Withings Steel HR Sport Hybrid Smartwatch
The Withings Steel HR Sport is a hybrid smart watch which elegantly blends smart functionality with a stylish mechanical look.
- Heart rate tracking – Maximize your workouts with continuous heart rate and in-depth reporting plus daily and overnight HR
- Workout mode w/connected GPS – Maps your session with distance, elevation and pace and now enjoy Strava integration
- Fitness level – Assesses your cardiovascular capacity when running based on V02 max estimation
- Goes the distance – Water resistant up to 50m, 25 days of battery life on one charge, durable stainless steel case
- Sleep tracking – Wake to a Sleep Score based on light & deep sleep cycles, interruptions, depth & regularity plus enjoy a silent vibrating alarm
- Smart notifications – Call, text, event and app notifications from your smartphone
- Battery – The charging time is approximately 2 hours to 100% and about 1 hour to 80%.The battery life is Up to 5 days in workout mode and +20 additional days in power reserve mode (time and activity tracking only)
Amazon.com
eBay
S. Schirmer –
Firstly i am starting to enjoy Nokia / Withings products. I owned the scales first (which are excellent) then bought the Blood pressure monitor (also very good) and then the Thermometer (was also good until the dog chewed it to smithereens).Now my next product is the Watch and i am pleased to inform that it does not disappoint. Here are my thoughts:Looks:- Beautiful and elegant design, much nicer than say the Apple Watch. Also it is slightly smaller than i expected. In the pictures it looks huge, but in person it seems much smaller than i expected. I have huge wrists so maybe that is why. But in any case it is a lovely size- Now a quick comment about colour. YES it does matter. I bought the black version of this watch first and i HATED the colour. Why? Simply because i could not see the hands properly. What on earth prompted them to make the hands dark grey on a black ground? It simply does not work for me and i found it so annoying i replaced it with the WHITE version. Thankfully i did as the white version is gorgeous and no problems seeing the handsFunction:- The watch works seamlessly with the Nokia Health Mate App. My scales and blood pressure monitor already sync with this app and i love it. The watch syncs perfectly with it too.- A quick comment about heart rate. Very interesting how they have done this. My scales gave a heart rate reading and this goes on the app, but when my blood pressure machine takes heart rate reading this supercedes the scales reading. Now when the watch takes a reading this supercedes both. Clever. The reading itself is taken every 30 mins automatically and a profile is built in the app. Both awake HR and asleep HR.- Steps. Now this is a key item for me especially after having so many fitbits previously. I have noticed one clear difference between this watch and the fitbit, if i am having a lazy pyjama day the step reading barely climbs above 2000 steps a day. But for the fitbit it would still reach 4000-5000 for the exact same day. I suspect this is because the fitbit counts every movement as a step (even waving arms around) whereas this watch does not. Which i greatly appreciate- Sleep: The sleep monitor is similar to fitbit in that it measures light and heavy sleep. But it goes one step further and gives a sleep score. Very usefulBattery- This is the bit which really floored me. I have been using it for a week or so now and the battery has barely budged from 100%. I think it is still at 99% the last time i looked. I find this incredible. In fact i may as well store the charger away as i won’t be needing it this month.Overall- A gorgeous watch which looks the part (i can take this into meetings no problem) and has so much function and battery. I personally would advise choosing the White instead of the Black version, simply as the display is much easier to read.UPDATE:I’ve had the watch for 3 weeks now and i’ve used it constantly with bluetooth on my phone set to on permanently. The battery level is 31%. I still have not had to charge it yet. At this rate the 1 month battery before charges is actually an understatement. What a fantastic watch, best i’ve ever owned. Next week i’ll need to go find the charger…
Isaac –
The thing that sold me on this watch over other fitness trackers was the look. Which is why it is so annoying that the watch face doesn’t line up with the markings on the metal rim. I thought it might be a one off so did a trade through Amazon but even the second has the exact same problem. If you look at the images, the twelve o’clock position most clearly shows the problem. The face is somehow rotated counter-clockwise from the casing.Otherwise the watch has been working great. Sleep tracking is not super precise but I don’t care so much about that feature.I’m very disappointed with this defect and I will probably return the watch when my OCD can’t take it anymore.
