Samsung Galaxy Smart Watches 2021 - Which one should you get in India?

The Samsung Galaxy watch has proved to be one of the most refined smartwatches you can buy today - with its attractive design, cohesive user interface and most importantly, a four-day battery life. It has been a tough competitor to the top wearables like the Apple Watch, Garmin Fenix and Fitbit Versa.

Samsung's Galaxy Watch Series:

• The Galaxy Watch
• Galaxy Watch
• Galaxy Watch 3
• The Galaxy Watch Active
• Galaxy Watch Active 2

Alternatively, if you are more interested in ultra-affordable Fitness Trackers, check out this article from not too long ago.

The Samsung Galaxy Smart Watch brings the look and feel of a high-end wrist-watch, with a circular stainless steel case and stylized bezel. It’s stylish and functional as the bezel rotates to cycle through its various on-screen menus while also providing fall detection.

With the Galaxy Watch, Samsung brings its smartwatch line under its Galaxy umbrella, making it fit seamlessly under Samsung's personal devices brand. When comparing the pricing with the Galaxy Watch, the Galaxy Active 2 is a little cheaper, and doesn’t feature the rotating bezel. Instead, it has a touch sensitive bezel for user interaction and also packs some extra fitness features that the Samsung Watch leaves out.

On the Galaxy Watch, turning the bezel clockwise or anticlockwise allows you to browse through the device's UI and Apps. It is surprisingly convenient and intuitive, and the fact that you don’t have to use your finger to navigate, leaves the display completely visible at all times. Haptic buzzing responses stimulate a tactile feel while going through the menu.

Tizen is Samsung's Linux-based Operating System that runs on these devices and it offers a similar experience to that of Apple Watch Range and Wear OS watches.

Features

The Samsung Galaxy Watch

The Samsung Galaxy Watch comes in 2 options - Bluetooth and Bluetooth+LTE. The Bluetooth version connects to your smartphone via Bluetooth for further connectivity, while the Bluetooth+LTE version works with a built-in eSim for direct connectivity. In India as of Jan 2021, eSims are supported by only Reliance Jio and Airtel Postpaid.

The Galaxy Watch offers 39 built-in trackers, including sensors for 4-stage sleep tracking with continuous heartbeat and stress monitoring. Additionally, it provides 50m water resistance, making it practically waterproof.

The inbuilt GPS allows you to track location and movement while the Samsung Health App gives you analytics on your fitness.

The display is a vivid super AMOLED screen and offers various customizable Watch Faces.

The Samsung Galaxy Watch 3

The Samsung Galaxy Watch 3 is the latest edition of the Galaxy Watch and offers some newer and more advanced features. It is a little more expensive than the Galaxy Watch, but packs a lot more value. It comes in 3 colours - Gold, Silver and Black.

The Watch 3 offers 2 versions similar to the Galaxy Watch - a Bluetooth and a Bluetooth+LTE version. The Bluetooth+LTE version again offers inbuilt eSIMs, that are supported by Jio and Airtel in India. There are also 2 available sizes - 41mm and 45mm. The 41mm version is slightly smaller, lighter and cheaper than the 45mm version, and offers a smaller display and slightly smaller battery. Apart from that, all the features stay practically the same.

The Samsung Galaxy Watch 3 offers a circular super AMOLED display with customizable Watch Faces. The rotating bezel can be used to interact with the Watch UI.

There are a number of sensors on the Galaxy Watch 3, including advanced fitness and health monitoring, running analysis, sleep analysis, blood oxygen, heartbeat tracking, stress tracking and more. The Samsung Health App puts this all together and provides useful insights.

This Smartwatch provides notifications, smart reply options, auto chat history and more, allowing you to message and call directly from the Watch.

The Samsung Galaxy Active 2

The Galaxy Active comes in 2 styles - Aluminium and Steel. They are both sleek and stylish.

Again, there are 2 main versions of the Active 2 - Bluetooth and Bluetooth+LTE. The Bluetooth+LTE version provides direct 4G connectivity while the Bluetooth version connects to your Smartphone for connectivity.

There are a plethora of fitness trackers and sensors on this Watch. This one is ideal for fitness-oriented users, since it works as a great fitness tracker in addition to being a Smart Watch. It offers continuous heartbeat sensing, stress sensing and sleep monitoring and provides insights on the Samsung Health App.

It offers a vivid AMOLED display with customizable faces. Since it comes with removable straps, there are a lot of styles you can choose from to customize it as well.

The Active 2 has a battery that lasts 2 days. With a IP68 rating and 5ATM water and dust resistance, it can be used for sports, workouts and other intense activities.

User Experience

The Galaxy Smart Watches are very easy to use and seamlessly integrate into your lifestyle with their well designed onboarding process.

The always-on feature keeps the display always on, displaying the time while the other UI features are not in use.

By rotating the bezel clockwise or swiping left on the touchscreen, it will show you some widgets and the option to add contacts, alarms and workout activities. On the other hand, by rotating the bezel anti-clockwise or swiping right, it brings up the notifications you got. 

The Galaxy Watches are very fitness-focused, all thanks to the sensors and a revamped Samsung Health App, which tracks your progress by measuring the heartbeat rate, calories and tracking six activities while you exercise.

The Smart Watch additionally tracks your sleep quality, from heartbeat, stress and other sensor data modelled over a 4-stage sleep cycle. Monitoring your stress levels helps to assist you with meditation through guided breathing as well.

The 'My Day Watch face’ displays your schedules for the next 10 hours and sums them up at a single glance. For travel enthusiasts, the Galaxy Smart Watches offer GPS tracking with a built-in Altimeter and Barometer too.

Often, charging personal devices is an irritating chore, but the Samsung Galaxy Watches solve this with an effortless charging experience. Simply set it down on the wireless charging dock and the charging process begins automatically. Use a Samsung Galaxy Wireless Charger Pad for Qi wireless charging.

 

If you like your watch to match your outfit, you will love the customizability. There are 60,000 watch faces in the Galaxy Wearable App that can be set on your Galaxy Smart Watch. Additionally, check out the changeable straps for the Galaxy Active 2.

Overall, the Galaxy Smart Watches have better battery life than the Apple Watch. It is a great competition to most top Smart Watches in the market.

Getting started with Galaxy Smart Watches

Getting started with a Samsung Galaxy Smart Watch is quite simple, since it is guided by a smartphone App. Here are the steps you would have to follow:

1. Pair the Galaxy Watch with your smartphone 

(the watch is supports Android and iOS)

2. Download the Galaxy Wearable App on Android or the App having the same name as your Galaxy Watch on iOS

3. Once the App is installed, you will be taken through the pairing process over Bluetooth

4. The App will then give you a Dashboard that shows you the battery percentage, internal storage and memory consumed

Concluding

As far as smartwatches go, the Galaxy Watches are currently very popular. They come with a familiar design similar to the older Gear S3 and also offer a lot of new features. The sleek design and the number of faces have been the most attractive feature of the watch. The user interface is quite user-friendly with some of the best AMOLED displays around along with an impressive battery life.

 

The third-party applications like Google Maps, WhatsApp and Facebook cannot be downloaded on the Watch and Bixby is still, well, Bixby. The Galaxy watch works best with the Android phones, especially Samsung devices. The Galaxy watch is an easy recommendation for anyone who wants to use a smartwatch on the go, so that they don’t have to always depend on their smartphone.