slower and it says in my settings I will get almost 4 days. I will check in the AM and report back. I loaded my backup from the site also settings are the same. I am using a face with no animation.

 

[Greymire]

I will add something interesting though. I read a post by a Samsung support tech that said if your battery life is poor to try a factory reset. I did that this morning. Right now it seems to be draining much slower and it says in my settings I will get almost 4 days. I will check in the AM and report back. I loaded my backup from the site also settings are the same. I am using a face with no animation.

You can forget the reset. I have had it on an hour and the battery readings in settings already have adjusted saying 2 and a half days time. It will probably adjust to less by the time I go to bed.

 

[Peter621022]

@Drew Steven
Sorry to hear you have had such a bad experience. Since your experience is much worse than mine and many others', can we do some fact checking please?
Which model of the watch do/did you have?
Did you get the latest firmware update?
Did you try a full reset to see if that would improve the behaviour of your watch?
Which apps did you try that didn't work?

To be honest, I think a battery life of a day and a half is not bad at all compared to most other watches out there, although with this watch you should be able to get more out of it, certainly with the 46mm watch.

 

[Peter621022]

Just to put opinions about battery life a bit in perpective:
I read a review on the Apple Watch 4.
Quoting: "The Apple Watch’s battery capacity is unknown, but Apple says it will last for around 18 hours before it needs a recharge using the included magnetic charging disk.....with only notifications and turning it off overnight, we could almost reach 24 hours"

For the rest a really positive review.

 

[Greymire]

@Drew Steven
Sorry to hear you have had such a bad experience. Since your experience is much worse than mine and many others', can we do some fact checking please?
Which model of the watch do/did you have?
Did you get the latest firmware update?
Did you try a full reset to see if that would improve the behaviour of your watch?
Which apps did you try that didn't work?

To be honest, I think a battery life of a day and a half is not bad at all compared to most other watches out there, although with this watch you should be able to get more out of it, certainly with the 46mm watch.

My first thoughts were that a day and a half isn't bad, but if people really are getting four days then it's bad. My Fitbit Ionic got four days (other issues were there), the Garmin get much longer and the Tic Watch gets three days. I thought my 46mm would do better.

 

[Peter621022]

My first thoughts were that a day and a half isn't bad, but if people really are getting four days then it's bad. My Fitbit Ionic got four days (other issues were there), the Garmin get much longer and the Tic Watch gets three days. I thought my 46mm would do better.

Could it be that the LTE bit is causing battery drain? A bad connection may be? When I am travelling often my Phone battery is drained much faster because of bad LTE connection.

 

[Greymire]

Could it be that the LTE bit is causing battery drain? A bad connection may be? When I am travelling often my Phone battery is drained much faster because of bad LTE connection.

I have a Bluetooth version

 

[jimjonesG7]

i haven't experienced these issues, there are so many others that haven't too.
The Galaxy watch is a smart watch with fitness capabilities and will not offer the best features for fitness, also depends what primary functions you require.

All i can say is you guys have been unlucky..

 

[garak0410]

I've had mine since August. I get 3-4 days easily on the 46mm version, with AOD off. Heart rate is every 10 minutes.

 

[Greymire]

I've had mine since August. I get 3-4 days easily on the 46mm version, with AOD off. Heart rate is every 10 minutes.

I am at 55% after 22 hours. The best I ever get.