Demo318 –
After 3 DaysMy aim was to buy a watch with fitness/workout/sleep tracking comparable to an Apple Watch but which was stylish enough to wear to work. I wear a suit to work in a Four Diamond hotel, so not just any watch would be fitting for my daily dress code. The Withings Steel HR Sport meets these requirements wonderfully (and, compared to Apple, cheaply)!Setting up the watch and syncing it to my phone was a breeze. The Withings Health Mate app has a great aesthetic, and the process was very straight-forward. The app does have you calibrate all of the dials (the crown on the watch doesn’t turn – it’s just a button – so you move the dials with the app on your phone), which felt tedious, especially for the small steps-goal %. Fortunately, you can re-calibrate at anytime through the app if you get it a little bit wrong.Withings recommends wearing the watch one finger-breadth above the bone on your wrist. This is to ensure the HR monitor isn’t put at any funny angles and can’t take readings. I’ve been wearing mine comfortably lower than that (closer to my hand), and I’ve had no trouble getting HR readouts.The HR monitor is really slick. Throughout my day, it’s taking measurements (every 10 minutes, I believe), and I can pull up the app and see what has been measured. I can also use the button to initiate an HR reading at anytime (It will immediately display the results from the most recent reading, if it quietly took one in the background, and then take a new reading if you wait just a moment on the HR screen.), and then when you go into fitness mode, it monitors continuously (as well as initiates GPS tracking, when connected to your phone). The step counter has also been great to have on my wrist. Throughout the day, I have checked both the digital screen and the little dial to see how I’m tracking. And when you reach your goal, it vibrates and displays the step count to let you know.Tracking sleep data seems accurate so far. It does a good job of continuing sleep monitoring even if you get up for a short while in the middle of the night (such as when taking care of an infant). One morning though, I woke up, set the watch on the countertop while I took a shower, and found later it recorded my whole morning routing as 30 minutes of ‘deep sleep’ which inflated my ‘sleep score.’ You can go in and edit your asleep & wake-up times, though, so a quick adjustment made the data more reliable. Alarms are also based on your sleep cycle, trying to wake you up when you’re not in a deep sleep. It has worked well for me so far. Also, the watch itself is hardly noticeable when I sleep (unless I don’t turn notifications off), but the band it ships with isn’t all that comfortable. I think I might get something fabric, not silicone, for sleeping.At first, I thought interacting with the screen would be frustrating. I thought that perhaps I would feel constrained. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. It’s almost a relief not to have a deluge of digital information on my wrist. The notifications have been great. I can see if a message/email needs to be checked right now or not, and if it does, I pull out my phone to deal with it (which is what all my Apple Watch-wearing friends seem to do anyway). The single-button design works really well, too. In the app, I can customize which screens the digital display can show.I admit, I haven’t done much exercising with it – just a few long walks so far. I hope to have some exercise in before my next update to this review.After 1 WeekThe band included is really not that comfortable, I found, which is why I’m glad this watch uses a standard 20mm watch band. I ordered a different sport band, and the result was immediate. My wrist has been much, much more comfortable since. Gear Sport Band, KADES Soft Silicone Band Breathable Strap Compatible for Samsung Galaxy Watch 42mm/ Garmin VivoActive 3/ Ticwatch 2/ Ticwatch E/Amazfit Bip Smart Watch- White/Black Sleep tracking has worked really well. Sometimes, if I set my watch down shortly after waking up, the watch will think I’m still sleeping. I’ve been surprised a couple times to see that the app shows I was in a ‘deep sleep’ when in fact I was showering or brushing my teeth. Withings made it quite easy to go into the app and adjust the ‘wake up’ time, so that any sleep data collected while you were awake is disregarded.For the most part, the notifications on the watch have been really useful. Even though they’re just short snippets of text that scroll by, they’ve still been useful. I much prefer glancing at my watch instead of pulling out my phone from my pocket to see who that text/email is from.Notifications only work, though, for applications which have been integrated by Withings. I wish there was some way to see notifications from other apps on my phone. For example, I use Waterlogged on my iPhone to help me ensure I’m drinking enough water throughout the day. I wish those notifications popped up on my wrist as well as my phone.There are no move reminders. If you sit all day long, your Steel HR Sport will not complain (unlike an Apple Watch or Fitbit, for example). Perhaps there’s a way to use an iPhone app which can send such notifications, but I haven’t found it yet.The battery life is incredible. I put this on the charger on October 10th (just to try it, not because it actually needed charging). It is now October 16th, and I’m at 58%. That includes several sessions tracking activities.Activity tracking seems to work really nicely. It even automatically detects workouts. I had a little impromptu soccer game with my two-year-old. I was running around, heart rate elevated, for about 15-20 minutes. As we walked away from the field, my phone buzzed with a notification “workout detected.” It automatically categorized it as ‘other’ (which isn’t surprising, soccer with a toddler is a pretty unique set of movements), but I could easily hop in the app to change the category and add notes so that it was recorded effectively to my log.I’ve been using this in conjunction with dieting to. The companion app Health Mate ties in with MyFitnessPal very well for comparing calories burned with calories consumed.One downside to mention is that I’m not sure the Steel HR Sport counts stairs climbed. On a walk I tracked, it counted elevation in the post-workout stats, but I’m not sure if that was from the watch’s onboard telemetry or comparing GPS info to known topographical data from other sources.I’ve hit my 10,000 step goal a few times now. I love the little celebration notification that pops up. It’s rewarding and well done.Finally, I really, really like the look of the watch (I have the white watch face). I’ve noticed at work a lot of folks wearing Apple Watches. To me, they know look large and clunky (especially with the extra armor/cases they put on to protect them). Every day, I’m quite glad to be wearing a watch that looks like a watch.After 1 MonthI still love this watch. It seamlessly fits into my day-to-day as a pair of glasses or perhaps a favorite coat. I’m not often presently aware that I have it on, until I check the time or perhaps my heart rate.Notifications work better than previously thought. The companion application becomes ‘aware’ of a notification after it has appeared on your phone. Here’s a step-by-step of how to get an app on your phone to show notifications