The Samsung Galaxy Watch is a wearable released by Samsung Electronics in August 2018. It comes in two variations: a 42mm as well as a 46mm one; with each varying slightly in specs. Two years later, it is still one of the best smartwatches around!
The 46mm boasts a 1.3” display with an overall size of 46 mm x 49 mm x 13 mm. It has a 22mm strap, weighs 63 grams, and is only available in silver. Its battery boasts an amazing 472 mAh which can last up to 7 days.
The 42mm on the other hand has a 1.2” display and measures 41.9 mm x 45.7 mm x 12.7 mm. It has a 20mm strap and weighs 49 grams. It has a 270 mAh battery (up to 4 days) and comes in Midnight Black and Rose Gold.
This review shall dive into the 42mm model of the Samsung Galaxy Watch, but if you’re interested in its bigger brother you may want to scroll down for a comparison of their differences.
Live a stronger, smarter life with Galaxy Watch at your wrist rest well and stay active with built in health tracking and a Bluetooth connection that keeps everything at your wrist Plus, go for days without charging
Go nonstop for days on a single charge; The wireless charger lets you power up without slowing down (Average expected performance based on typical use; Results may vary). Battery type and size - 270mAh
Available in 2 sizes and 3 colors, the Galaxy Watch offers stylish watch faces so realistic they hardly look digital; Plus, choose from a collection of interchangeable bands
Pairs with both Android and iOS smartphones via Bluetooth connection; Compatible Devices Samsung Smartphone, Non Samsung Android Smartphone(Android OS 5.0 and above RAM 1.5GB and above ), iOS 9.0 and above iPhone 5 and above
Included in box: Galaxy Watch, Additional Strap (Large and Small included), Wireless charging Dock, Travel Adaptor, Quick Start Guide, User Manual (Warranty: 1 Year Standard Parts and Labor). OS: Tizen 4.0
Display: 1.2” (30 mm), Circular Super AMOLED (360 x 360)
Which phones are compatible with the Samsung Galaxy Watch?
Android: Android 5.0 or higher & RAM 1.5GB above
iPhone: iPhone 5 and above, iOS 9.0 or above
In my case, I am testing it on a Sony Xperia.
How to connect Samsung Galaxy Watch to phone
Before attempting to set up, the watch needs a first charge of around 2 hours and 45 minutes.
Setting up the watch is pretty straightforward, however, there are a number of apps you may want to download and sync. So it might take a while.
Firstly, download the Galaxy Wearable app, and choose which wearable you would like to pair. Switch on your Bluetooth and proceed to the setup. Your phone will ask for a number of permissions such as sending SMS and accessing your calendar.
At the end of this setup, a basic ‘How to use’ guide will pop up. After having your terms and conditions section, you are encouraged to create a Samsung account to make the most out of certain functions namely Notifications, Messages, Email, Find my Watch and Find my Phone, Backup, and Restore.
The setup is now done, and a basic how-to guide will pop up on your watch!
Samsung Galaxy Watch bands
The 42mm version of this wearable has a 20mm standard strap whilst the 46mm one has a 22mm one. Samsung does not have any other official band designs for this Galaxy Watch apart from being able to buy spare silicone ones; however, you will easily find different bands to suit your needs; be it for sports, or a night out on the town.
Apart from its killer Stainless Steel housing and fancy rotating bezel, this watch is fun to use due to the thousands of available watch faces. For something a little bit more flashy you might even want to pay for some exclusive watch faces through the play store. Alternatively, you may even want to upload your own photo and have a mini slideshow at your wrist.
Live a stronger, smarter life with Galaxy Watch at your wrist rest well and stay active with built in health tracking and a Bluetooth connection that keeps everything at your wrist plus, go for days without charging
Go nonstop for days on a single charge; The wireless charger lets you power up without slowing down. (Average expected performance based on typical use; Results may vary.)
Available in 2 sizes and 3 colors, the Galaxy Watch offers stylish watch faces so realistic they hardly look digital; Plus, choose from a collection of interchangeable bands
Pairs with both Android and iOS smartphones via Bluetooth connection; Battery type and size 270mAh; Music play time: Up to 9 hours; Main display resolution 360 x 360
Note: Kindly refer user manual before use
Ladies, Samsung has got you covered. The 42mm design has an exclusive rose gold model that marries functionality with elegance and femininity; definitely making this wearable one of the top contenders for women. Most high-end smartwatches seem robust and masculine, however, the endless number of personalization options with the Galaxy Watch makes it possible to have the degree of femininity you want.
