4 recommended fitness trackers. Carefully selected by actually using a device that can manage the amount of activity and sleep during the day
Fitbit, Garmin, Apple...which one?
Wirecutter recommends fitness trackers that can measure steps, heart rate, and sleep. We consulted with experts in exercise, sleep, sports medicine, and kinesiology to give you the results of our curated selection of products.
Fitness trackers that visually record your steps, stride length, and sleep are wearable devices that are ideal for managing your daily health and motivation to achieve your goals.
Since 2015, Wirecutter has used 35 different products to track activities such as running, walking, swimming, cycling, and sleeping. We researched which ones were accurate, easy to use, and comfortable to wear all day long. Although none of the distance traveled, number of steps, quality of sleep, calorie consumption, and heart rate could be perfectly recorded, the one that was judged to be the most recommended at the moment due to its functionality and ease of use. It was the Fitbit Charge 5. Especially recommended for those who are concerned about their activity records during the day.
"Fitbit Charge 5"
It looks simple and sophisticated. Automatically and accurately record your activities during the day. Built-in GPS. user friendly. Customizable.
"Fitbit Charge 5" can accurately measure the number of steps and heart rate, and automatically records exercise such as running, walking, cycling, and swimming 10 minutes after the start. The touchscreen is clear, vivid, and easy to see even in the sun. The app is intuitive and easy to use. Stay motivated by connecting with other FITbit users. The premium version costs 640 yen per month, but if you purchase it, you will get a 6-month membership. There are 20 exercise modes, and you can add them to your favorites list with the app. You can set which smartphone notifications you receive. ECG (electrocardiogram) app compatible, built-in GPS, you can record real-time distance data without a smartphone.
Battery life: up to 7 days (watch mode), up to 5 days (GPS mode)
Sleep Tracking: Yes (including naps longer than 1 hour)
Waterproof performance: Yes (maximum depth of water 50m)
Heart rate monitor: yes
GPS: Built-in
"Fitbit Inspire 2"
3 days longer battery life than "Fitbit Charge 5" and features a slimmer silhouette. It's small and the screen is black and white. Altitude measurement, no built-in GPS.
The slimmer Fitbit Inspire 2 has a black and white touchscreen, but it's bright and vivid. There is no built-in GPS, but if you connect it to a smartphone, you can measure the distance and pace of walking and running. For this reason, smartphones are a must when exercising. The accuracy of the step count varies slightly, but the heart rate measurement is stable. The Fitbit Charge 5 doesn't have guided breathing sessions, but it doesn't have an altimeter or an ECG. It has over 20 exercise modes and sleep stage tracking. If you use the optional clip, you can attach it to your clothing instead of your arm.
Battery life: Up to 10 days
Sleep tracking: Yes (not including naps)
Waterproof performance: Yes (maximum depth of water 50m)
Heart rate monitor: yes
GPS: Available only when connected to a smartphone
"Garmin Vívoactive 4S"
In terms of accuracy and wearing comfort, it is top class. The perfect wearable for exercise enthusiasts to wear every day. It's closer to a GPS running watch than the Fitbit introduced this time.
The Garmin Vívoactive 4S is a sporty and advanced fitness tracker. Recommended for people who exercise regularly and want to check their records in detail. Compared to the 45mm screen "Garmin Vívoactive 4", it is a little smaller with a 40mm screen. A feeling of wearing is top-class. It is larger than the Fitbit introduced above, and smaller than other Garmin and Polar. The touchscreen is crisp and responsive (although the colors are muted compared to others). A button on the side of the screen makes it easy to switch between training modes and start/stop exercise, and your workout data can be viewed multiple times at once (whereas the Fitbit above only shows one metric). indicators can be checked.
Battery life: up to 5 days
Sleep tracking: Yes (not including naps)
Waterproof performance: Yes (maximum depth of water 50m)
Heart rate monitor: yes
GPS: Built-in
Apple Watch SE
As a smartwatch, it provides an attractive display of your daytime activity, exercise, and health tracking. Weaknesses include short battery life and a lack of app detail and sophistication.