on your watch:1) Install app on your phone (this app will not show up in the watch’s companion app yet).2) Have the app ding your phone with any notification (now the app shows up in the watch’s companion app)3) Open up the Health Mate companion app, and enable your notifications.4) Enjoy getting buzzed on your wrist.Additionally, it seems there is a correlation in battery life and notifications. If your watch is buzzing every couple minutes all day every day with notifications, the battery wears down more quickly. Even so, it still seems to last forever.The watch band that the Steel HR Sport ships with is decidedly terrible. I found it profoundly uncomfortable. The 3rd-party watch band I mentioned above has been incredibly comfortable, day & night.Over the past couple weeks, the sleep and alarm features have been great! I’ve had to edit my sleep data a couple of times. Three times, I’ve woken up, set my watch down to take a shower, and found the app thought I was still sleeping. A quick edit fixes that and gives me good data. Once, I supposed I tossed and turned so much that it didn’t think I fell asleep until much later. Again, a quick edit with my actual bedtime corrected the data.The only hiccup I’ve seen so far is regarding steps. For whatever reason, in the day following the last software update, I was given 397 complimentary steps per hour from 6p – midnight. I had already put in 18,000 steps that day, but you can imagine my shock when I woke up to find Health Mate reporting 27,000. I’ve yet to speak with Withings to see if I can correct the data. It hasn’t happened again since that one instance.I still haven’t much used the sport features. Also, there’s at least one micro-scratch on the watch thus far. It’s only noticeable upon close inspection. I did buy Amazon’s suggested 2-year warranty, just in case.Just today, my wife asked me, “What don’t you really like about your watch?” And I surprised myself a little when I replied, “Nothing. Now that I’ve replaced the band, there is nothing that I don’t like.”After 3 Months (coming January 9, 2019)After 1 Year (coming October 9, 2019)
Demo318 –
After 3 DaysMy aim was to buy a watch with fitness/workout/sleep tracking comparable to an Apple Watch but which was stylish enough to wear to work. I wear a suit to work in a Four Diamond hotel, so not just any watch would be fitting for my daily dress code. The Withings Steel HR Sport meets these requirements wonderfully (and, compared to Apple, cheaply)!Setting up the watch and syncing it to my phone was a breeze. The Withings Health Mate app has a great aesthetic, and the process was very straight-forward. The app does have you calibrate all of the dials (the crown on the watch doesn’t turn – it’s just a button – so you move the dials with the app on your phone), which felt tedious, especially for the small steps-goal %. Fortunately, you can re-calibrate at anytime through the app if you get it a little bit wrong.Withings recommends wearing the watch one finger-breadth above the bone on your wrist. This is to ensure the HR monitor isn’t put at any funny angles and can’t take readings. I’ve been wearing mine comfortably lower than that (closer to my hand), and I’ve had no trouble getting HR readouts.The HR monitor is really slick. Throughout my day, it’s taking measurements (every 10 minutes, I believe), and I can pull up the app and see what has been measured. I can also use the button to initiate an HR reading at anytime (It will immediately display the results from the most recent reading, if it quietly took one in the background, and then take a new reading if you wait just a moment on the HR screen.), and then when you go into fitness mode, it monitors continuously (as well as initiates GPS tracking, when connected to your phone). The step counter has also been great to have on my wrist. Throughout the day, I have checked both the digital screen and the little dial to see how I’m tracking. And when you reach your goal, it vibrates and displays the step count to let you know.Tracking sleep data seems accurate so far. It does a good job of continuing sleep monitoring even if you get up for a short while in the middle of the night (such as when taking care of an infant). One morning though, I woke up, set the watch on the countertop while I took a shower, and found later it recorded my whole morning routing as 30 minutes of ‘deep sleep’ which inflated my ‘sleep score.’ You can go in and edit your asleep & wake-up times, though, so a quick adjustment made the data more reliable. Alarms are also based on your sleep cycle, trying to wake you up when you’re not in a deep sleep. It has worked well for me so far. Also, the watch itself is hardly noticeable when I sleep (unless I don’t turn notifications off), but the band it ships with isn’t all that comfortable. I think I might get something fabric, not silicone, for sleeping.At first, I thought interacting with the screen would be frustrating. I thought that perhaps I would feel constrained. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. It’s almost a relief not to have a deluge of digital information on my wrist. The notifications have been great. I can see if a message/email needs to be checked right now or not, and if it does, I pull out my phone to deal with it (which is what all my Apple Watch-wearing friends seem to do anyway). The single-button design works really well, too. In the app, I can customize which screens the digital display can show.I admit, I haven’t done much exercising with it – just a few long walks so far. I hope to have some exercise in before my next update to this review.After 1 WeekThe band included is really not that comfortable, I found, which is why I’m glad this watch uses a standard 20mm watch band. I ordered a different sport band, and the result was immediate. My wrist has been much, much more comfortable since. Gear Sport Band, KADES Soft Silicone Band Breathable Strap Compatible for Samsung Galaxy Watch 42mm/ Garmin VivoActive 3/ Ticwatch 2/ Ticwatch E/Amazfit Bip Smart Watch- White/Black Sleep tracking has worked really well. Sometimes, if I set my watch down shortly after waking up, the watch will think I’m still sleeping. I’ve been surprised a couple times to see that the app shows I was in a ‘deep sleep’ when in fact I was showering or brushing my teeth. Withings made it quite easy to go into the app and adjust the ‘wake up’ time, so that any sleep data collected while you were awake is disregarded.For the most part, the notifications on the watch have been really useful. Even though they’re just short snippets of text that scroll by, they’ve still been useful. I much prefer glancing at my watch instead of pulling out my phone from my pocket to see who that text/email is from.Notifications only work, though, for applications which have been integrated by Withings. I wish there was some way to see notifications from other apps on my phone. For example, I use Waterlogged on my iPhone to help me ensure I’m drinking enough water throughout the day. I wish those notifications popped up on my wrist as well as my phone.There are no move reminders. If you sit all day long, your Steel HR Sport will not complain (unlike an Apple Watch or Fitbit, for example). Perhaps there’s a way to use an iPhone app which can send such notifications, but I haven’t found it yet.The