Wanting to dial down the rose gold for a more corporate meeting at the office? Pair it up with some elegant black bands, and all that is left is a touch of femininity!
If you’re heading out to an elegant dinner, you don’t need to sacrifice your mini personal assistant: just pop on some fancy straps, and voila!
For an added price, one may purchase the standalone LTE version of this watch, which gives you the freedom to call, text, stream music and get notifications via cellular.
Going out for a jog now means you don’t have to carry anything extra, as your fitness tracker, telephone, wallet, and music are all at your wrist!
Is Samsung Galaxy Watch waterproof?
The Samsung Galaxy is beautiful but robust! It has a 5ATM rating which means being built to resist up to one hour underwater. The watch should not be used in water deeper than 10cm for more than 30 minutes; and deeper than 1.5 meters for more than 10 minutes.
The U.S. military specification ( MIL-STD-810G) tests a product’s durability through a series of 29 different tests and further puts your mind to rest that your companion will make it through all your adventures.
Specifically, the device is field and combat-ready via testing it against conditions of shock, vibration, humidity, heat, cold, gunfire shock, and more, so you can rest assured that your kayaking or underwater adventures are covered!
Samsung Galaxy Watch battery life
As mentioned above, the 42 mm and the 46mm have different battery capacities. Whilst the 42mm has a 270 mAh battery (up to 4 days), the 46mm big brother has an awesome 472 mAh which can last up to 7 days! This places the Samsung Galaxy Watch in a league of it’s own when you compare it to other smartwatches with similar features.
The wearable is charged via a wireless charging cradle, and once on charge, the display rotates sideways so you may continue using the watch till it fully charges!
The first round of battery charge seemed for some reason to last slightly fewer days, however, as from the second charge onwards, I was good to go for three days easy!
Battery use greatly depends on your usage of the phone, and there are quite a few tricks I found which helped me save more battery life.
Tricks to help you boost your Samsung Galaxy Watch battery life
Saving battery life really depends on how you mostly make use of your watch and making sure you minimize usage for things that are not essential for YOU. Here are some ideas:
Lower brightness
Disable voice wake up for Bixby
Frequency of updates such as weather app, pulse, and stress levels.
Deselect any apps you don’t need notifications from (from your Wearable app)
Close background apps frequently
Disable wake up on gesture (hardly reliable anyway!)
Disable always-on display
Disable any unused connections such as NFC till you actually need them
Choose your watch face wisely! A predominantly plain black background means the majority of the pixels are turned off and therefore the display uses much less energy (Especially if you want your Amoled screen always on!)
Samsung Galaxy Watch apps
Thanks to its apps, the Galaxy Watch is the perfect assistant to help you balance your work life, a healthy mind, and body, as well as all your SMART tech.
Samsung Health
The Samsung Health app is a great focal point of your wearable which merges all of the stats recorded relating to your health and fitness. This tracks your active time, exercise, food, sleep, weight, water, floors, stress, heart rate, and women’s health. It also gives you options to input and monitor your blood glucose, caffeine, weight management, and blood pressure, but these need other devices ( such as a heart monitor) or manual inputting.
Apart from reminding you to get up and stretch every hour or so (it will, of course, give you a list of stretches for you to try out!), the watch auto-detects 6 workouts: walking, running, cycling, elliptical, rowing, and dynamic workout, and has the option to choose from 85 workouts in total, including yoga, crunches, and weights. If you choose to do different exercises in your workout, the app will also tally up your burned calories and gives you a daily summary.
For those needing to accurately store this data, the Android app allows you to export as a *.gpx file, however, iOs doesn’t. In this case, however, one may use the Endomondo app which facilitates this.
A useful section is the ‘Discover’ section which asks you about your fitness level and fitness interests and presents you with a number of fitness programs. A workout schedule is worked out for you, and once you start it, your wearable and smartphone (or Samsung TV!) combine into the ultimate workout combo.