"Apple Watch SE" is a smart watch recommended for those who want to have Apple products. Compared to the "Apple Watch Series 7", it lacks sophistication, but the point is that the price is affordable. The screen is bright, crisp and intuitive. The visual appeal is unique to Apple, such as the completion of three rings when you reach your active calorie consumption target during the day. While fitness apps can track a variety of activities and workouts, they lack the detail compared to the products mentioned above. Always-on screen is not supported. Heart rate accuracy is top-notch, and it provides reliable data when it comes to step counting and GPS tracking. Battery life is short at 18 hours (whereas the products introduced above last for several days).
Battery life: up to 18 hours
Sleep tracking: Yes (not including naps)
Water resistance: Yes (maximum water depth 50m)
Heart rate monitor: yes
GPS: Built-in
For whom is a fitness tracker recommended?
Fitness trackers allow you to see how much you move throughout the day.
As a device, it's perfect for setting goals and managing your daytime activities, building exercise habits, improving your sleep, and checking your health like your heart rate. The app makes it easy to manage your diet, hydration, and menstrual cycle. Functionality changes depending on what kind of sensor is installed, so it is a point that you cannot underestimate whether it is easy for you to use.
In addition to fitness trackers, wrist wearables include smartwatches and GPS running watches. But the lines are blurring these days, as smartwatches can detect movement during the day, and GPS running watches can track activity during the day and sleep at night.
In particular, fitness trackers are smaller and easier to handle than GPS running watches, are less expensive, and can be recharged about once a week. And the latest fitness trackers go beyond step and exercise tracking, from smartphone notifications to third-party apps, to smartwatch-like features and sensors that help you better understand your daytime activity and your nighttime sleep. You may be able to get more information.
Finally, while fitness trackers can be useful, they are not a substitute for medical equipment, and if you have any health concerns, please consult a specialist.
Fitbit Charge 5
The latest version of Wirecutter's long-running Fitbit Charge series, the Fitbit Charge 5, is a great way to track your activities during the day. Ease of use and high accuracy should be expected. In particular, the accuracy of step counting is top class in the industry, with an error of about 6% (Wirecutter survey). Walking distance and heart rate data measurement are also quite good. Fitbit's basic app is not only intuitive and easy to use, but it's also significantly more convenient than its competitors. Sleep data can be tracked, including naps of 1 hour or longer.
The screen is bright and colorful. Easy to see even under strong sunlight. By the way, according to the manufacturer, the brightness is twice that of the previous model "Charge 4". Brightness can be selected from 3 levels (dark, normal, maximum). There's also an always-on screen setting that's handy during workouts. The touch screen is also responsive.
The case of the previous model "Charge 4" was made of plastic, but this one is made of aluminum. The band is made of flexible and comfortable silicone and can be replaced. There are more than 20 kinds of watch faces, convenient for customization.
App notifications can be changed from settings. For Android users, there are 5 presets for each message and emoji, which should come in handy for quick replies. No option to reply to messages for iOS users. Compatible with Fitbit Pay for contactless payments.
In the Wirecutter survey, when walking, running, cycling, etc. were performed to measure daytime activities, activities were automatically recorded 10 to 15 minutes after the start.
Heart rate data can be expected to be highly accurate during running (without breaks), but it may be somewhat distorted during walking and running with intervals. A feature called Active Zone Minutes displays your heart rate during a workout in three different zones: Fat Burn, Cardio, and Peak, so you can see how hard you've been working out. I'm here. It's based on your age and your resting heart rate, and it will notify you when you hit certain zones (and you can turn off certain exercises too). Of course, you can check it later with the app.
As you can see in the GIF video above, the interface is pretty simple. You can access different menus by swiping up or down from the home screen. Some third-party devices display only icons, making it difficult to understand what they do.
Using the "Screen Wake" feature to prevent battery drain, you can wake up the screen by turning your wrist. If you set it to manual, you can tap the screen to start the screen, and double-tap to switch to the home screen (until you get used to it, you may experience malfunctions such as starting a workout or messing with the timer).