battery life is incredible. I put this on the charger on October 10th (just to try it, not because it actually needed charging). It is now October 16th, and I’m at 58%. That includes several sessions tracking activities.Activity tracking seems to work really nicely. It even automatically detects workouts. I had a little impromptu soccer game with my two-year-old. I was running around, heart rate elevated, for about 15-20 minutes. As we walked away from the field, my phone buzzed with a notification “workout detected.” It automatically categorized it as ‘other’ (which isn’t surprising, soccer with a toddler is a pretty unique set of movements), but I could easily hop in the app to change the category and add notes so that it was recorded effectively to my log.I’ve been using this in conjunction with dieting to. The companion app Health Mate ties in with MyFitnessPal very well for comparing calories burned with calories consumed.One downside to mention is that I’m not sure the Steel HR Sport counts stairs climbed. On a walk I tracked, it counted elevation in the post-workout stats, but I’m not sure if that was from the watch’s onboard telemetry or comparing GPS info to known topographical data from other sources.I’ve hit my 10,000 step goal a few times now. I love the little celebration notification that pops up. It’s rewarding and well done.Finally, I really, really like the look of the watch (I have the white watch face). I’ve noticed at work a lot of folks wearing Apple Watches. To me, they know look large and clunky (especially with the extra armor/cases they put on to protect them). Every day, I’m quite glad to be wearing a watch that looks like a watch.After 1 MonthI still love this watch. It seamlessly fits into my day-to-day as a pair of glasses or perhaps a favorite coat. I’m not often presently aware that I have it on, until I check the time or perhaps my heart rate.Notifications work better than previously thought. The companion application becomes ‘aware’ of a notification after it has appeared on your phone. Here’s a step-by-step of how to get an app on your phone to show notifications on your watch:1) Install app on your phone (this app will not show up in the watch’s companion app yet).2) Have the app ding your phone with any notification (now the app shows up in the watch’s companion app)3) Open up the Health Mate companion app, and enable your notifications.4) Enjoy getting buzzed on your wrist.Additionally, it seems there is a correlation in battery life and notifications. If your watch is buzzing every couple minutes all day every day with notifications, the battery wears down more quickly. Even so, it still seems to last forever.The watch band that the Steel HR Sport ships with is decidedly terrible. I found it profoundly uncomfortable. The 3rd-party watch band I mentioned above has been incredibly comfortable, day & night.Over the past couple weeks, the sleep and alarm features have been great! I’ve had to edit my sleep data a couple of times. Three times, I’ve woken up, set my watch down to take a shower, and found the app thought I was still sleeping. A quick edit fixes that and gives me good data. Once, I supposed I tossed and turned so much that it didn’t think I fell asleep until much later. Again, a quick edit with my actual bedtime corrected the data.The only hiccup I’ve seen so far is regarding steps. For whatever reason, in the day following the last software update, I was given 397 complimentary steps per hour from 6p – midnight. I had already put in 18,000 steps that day, but you can imagine my shock when I woke up to find Health Mate reporting 27,000. I’ve yet to speak with Withings to see if I can correct the data. It hasn’t happened again since that one instance.I still haven’t much used the sport features. Also, there’s at least one micro-scratch on the watch thus far. It’s only noticeable upon close inspection. I did buy Amazon’s suggested 2-year warranty, just in case.Just today, my wife asked me, “What don’t you really like about your watch?” And I surprised myself a little when I replied, “Nothing. Now that I’ve replaced the band, there is nothing that I don’t like.”After 3 Months (coming January 9, 2019)After 1 Year (coming October 9, 2019)
Demo318 –
After 3 DaysMy aim was to buy a watch with fitness/workout/sleep tracking comparable to an Apple Watch but which was stylish enough to wear to work. I wear a suit to work in a Four Diamond hotel, so not just any watch would be fitting for my daily dress code. The Withings Steel HR Sport meets these requirements wonderfully (and, compared to Apple, cheaply)!Setting up the watch and syncing it to my phone was a breeze. The Withings Health Mate app has a great aesthetic, and the process was very straight-forward. The app does have you calibrate all of the dials (the crown on the watch doesn’t turn – it’s just a button – so you move the dials with the app on your phone), which felt tedious, especially for the small steps-goal %. Fortunately, you can re-calibrate at anytime through the app if you get it a little bit wrong.Withings recommends wearing the watch one finger-breadth above the bone on your wrist. This is to ensure the HR monitor isn’t put at any funny angles and can’t take readings. I’ve been wearing mine comfortably lower than that (closer to my hand), and I’ve had no trouble getting HR readouts.The HR monitor is really slick. Throughout my day, it’s taking measurements (every 10 minutes, I believe), and I can pull up the app and see what has been measured. I can also use the button to initiate an HR reading at anytime (It will immediately display the results from the most recent reading, if it quietly took one in the background, and then take a new reading if you wait just a moment on the HR screen.), and then when you go into fitness mode, it monitors continuously (as well as initiates GPS tracking, when connected to your phone). The step counter has also been great to have on my wrist. Throughout the day, I have checked both the digital screen and the little dial to see how I’m tracking. And when you reach your goal, it vibrates and displays the step count to let you know.Tracking sleep data seems accurate so far. It does a good job of continuing sleep monitoring even if you get up for a short while in the middle of the night (such as when taking care of an infant). One morning though, I woke up, set the watch on the countertop while I took a shower, and found later it recorded my whole morning routing as 30 minutes of ‘deep sleep’ which inflated my ‘sleep score.’ You can go in and edit your asleep & wake-up times, though, so a quick adjustment made the data more reliable. Alarms are also based on your sleep cycle, trying to wake you up when you’re not in a deep sleep. It has worked well for me so far. Also, the watch itself is hardly noticeable when I sleep (unless I don’t turn notifications off), but the band it ships with isn’t all that comfortable. I think I might get something fabric, not silicone, for sleeping.At first, I thought interacting with the screen would be frustrating. I thought that perhaps I would feel constrained. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. It’s almost a relief not to have a deluge of digital information on my wrist. The notifications have been great. I can see if a message/email needs to be checked right now or not, and if it does, I pull out my phone to deal with it (which is what all my Apple Watch-wearing friends seem to do anyway). The single-button design works really well, too. In the app, I can customize which screens the digital display can show.I admit, I haven’t done much exercising with it – just a few long walks so far. I hope to have some exercise in before my next update to this review.After 1 WeekThe band included is really not that comfortable, I found, which is why I’m glad this watch uses a standard 20mm watch band. I ordered a different sport band, and the result was immediate. My wrist has been much, much more comfortable since. Gear Sport Band, KADES Soft Silicone Band Breathable Strap Compatible for Samsung Galaxy Watch 42mm/ Garmin VivoActive 3/ Ticwatch 2/ Ticwatch E/Amazfit Bip Smart Watch- White/Black Sleep tracking has worked really well. Sometimes, if I set my watch down shortly after waking up, the watch will think I’m still sleeping. I’ve been surprised a couple times to see that the app shows I was in a ‘deep sleep’ when in fact I was showering or brushing my teeth. Withings made it quite easy to go into the app and adjust the ‘wake up’ time, so that any sleep data collected while you were awake is disregarded.For the most part, the notifications on the watch have been really useful. Even though they’re just short snippets of text that scroll by, they’ve still been useful. I much prefer glancing at my watch instead of pulling out my phone from my pocket to see who that text/email is from.Notifications only work, though, for applications which have been integrated by Withings. I wish there was some way to see notifications from other apps on my phone. For example, I use Waterlogged on my iPhone to help me ensure I’m drinking enough water throughout the day. I wish those notifications popped up on my wrist as well as my phone.There are no move reminders. If you sit all day long, your Steel HR Sport will not complain (unlike an Apple Watch or Fitbit, for example). Perhaps there’s a way to use an iPhone app which can send such notifications, but I haven’t found it yet.The battery life is incredible. I put this on the charger on October 10th (just to try it, not because it actually needed charging). It is now October 16th, and I’m at 58%. That includes several sessions tracking activities.Activity tracking seems to work really nicely. It even automatically detects workouts. I had a little impromptu soccer game with my two-year-old. I was running around, heart rate elevated, for about 15-20 minutes. As we walked away from the field, my phone buzzed with a notification “workout detected.” It automatically categorized it as ‘other’ (which isn’t surprising, soccer with a toddler is a pretty unique set of movements), but I could easily hop in the app to change the category and add notes so that it was recorded effectively to my log.I’ve been using this in conjunction with dieting to. The companion app Health Mate ties in with MyFitnessPal very well for comparing calories burned with calories consumed.One downside to mention is that I’m not sure the Steel HR Sport counts stairs climbed. On a walk I tracked, it counted elevation in the post-workout stats, but I’m not sure if that was from the watch’s onboard telemetry or comparing GPS info to known topographical data from other sources.I’ve hit my 10,000 step goal a few times now. I love the little celebration notification that pops up. It’s rewarding and well done.Finally, I really, really like the look of the watch (I have the white watch face). I’ve noticed at work a lot of folks wearing Apple Watches. To me, they know look large and clunky (especially with the extra armor/cases they put on to protect them). Every day, I’m quite glad to be wearing a watch that looks like a watch.After 1 MonthI still love this watch. It seamlessly fits into my day-to-day as a pair of glasses or perhaps a favorite coat. I’m not often presently aware that I have it on, until I check the time or perhaps my heart rate.Notifications work better than previously thought. The companion application becomes ‘aware’ of a notification after it has appeared on your phone. Here’s a step-by-step of how to get an app on your phone to show notifications on your watch:1) Install app on your phone (this app will not show up in the watch’s companion app yet).2) Have the app ding your phone with any notification (now the app shows up in the watch’s companion app)3) Open up the Health Mate companion app, and enable your notifications.4) Enjoy getting buzzed on your wrist.Additionally, it seems there is a correlation in battery life and notifications. If your watch is buzzing every couple minutes all day every day with notifications, the battery wears down more quickly. Even so, it still seems to last forever.The watch band that the Steel HR Sport ships with is decidedly terrible. I found it profoundly uncomfortable. The 3rd-party watch band I mentioned above has been incredibly comfortable, day & night.Over the past couple weeks, the sleep and alarm features have been great! I’ve had to edit my sleep data a couple of times. Three times, I’ve woken up, set my watch down to take a shower, and found the app thought I was still sleeping. A quick edit fixes that and gives me good data. Once, I supposed I tossed and turned so much that it didn’t think I fell asleep until much later. Again, a quick edit with my actual bedtime corrected the data.The only hiccup I’ve seen so far is regarding steps. For whatever reason, in the day following the last software update, I was given 397 complimentary steps per hour from 6p – midnight. I had already put in 18,000 steps that day, but you can imagine my shock when I woke up to find Health Mate reporting 27,000. I’ve yet to speak with Withings to see if I can correct the data. It hasn’t happened again since that one instance.I still haven’t much used the sport features. Also, there’s at least one micro-scratch on the watch thus far. It’s only noticeable upon close inspection. I did buy Amazon’s suggested 2-year warranty, just in case.Just today, my wife asked me, “What don’t you really like about your watch?” And I surprised myself a little when I replied, “Nothing. Now that I’ve replaced the band, there is nothing that I don’t like.”After 3 Months (coming January 9, 2019)After 1 Year (coming October 9, 2019)
Bruce C –
My second Steel HR, I was taken by the “Connected GPS” of this model. Great battery life and good looks, excellent heart rate monitoring.However the step counter doesn’t work when your hand is not moving in the normal walking manner, eg. when you are pushing a baby stroller or golf trolley. All such steps are ignored by the associated HealthMate app, even when it is set up to sync with your phone’s health app. Despite your phone’s pedometer avoiding this issue, its data will be ignored by the HealthMate app in favour of the lower and inaccurate count from the watch.Assuming that fixing the watch is not practical, Withings could revise the app to help its customers enjoy more accurate exercise data. For example, the app could accept the phone’s step count ahead of the watch’s count, perhaps as a user selection option. Instead, Withings’ only suggestion is to disassociate the watch from the app, thus losing lots of its core functionality. Not impressive, Withings Customer Service.
