Samsung Galaxy Watch Review: Feature-Rich With Great Battery Life

Setting up the Galaxy Watch couldn’t be any easier. The Samsung Galaxy Watch is compatible with both Android (5.0+) and iOS, and assuming Bluetooth is enabled on your device, it is simply a matter of downloading the Galaxy Wearable app, letting it detect the watch, and following a few simple prompts.


The Galaxy Watch displays some simple setup instructions on-screen as soon as it is powered up, but the bulk of the actual setup is handled on your mobile device. The setup is simple, however, and requires little more than hitting ‘Connect’ and ensuring the pin number on the Watch matches what is displayed on your phone. It really couldn’t be any simpler.


Once the Galaxy Watch is paired, the Samsung Wearable app runs through a quick tutorial to explain some of the main features. There really isn’t much to using the Galaxy Watch, though and it's relatively intuitive. The top button takes you to the Home screen, the bottom button brings up the app menu or steps backwards to a previous screen, rotating the bezel clockwise scrolls through installed Widgets, and rotating it counterclockwise steps through any notifications. The bezel can also be used to rotate through menu options in a particular app as well. Of course, the Samsung Galaxy Watch has a touch screen too, so tapping and swiping behaves much like a smartphone to bring down the settings menu or browse through notifications, etc.


There are an array of apps and widgets pre-installed on the Galaxy Watch, like Samsung Health, Pay, Flow, and Knox, along with many things you’d expect, like a messaging app, weather widget, calendar, contacts, phone app, etc. Via the Galaxy Wearable app, however, there are a multitude of additional apps, widgets, and watch faces available as well. The Wearable app also shows useful information, like available battery life, storage space, and memory. Many of the Galaxy Watch’s settings can be tweaked via the Galaxy Wearable app as well, if you prefer to not tap through menus on the Watch’s small screen.


Samsung has done a commendable job making the Galaxy Watch easy and intuitive to use. In fact, many of its functions are automatic. For example, the activity tracker can auto-detect walking, running, cycling, rowing, swimming, and even elliptical training, among other things. Versus previous Samsung wearables, the new Galaxy Watch also supports 21 new trackable indoor exercises for arms, back, core, legs, shoulders, or chest – in total 39 workout types can be tracked.


The Galaxy Watch can also auto-detect high stress levels and will prompt the user with a breathing guide, in an attempt to help him or her relax. And the sleep tracker can monitor light, deep, and REM sleep and offers up a daily sleep score. Weekly summaries are also presented to help track your progress or rhythm over time.


In addition to tracking an array of activities, the Samsung Health app also has calorie management features and allows for easy food intake tracking using Bixby. The app will even present users with a chart showing caloric intake versus calories burned, for users focused on weight loss.


Over and above the fitness and health tools, the Galaxy Watch is also integrated with Samsung SmartThings devices for controlling smart devices in your home and it works with Samsung Pay as well. The Samsung Galaxy Watch actually does a lot more than just track health and sleep related data and present notifications.