Exercise mode gives you 20 different workouts, including boot camps and hikes, as well as setting interval timers. While it's convenient to set goals such as time, distance, calories burned, and heart rate zone, you can't see all the data on one screen like "Garmin Vívoactive 4S" and "Apple Watch SE" you have to scroll and check each item.
Built-in GPS allows you to measure distance and pace in real time, so you don't have to carry your smartphone with you while exercising, but the weak point is that the battery drains quickly. It takes about 20-30 seconds to get the signal, and you will be notified on the screen when it is connected. Running a 4.92-mile (8km) loop in New York's Central Park recorded 5.08 miles (8.2km) and walking 1.4 miles (2.2km) recorded 1.43 miles (2.3km). There are some errors such as GPS performance is decent, but occasionally disconnects and reconnects.
Customizable notifications to help you reach your daily goals. There is also a reminder function if you are sitting for 250 steps per hour, but you can turn it off. In addition to a breakdown of your goal achievements, you can also check the activity/rest time in detail in the app (see image below). Other than that, you can set reminders to wash your hands, drink water, and notify you when your heart rate deviates from the normal value.
An SpO2 sensor measures blood oxygen levels during sleep, and a new EDA (electrodermal activity) sensor measures stress levels. EDA shows that the less you react in 3 minutes, the more calm you are.
The ECG (electrocardiogram) app measures changes in your heart rate, and the "Today's Energy Score" is calculated from your sleep and heart rate changes to give you an idea of how hard you should be exercising during the day.
Compared to other apps, Fitbit's basic app is intuitive and easy to use. It's convenient because it's easy to keep motivated from social elements, and it's easy to know where to look to check the details. You can also record food, water, and menstrual cycle. There is also helpful information about each metric within the app.
When you purchase, you can try "Fitbit Premium" for 640 yen per month for free for 6 months, so don't miss it. You can use functions related to health management such as advanced sleep and stress analysis.
The Fitbit Charge 5's sleep tracking feature measures your sleep stages (wake, REM, light, and deep sleep) based on your heart rate and accelerometer movements. However, sleep stage data requires at least 3 hours of sleep. Since it uses heart rate variability data to measure the transition to each stage, it is an estimate rather than a medical statistic.
Set Do Not Disturb to turn off notifications and dim your screen while you sleep. For alarm settings, you can use the alarm function (snooze and vibration) on your wrist. If you set it to "strong," the vibration sound is strong, but it's also useful if you don't want to wake up the person sleeping next to you.
Fitbit says you can expect up to 7 days of battery life on a single charge. In my Wirecutter study, I had a generous 69% charge in two days and nights, even after a few workouts and a few auto-detected activities. The battery level is easy to understand as it is displayed both as an icon and as a percentage.
Here are some of the things that annoy me about the Fitbit Charge 5. First, while you can record more than 20 different activities, you can only see six on your device at a time. There is no problem if you do less than 6 types of exercise on a daily basis, but if not, you will need to replace the items. "Garmin Vívoactive 4S" and "Apple Watch SE" can record more than 6 types of activities at once.
Second, you may not be able to use some metrics and goal settings, such as swim time and distance. You can do this with the Garmin Vívoactive 4S.
The third is that the GPS connection is sometimes unstable. According to DC Rainmaker's review, there is also a theory that GPS will not connect if the band is too tight. However, if it is too loose, the heart rate measurement will not go well, so be careful. The Wirecutter study found that people overestimated their pace when they went for a 3-mile run without a smartphone, route maps were confusing, and a 2.5-mile walk was half a mile underestimated. There was also a thing. Other than that, when I went out for a run with my phone, it connected to GPS in seconds and was tracking consistently and accurately.
Fourth, you can't do things like guided breathing sessions (without the app) or navigating Spotify that the previous Charge 4 did. You can do this with the Garmin Vívoactive 4S and the Apple Watch SE.
Older models of the "Charge" series were reported to be buggy, but Fitbit's customer service response to replacing defective products has been pretty positive. However, after the one-year warranty period (as with other manufacturers), you can't expect too many options.
