Huawei Watch GT – The Fitness Tracker Disguised As A Smartwatch.

The smartwatch market is a difficult one to navigate these days. There are devices that’ll blow your socks off and others that are just plain disappointing. Technology giant Huawei currently has the Huawei Watch GT on the market and I’m happy to say that it’s not one that’ll disappoint you, but that doesn’t mean that it doesn’t have it’s shortcomings.

Price and availability

You can find the Huawei Watch GT at any location of The Source or order it from their online store.  It usually retails for $259.99CDN but over the past few days I’ve seen it drop to $199.99CDN during their crazy Black Friday sale. Hopefully there’ll be another price drop soon with the holiday season here. I’m sure a lot of people will be glad to see this device under the tree.

Looks

The Huawei Watch GT has a classic but sporty design. It’s only 10.6mm thick, has a stainless steel shell, and a ceramic bezel that’s very useful in helping to protect the display. The 1.39 inch AMOLED touch screen display has a 454 x 454 pixel resolution and supports taps and sliding gestures. Even though the watch itself is pretty sizeable, it’s very light and comfortable.

On the side are two buttons. Press the top one and you’ll get access to a variety of apps such as notifications, stopwatch, heart rate monitor, activity records and others. The bottom button monitors you during your exercises such as indoor and outdoor runs, cycling, swimming and, for the super humans out there, even has a setting for those taking part in a triathlon.

Huawei Watch GT health features

Huawei Watch GT workouts

The numbered bezel around the face, the black stainless steel body, and, the two buttons all combine to give this device the look of a traditional watch, and it’s a look that I really like.

Huawei gives you the option to customize these watches by offering different coloured leather and silicon bands. I found the silicon bands very comfortable and had no problems wearing it for the entire day.

Battery Life

I love the look, and the features on this device but its the battery life that has me tickled pink! It comes with a 420mAh battery  and Huawei promises a 2 week battery life. Can you imagine any of your devices not needing a charge for two weeks?  While It did last longer than my other devices I found that I’d usually go 9 to 10 days between charges. From what I’ve read about other wearables, that’s very impressive.

I’m sure if I was more conservative by not using app notifications or sleep tracking and dimming the display it would’ve lasted longer, but what’s the point of having a device like this if you’re going to use it like that?

Huawei employs a double chip architecture inside the watch to help with the battery life. One chip is tailored for low-power tasks when the user is sedentary and a more powerful chip for keeping up with more dynamic tasks

The Energy watchface

Lite OS

The watch uses Huawei’s own operating system called Lite OS instead of Google’s Wear OS. Both of the operating systems operate quite similarly to each other. Swipe up to see your notifications and down to get to an access menu. Swiping right will show the heart rate monitor, weather and activity tracker. To wake up the watch you raise your arm as if you’re looking at the time. It works fine but I wish it also came with a “tap to wake up” feature.

It comes with 13 different watch  faces. Some are activity focused, some are weather themed and then you have some that just show the time.

Health Features

Huawei markets this device as a smartwatch but personally I think the health and fitness tracking features are the selling points in this device. To take advantage of these features you need to have the Huawei  Health app installed on your phone. It’s available for both Android and iOS. The app is the place to go to really appreciate all the information gathered by this watch, some of which are described below.

Intelligent Sleep Statistics

When the TruSleep feature is enabled your sleep quality and breathing patterns are monitored in real time. The watch can also analyse sleep patterns and help diagnose six types of sleeping problems. If you choose not to enable TruSleep you can still see how long you’ve slept and the quality of sleep you had (deep, light, awake). The watch will also give recommendations on how to get more deep sleep.

Realtime Heartrate Monitoring

Huawei equipped this device with their TruSeen™ 3.0 Heartrate Monitoring technology which, according to the company, “provides a more efficient and accurate real-time personal measurement of your heartrate by using a self-learning algorithm and innovative sensors”.  In English, the watch knows where it’s located on your wrist and uses the optical sensors on the back to measure your heart rate.

Fitness Tracking

One look at the workout options in this watch and it’s obvious that this device is geared towards the ones who pursue a more athletic lifestyle.  Pressing the bottom button opens the fitness tracking mode menu. You can track your running, cycling, indoor and outdoor walks, trail runs, pool and open water swims and more.  In these modes the watch will track calories burnt, heart rate and time.

GPS Tracking

You’d never get lost while wearing this watch as it supports 3 satellite positioning systems (GPS, Glonass and Galileo) worldwide to offer more accurate, faster and precise positioning. Since it had an internal GPS chip you wont need to have your phone when tracking your swim, run or bike ride.

Conclusion

As I mentioned before Huawei is marketing this device as a smartwatch, but there are some things that needs to be included for this device to go from being a damn good fitness tracker to a true smartwatch. For example, this watch does not support NFC so contactless payments aren’t possible.  There is no support for music so while it’s a great device for tracking your workout you’d need your phone if you want to listen to music while tracking that workout. This watch also needs the ability to make or, at least, receive phone calls.

I guess the question now is, should you purchase this watch? That all depends on you, the user. How do you intend to use the watch? Want something with amazing battery life and very useful health and fitness features? This is the device for you. If you’re looking for a device that’ll allow you to listen to music while working out, taking an important call on the treadmill, and finally, paying for your smoothie as you leave the gym then I’d suggest waiting for the Huawei Watch GT2.

DISCLAIMER: I was provided with one of these devices by Huawei Canada but all opinions expressed above are 100% my own.