Your smartphone shows you the exercises as well as real-time heart rate readings from your smartwatch! All your efforts are obviously tallied up in the day’s burned calorie report, and you are of course reminded of your workout schedule thanks to your smartwatch calendar.
The app provides a holistic approach to health as it also provides a Mindfulness section with meditation, sleep stories, and music. Though the idea is absolutely brilliant, I was a bit disappointed that most items needed a premium subscription.
Another health function that I absolutely adored on this wearable was the Stress section. Even though I was a bit disappointed that in reality, it merely gave you a heart rate reading, the Galaxy Watch gives breathing exercises for your requested length of time, right on your wrist! You can choose to have it vibrate/sound to indicate every inhale and exhale, and helps you to have a tactile vibration to keep you in the moment and remind you to breathe. The watch will monitor your heart rate and you can actually see how the breathing exercises have lowered your racing heart!
Finally, your sleep patterns are recorded to help you map your awake, REM, light, and deep sleep patterns and in turn understand your sleep efficiency.
The Samsung Galaxy Watch has your back in every situation. As you wake up, your watch prepares you your daily briefing which includes date, weather, schedule, reminders, and battery information.
Whether driving, cycling, or walking to work, your Galaxy Watch will help you navigate through rush hour, or keeps you company by playing you your Spotify (If you have a premium account you can save offline too!) or saved music.
Incoming call whilst you’re driving? Keep your eyes on the road and take the call using the inbuilt microphone and speaker on your wearable device!
Your Samsung Reminder and Voice Notes are also helpful here; for when you need to quickly jot down ideas or things to do, speech to text will automatically transcribe your message and send it to your phone.
Mid-meeting and can’t bring out your phone to reply to that Whatsapp message? The Galaxy Watch allows you to customize preset replies apart from being to reply via keyboard or speech to text.
If you’re popping out for a quick errand, sync your Bluetooth headphones, and use Samsung Pay with your wearable’s NFC to pay for your Mocha latte: No need to drag your phone or wallet out with you!
The Watch Translator app is one of my favorites, as you can merely speak into your watch, it automatically detects your language and translates your speech to virtually any language, and obviously vice versa! This gives you the ability to have a real-time translation of your bi-lingual conversation!
In a real emergency? Press the Home button quickly 3 times, and your pre-set emergency contact will receive an SOS request with your current location and directions to be able to track you for up to one hour. Incoming calls are answered automatically, and of course, the volume is automatically set to the lowest audible volume level; for the ultimate discretion!
Perhaps one of the ironies is that Bixby, Samsung’s personal voice assistant, is one of the least helpful functions on your wearable device. You might impress your friends by changing through your SamsungTV channels by speaking to your watch, but is not reaching for the remote really worth all the battery you would need to waste on your watch to do so?
How to add apps to the Samsung Galaxy Watch
Installing new apps is simple once you have downloaded the Galaxy Wearable app on the connected phone. Simply tap the Discover tab at the bottom which suggests further apps and watch faces.
Once an app is chosen and installed on the phone, it is automatically also installed on your wearable!
How to reset the Samsung Galaxy Watch
The following will reset and erase any data on your wearable device. So do make sure to backup all of your data from internal memory.
Samsung Galaxy Watch 42mm vs Samsung Galaxy Watch 46mm
Curious to see if you should upgrade to the 46mm version? Check out the comparison table below!
Pros:
– Great battery life
– Great all-rounder, especially if you have Android, and even more if you have a Samsung
– Highly customizable, down to widgets and app menu layout
– Rotating bezel useful for people with bigger fingers, and downright satisfying to use
– Numerous useful modes such as Theatre Mode (no useless sights and sounds during movies!), Goodnight mode (no notifications to wake you up during the night), and water-lock mode (the wake-up gesture feature, the touchscreen, and watch always-on features will turn off).
– NFC!
– Can reply to messages via your wearable
– Designed to be used during swimming so much so that it has an ‘Eject Water’ function to remove water from speakers!
Cons: – Slightly thick, so shirts are bound to get stuck on it
– Wake up gesture mostly doesn’t work
– Upon waking up, doesn’t immediately go to the new screen but presents last time/ app open
– Not all features work well on iOs; such as call function
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