Finally, some concerns have been raised by privacy experts since Fitbit was acquired by Google. In the EU, there is an agreement not to use Fitbit data for personalized advertising, but it's hard to predict what Google will do with the information going forward. If you are concerned about this point, "Garmin Vívoactive 4S" is recommended.
"Fitbit Inspire 2"
The "Fitbit Inspire 2" is smaller and lighter than the "Fitbit Charge 5" introduced above. There are no functions such as color display, altimeter, contactless payment, ECG (electrocardiogram), SpO2 (oxygen saturation) sensor, and it is characterized by simple appearance and usability. That said, it does have daytime activity tracking, automatic activity detection, sedentary reminders, heart rate monitoring, resting heart rate data, sleep stage tracking, GPS connectivity for real-time measurements during exercise, and more than 20. Functionality such as exercise mode is plentiful.
The OLED screen is bright and crisp, but can be difficult to see in direct sunlight. No always-on screen feature. To wake up or return to the home screen, you have to twist the side of the device to scroll through the menu. (The Fitbit Charge 5 allows you to swipe vertically and horizontally to move between modes and menus, while the Inspire 2 only allows you to swipe vertically.) The included silicone band is soft and comfortable.
The battery lasts up to 10 days on a single charge, three days longer than the Fitbit Charge 5. In a Wirecutter study, the Fitbit Charge 5 dropped to 69% (probably due to the built-in GPS) when wearing it for two consecutive days of activity, while an impressive 81% remained.
As with other wrist-worn wearables, the accuracy of step counting (since arm swings are counted instead of actual steps) is not perfect. When walking outdoors, it was only about 15 steps off. The number of steps counted during the day is 30% higher, which is quite a margin of error compared to the Charge 5.
Other activities, such as running for 30 minutes and walking for 21 minutes, are automatically detected accurately. Heart rate test performance is also robust. Premium subscribers to the Fitbit app can see their "Today's Energy Score," which is calculated based on heart rate variability and sleep, and gives an indication of how hard they should be exercising.
Similar to "Charge 5", it measures sleep stages (waking state, REM sleep, light sleep, deep sleep). You can also see when you woke up, total time asleep, and sleep score. The tracker detects sleep from your movement and heart rate patterns, but it doesn't show sleep stages until you've slept for at least 3 hours. Within the app, you can manually register naps. Alarms can be set from the app.
I've tried a number of fitness tracker apps and none have a simpler interface and ease of use than Fitbit. The premium version costs 640 yen per month, and you can check the indicators in more detail. You can choose from a variety of dials (similar to the Charge 5).
"Inspire 2" can be worn on the wrist, and there is also a clip accessory (sold separately) that can be attached to clothing.
Garmin Vívoactive 4S
If you have a habit of exercising and are interested in tracking your daily activities in detail, the Garmin Vívoactive 4S is for you. It's practical and should be a great alternative to a GPS running watch. In addition to monitoring the basics such as steps and heart rate, as well as more than the basics such as stress and breathing rate, it also provides numerous activity modes and exercise instructions. You can also customize your workouts in a way that Fitbit can't.
The color touchscreen is subdued (compared to other models), but crisp and responsive. The company's Garmin Venu 2S, which looks and feels similar, offers more advanced features, a higher-resolution screen, and longer battery life (plus 3 days).
Two buttons on the side of the Garmin Vívoactive 4S screen allow you to switch between workout (top) and general settings (bottom), giving you a running watch-like experience. Of course, the nature of fitness watches, such as reminders for sedentary measures and notifications for reaching goals. The size is 40mm, which is slightly smaller than the 45mm "Garmin Vívoactive 4".
When it comes to measuring steps and distance, it's one of the most accurate trackers in the Wirecutter survey. Heart rate data is also reliable. As for exercise, there are over 20 exercise modes including running, cycling, yoga, swimming, climbing and more. The Garmin Connect app also allows you to sync various workouts. You can conveniently play animated demo videos by uploading your workouts to your device.
Automatic activity detection is a bit annoying. Especially when pushing a stroller, it tends to detect cycling (although this is common with other products).
The Vívoactive 4S focuses just as much on rest as it does on sedentary measures. It monitors sleep depth, wake time, and breathing, but doesn't automatically record naps. The 'Body Battery' feature tells you when to rest.