Dennis Rogers –
Love this watch, in 2 days battery level is at 84%, but I am quite active. I also have a Garmin vivomove hr.The Steel Sport accually tracks hr better than my vivomove, this watch is well underrated and has a good battery life, so at a 18% drop in battery level and using the tracking features often is good, so may ammount to 6-7 days using to track my activities, as I have had a few walks and bike 12.5km per day.The watch is so comfy you dont know your wearing it.If there is one issue, does seem to under esmitate steps, pushing a trolley, mower, shopping trolley, etc, it’s not counting steps.Apart from this it’s great, GPS tethered to the phone is very accurate, same as sleep tracking. It’s a great fitness watch, with solid hr accuracy, which tracks continuous hr better than my Garmin Vivomoce hr.Love the small dial, which goes from 0-100% and shows how far you are from your goal, so no need to keep pressing buttons to keep an eye on your steps.Would I recommend this watch, yes without question and far underrated and many will pass over this as they want the horrible dead screen displays with fansy features, if you want fansy feature this is not for you, but if you want a watch that looks like a real watch then buy this.By dead screens I mean the screen is not on till you flick your wrist, or press a button, for me I missed the good old analog watch and if you prefer a real watch, buy this.
JL –
A lot of my friends have smartwatches, but I just did not have a desire to own one, as I liked how traditional watches looked, and I did not need all the bells and whistles an Apple Watch offered. I also was turned off by the need to charge my phone every 1-2 days.Frankly, I wanted something that looked like a normal watch, but that could give me very basic notifications – calls, texts, work e-mails, and alarms. I didn’t need Facebook, Twitter or third party notifications; steps, heart rate, sleep tracking, etc., were great, but, again, they were not must-haves for me. My phone is often on silent/vibrate, and, when the phone is in my pocket, I often don’t feel the phone vibrate. Given my office job, I also don’t like having my ringer set too high and causing a disruption.For a year or so, I wore a traditional time piece on my left wrist, while wearing a Xiaomi Mi Band 2 on my right wrist, as the Mi Band worked well for notifications and alarms. However, I finally decided I’d prefer to just wear one device – preferably something resembling a watch – so I started looking into products that would address my very specific preferences.At first, I was interested in the Chronos and Trivoly, two companies that made smart disks that attached to the bottom of your analog watch, and which would provide vibrating notifications. However, the reviews for both products looked terrible, and it appears both companies are dead in the water. I also looked at smart watch straps, but those companies also failed to bring their products to market.After doing some research, I zeroed in on hybrid smartwatches. At first, I tried out two Skagen hybrids – the Jorn and the the Hagen (my local TJ Maxx had them for less than $75). I liked that they looked like normal, analog watches, and they were powered by a battery that needed to be replaced every 4-6 months. While some reviews complained the watches did not give you any indication what the notification was for, I felt like this was a reasonable tradeoff – I’d have a watch that was a watch first, but which provided notifications, even though I would not initially know what that notification was, i.e., I’d still have to pull my phone out of my pocket.However, while they are made by the same company and ran the same software, the Jorn did not have an alarm feature. More importantly, I felt like the vibration motor on both Skagens was so weak that, unless I was expecting a call, text or email, I would miss the notification altogether. This defeated the purpose of buying a hybrid smartwatch. I also considered other hybrids made by Fossil, but preferred a more conservative and cleaner watch face.I also considered the Garmin Vivomove HR, along with hybrid smartwatches by Martian, but I was turned off by the reviews, and I was not a fan of the designs. I also considered a company called Kronaby, but I did not feel comfortable spending $350+ for a piece of technology from a company I had never heard of.Enter Withings/Nokia. I loved the way they looked, but I had disregarded it in the past because their original product, the Steel, did not have notifications. This changed with the Steel HR and the Steel HR Sport. First, I preferred a 40mm face, which eliminated 2 of the 3 versions of the Steel HR that have 36mm faces. The 40mm version of the Steel HR only came with a black face, while both versions of the Steel HR Sport had 40mm faces, and came in both black and white. What’s also great is that the Steel HR and Steel HR sport have this discrete screen that show notifications.At first, I thought the black-faced watch would look better, and it would conceal the notification screen better. However, while the black Steel HR and Steel HR Sport do conceal the notification screen, I found the hour and minute markings to be too light, and the hour and minute hands to be too thin. This really became a problem if I was trying to read the time in anything but direct light. Basically, with the black-faced watches, they were unreadable in anything but direct light. As a lot of the reviews have stated, this is due to how reflective that mineral glass is. In addition, I felt like the minute and hour markers on the Steel HR (the straight lines) were so light that it was hard to tell time. Though I might be wrong, I suspected it would be hard to tell time even with the white-faced 36mm Steel HR.I thought that the white-faced Steel HR Sport would not look as good as the black one, but my presumption turned out to be wrong. I’ve only had the white Steel HR sport for about two weeks, but I am loving it. It looks like a classic watch, and I get call, text, work e-mail notifications, and alarms. Unlike the black-faced Steel HR and Steel HR Sport, the time is easy to read. It’s still hard to read the time in darkness, as there’s no lume on the hands, but the readability of the white-faced watch is significantly better than that of the black-faced watch.In addition, the product’s battery is supposed to last up to 25 days. Two weeks after fully charging the watch, the app tells me the battery is at 61%. Not bad, though I also have not yet used the watch for workouts of any kind.As an added bonus, this watch uses a standard (and very common) 20mm watch band, so I replaced the perforated silicone sport band w/ a brown leather band, which goes well with my typical business casual work attire.A number of reviews complained about how easily scratched the mineral glass is. Since I’ve only owned the watch approximately two weeks, I have not noticed any scratches. However, I also bought a screen protector to prevent future scratches (IQ Shield brand).Time will tell how durable the Steel HR Sport is. While I tend to be very cautious with anything I buy, I am not going to be terribly upset if the watch lasts a year or two, as I paid $150 after tax (through Amazon Warehouse).So, in summation, I recommend the Steel HR Sport, but only in white.
