Samsung Galaxy Watch Active 2

Samsung Galaxy Watch Active 2

 

You don't have to use a Samsung phone to enjoy the benefits of owning a Samsung smartwatch, and the Galaxy Watch Active 2 provides the most well-rounded wearables experience for Android users right now. It's compact and lightweight but features an extremely sharp and vivid touch display that's easy to navigate and fun to use thanks to the new capacitive bezel. The Tizen OS is smooth and battery-friendly, unlike Google's own Wear OS, and while the app selection isn't massive, the core tenets are there, like Spotify, Strava, and more.

The Galaxy Watch Active 2 contains its primary purpose in its name: exercise tracking. The watch comes with GPS built-in, and features automatic workout-tracking, along with sleep tracking, water, food and caffeine consumption tracking, and more. The Running Coach feature is improved, which now gives you real-time pace metrics and a rundown of what to expect from your workout before you start. You'll receive audio cues that can be heard through the watch speaker or Bluetooth headphones.

If you mainly wear a smartwatch for notifications, the Galaxy Watch Active 2 delivers there, too, with excellent support for Android's notification system, letting you reply using your voice, the built-in keyboard, or with one of the many quick answers.

Finally, battery life, while not quite as good as some of the other larger watches on the list, is still pretty excellent, and the watch can be topped up with select Qi wireless pads or with the Galaxy S10's Wireless PowerShare feature.

Pros:

·         Compact and well-designed

·         2 to 3 days of battery life

·         Automatic workout tracking

·         Water-resistant up to 5ATM

·         Built-in GPS and NFC

·         Capacitive bezel

·         Optional LTE

Cons:                                

·         Third-party app support could be better

·         Tizen OS learning curve