It also has smartwatch-like features, such as the ability to use Garmin Pay for contactless payments, and the ability to pair with headphones to listen to music from Spotify and Amazon Music. For example, it's convenient to be able to control the podcast playback on your smartphone with your wrist even while you're working out. After using it for 2 consecutive days, the battery life dropped to 48%. The battery drains faster than the other models introduced above, but it may be natural if you use training, music, GPS mode, and increase the brightness of the screen.
In 2020, it was reported that Garmin's service was suspended for several days after a ransomware attack and that it responded to payments of hundreds of millions of yen. According to the company, no customer data was leaked.
Apple Watch SE
The Apple Watch SE is a low-cost smartwatch recommended for iPhone users. It's perfect for people who want to manage their health and exercise data within Apple's ecosystem, and who don't need the advanced features of the Apple Watch Series 7.
The Apple Watch SE comes in two sizes: 40mm and 44mm. The screen is bright and crisp, and the band is comfortable. While it does have an altimeter, it lacks the always-on screen feature of the Apple Watch Series 7, or the SpO2 sensor that measures blood oxygen levels. Currently on watchOS 8.
When you reach your active calorie goal, you'll see three rings (Exercise, Move, and Stand) complete, making it easy to see. Based on your estimated basal metabolic rate, detected movement, and heart rate, your active calorie target is determined.
"Apple Watch SE" emphasizes the minimum amount of exercise (30 minutes) and moving at least once an hour for half a day rather than counting steps. Of course, these goals are customizable. If you're sticking with numbers, you can also see things like steps taken, stairs climbed, standing time, exercise time, and specific exercise times within the workout app.
Your device will auto-detect within 3-10 minutes when you start doing certain exercises like walking, running, swimming or rowing. The Wirecutter survey gives the impression of high performance. It also features many workout modes such as fencing, squash, and fishing. The step count is highly accurate, with the Wirecutter survey measuring 21% more over the two days. Built-in or smartphone GPS is used to record outdoor walks, runs, hikes, and bike rides. The error is small, such as outdoor walking of about 2.2 km is displayed as 2.3 km. It was impressive that a fairly accurate route map was made even for hiking with many uphills. Compared to the Fitbit Charge 5, the average pace is more accurate.
It doesn't have an always-on screen feature, but it wakes up quickly when you raise your arm, so you don't have to move too much while exercising. Unlike the Series 7, it doesn't have an ECG (electrocardiogram) function, but it performs well on heart rate tests. There was a notification when my heart rate dropped during sleep.
Check your activity and exercise during the day, sleep at night, heart rate, breathing and more in the Health app on your iPhone.
The sleep app is easy to set up and helps you keep track of your sleep schedule. The indicators are sleep time, average sleep time, average bedtime, breathing rate, etc. No sleep stages.
You can expect 18 hours of battery life on a single charge, but that number is pretty short (compared to days on other trackers). In the Wirecutter survey, after finishing the desk work, it decreased to 35% while recording workouts, walking, housework, etc. Taking into account the recording of sleep at night, it seems necessary to charge once a day.
The device has a one-year manufacturer's warranty.
Other Recommended Fitness Trackers
If you're looking for a stylish fitness tracker packed with premium features, the Garmin Venu 2S is the one for you. It looks similar to the Garmin Vívoactive 4S, but the functionality is different. The price difference between the two is usually about $70 (about 8,000 yen), but if it suits your taste and purpose, it should be worth it. The size is 45mm, and there is also a smaller (40mm) Garmin Venu 2. The Wirecutter survey also impressed with the built-in GPS, heart rate accuracy, and step counting. In addition to more than 25 types of exercise modes, there are also workout modes such as strength training and yoga, and high-intensity interval training (HIIT). The screen is bright and clear. The built-in music storage is up to 650 songs. Always-on display, battery life up to 10 days. Easy to put on. Customizable and scrollable home screen.
Prices shown are current as of writing. Please check the sales page as it is subject to change.
©2022 WIRECUTTER, INC. A NEW YORK TIMES COMPANY.