hejrene –
Right first things first, a pretty long review below but…. I did buy from Amazon but they sent me the white one instead of the black which has been returned, however I already own one of these watches (the one returned was a gift!) So shall review it as I know it.I’ve been a Fitbit user for a long time, but the recently there have been issues with QC and nothing really that’s excited me. As I wear a suit to work and in my own time do weights and powerlifting, I wanted something a little more classy that could also cut the mustard as a fitness tracker for my uses.The design: This watch is slimline and pretty classy to look at. The glass on the watch is slightly domed and looks equally at home in the office than in the gym. The options available are a black and a white face. It’s subjective of course, but I personally prefer the black face model. However this is harder to read in darker surroundings, but you can always press the button and bring up the digital time on the LCD display so this isn’t a issue.The Strap: This is by far one of the best smart watch straps (or watch straps in general) available. It’s got a nice amount of give and flex within, is perforated for airflow and stretches with the contours or your arm. This is especially useful when swimming, as to keep the HR working well it needs to be pulled tighter to the skin to pick up the readings with water flowing around and under it. I’ve also got the red silicone and brown leather straps so can mix it up depending on mood and clothing choices. The watch due to the black face and grey case works well with every strap and doesn’t look odd at all.The Battery life: Withings quotes 25 days max life which is very impressive but for that you need to turn off all notifications and not use much fitness tracking as these are harder on the battery life. If training every day before a competition the battery lasts around 10-12 days. If every other day or normal use that includes 24 hour a day wear, I get about 17-19 days out of the battery. Better than my Ionic that could manage about 27 hours!Fitness tracking: This is where there will always be some compromise for styling but not any that are especially negative. This watch uses connected GPS from your phone for route and pace tracking, so remember to take it with you. Has weight training options, has generic fitness and other workout options for if something you are doing doesn’t have a particular category, has a number of workout options you can select to start from the watch directly, so you can pick and choose. Even has some more unusual ones for the type of watch it is, such as Pilates, baseball and elliptical. Works well with swimming, waterproof up to 50m, remember to rinse and dry the watch off afterwards to prevent skin irritation or degradation of the strap.Sleep tracking: Unlike my fitbit, this picks up if I go to the toilet in the night and wake, or when my alarm goes off and I turn it off, rather than my fitbit assuming I’m still fast asleep. It gives you your sleep metrics In the app in a far more user friendly manner than the Fitbit app and the sleep stages seem to be consistent.Notifications: The watch has a small round LCD in the face which gives you your notifications. Due to it being a hybrid with a tiny screen, you have to wait for the message to scroll and the amount of space is limited, so to bring up different metrics or continuations of what you are already doing you need to press the button. This is one aspect which could be considered negative but I don’t have a issue with it. The trade off for the style is well worth it.Charging time: 10% to 100% takes around 50 mins give or take.Overall: I am very impressed with the Steel HR Sport and as alluded to above, my wife was so pleased with mine she wanted one too. It has a good mix of aptitudes that make up for any specific shortfalls. Looks right in any environment and was worth every penny of this £189.99 pricetag. Give it a try and see.
Raul A. C. S. –
This was an awesome buying, I laughed at my “iwatch apple friends” because they have to charge it dayly and I did it every 24 days. My nightime readings where awesome… till I went surfing and my steel watch died, I tried to contact withings on their web page, but there is no mail to do so, the customer’s help is just FAQ. So Withings guys if you ever read this… thanks for the support. UPDATE MAY 15TH: AFTER SOME BACK AND FORTH MAILS, AMAZON AND WITHINGS REFUSED TO HONOR THEIR 1 YEAR WARRANTY, OFFERING A “25% DISCOUNT ON MY NEXT PURCHASE”. NOT!
Isaac –
The media could not be loaded. This was an awesome buying, I laughed at my “iwatch apple friends” because they have to charge it dayly and I did it every 24 days. My nightime readings where awesome… till I went surfing and my steel watch died, I tried to contact withings on their web page, but there is no mail to do so, the customer’s help is just FAQ. So Withings guys if you ever read this… thanks for the support. UPDATE MAY 15TH: AFTER SOME BACK AND FORTH MAILS, AMAZON AND WITHINGS REFUSED TO HONOR THEIR 1 YEAR WARRANTY, OFFERING A “25% DISCOUNT ON MY NEXT PURCHASE”. NOT!
B. Normal –
This is an excellent watch for what I was looking for and I’m really glad I found it.The one remaining concern I have for it is longevity, because for $200 I expect this to last at least 3 years.But to sing some praises first:- Great battery life, quick recharge8hrs in exercise mode (continuous HR monitoring) takes about 40% of the battery for me. Otherwise the battery seems like it will last a month if I didn’t use that mode.- Looks goodI literally had someone comment on how they would rather wear this than an Apple watch because it looks like a normal, nice watch. I agree, although the Apple watch has a lot more features and I’d use one if I liked their phones at all.- Solid HR trackingThis was the reason I bought and kept this watch, the HR tracking is solid. The sensor could be better like the multiple larger lights in the galaxy watch, sure. But the galaxy watch and almost every HR monitoring wrist band on the market right now sucks. Either because they all skimp on the HR monitor or because the design doesn’t make effective use of the sensor (including algorithms to get accurate HR from the sensor) because they don’t think anyone wants to have accurate, continuous monitoring. But I do. I use this watch in workout mode to record my HR during exercise, where tracking can be hard for light based sensors. Other watches, including galaxy watch, suck at this. Sometimes sweat buildup messes up the reading on this one too, sure, but it happens way less often and swiping my finger under the reader fixes it right away. The watch itself is designed intelligently to push the sensor down onto your skin without pushing the entire watch body into it and causing chafing, unlike most other devices in this class. A simple yet effective as hell solution! Good job to the designers.- Water resistanceI have had several devices like this and this one really makes me feel good with its simplistic physical design there is only one place where sealing could be a problem and it looks thoroughly sealed (button). I have worn it in the shower, swimming, and sweat like crazy during workouts on it, zero signs of any issues.- Data is accessibleThe HR data is transferable to other apps easily too, unlike the garbage data hoarding most of these companies do (Samsung health, more like Samsung hell). This was another huge plus for me. I use Withings app only because it does have a few nice addons to it I enjoy, but I feel a lot better knowing that if I didn’t like how the company was behaving with my data they allow me to use the watch with other apps.- Sleep tracking is goodHonestly the tracker is really good, I wish it had stronger compatibility with Sleep for android because it does a great job of detecting when I fall asleep, when I wake up briefly, etc. But it isn’t compatible yet, so I use a Mi Band additionally for sleep tracking. I do like to compare their data, and this one is usually more accurate. The data IS accessible, it can be exported and then imported to Sleep, so that’s nice, but obviously not how I wanted to do it.For cons, I’ll have to think hard:- Stock band is a bit suffocatingI haven’t had a chance to try other bands but I know with other watches I haven’t had any instances of them trapping sweat under the band in a way that causes irritation the way this one has. It’s not hard to fix, just keep it clean. I might buy other bands to try out in the future.- Face is a little small for meI would prefer something the size of the galaxy watch, but that’s very much just a style preference.- Gimmick VO2 feature?I got this version thinking I’d like to use the VO2 feature but it ONLY works if you run outside where it can get GPS and elevation data during your run. I run on a treadmill, so I’m out of luck until I go hiking. That was disappointing to find out.- PriceOf course I wish I paid less for it. I could have got the non sport version to save money since I’m not using that feature. But overall I’m using this like a fitbit for twice the price. I don’t care about the notifications, it’s not really a competitor for smart watches… It’s a health tool and I have to admit it nailed that enough that I’m willing to pay for it. But I think if their competitors pulled their heads out of their asses for a day they could be quickly bringing the price down to something I’d be much happier with (like half..).That’s all I’ve got. Owned the watch about a month, so take that into account. Will be watching for battery life degradation, or other malfunctioning.8-month Update:Time flies! I’ve been using this watch for a while now. The company continues to support data migration which I LOVE, big props to them for putting in the support work to make it easy to use MY data with whatever I want to! This is probably the one thing that will keep me coming back to this watch. Oh, and my original review has some outdated information – the watch IS supported now in Sleep for Android, and a lot of other apps that didn’t support it at the time. Very cool having that compatibility across so many apps, I love to support this kind of product.They did a few firmware updates, not too many, and from what I can tell this improved the battery life in certain conditions (like in exercise modes). I do not like a recent update that added a “feature” to let you pause a workout, because I was used to just ending and restarting workouts whenever I needed and now I have to click through an extra screen to do that… but I see how others would want this. Overall I am really happy that they don’t push out updates too often, but they are also clearly still constantly working on improvements! Great job.One complaint I almost had was the button – it started sticking and losing the tactile feel to it, which made navigating menus harder. I was really annoyed at this because it signals to me that gunk (probably from all my sweating) is getting IN the button and that could even cause it to stop functioning eventually. However, I solved this… in the shower (which I take the watch with me in) when I was washing up, I got the lathered soap as much into the button as I could then pressed it a lot to try to work it in, then rinsed it and pressed the button a bunch more to wash out the soap. Worked. Button is working again like it used to. For now. Hopefully doing that doesn’t do any damage long term to the watch though.Oh, another complaint that other people have had. The watch face scratches easily. Mine has some nicks. =( Nothing that I can see without looking hard though, nothing functionally invasive. I’ve had plenty of surprised compliments from people who thought I was into the recent “vintage/classic watch” wearing fad, only to find out mine is actually fully functional! =)I also have recently purchased the Fenix 5 Sapphire watch from Garmin and can offer a comparison to this. An important note for comparison, on a black friday sale the Fenix dropped to $300. That’s the deep sale price for it. While of course, this watch has (since I purchased it for $200.. =( ) has dropped to around $120-$150 in sale prices. So literally comparing a watch that costs nearly twice as much. But still. The Fenix glass does not scratch almost at all, where this watch absolutely does. The Fenix is also a better HR tracker, sad to say. During heavy exercise I notice sometimes they both can run into issues losing tracking for a bit (usually cleared up by swiping sweat away from the sensor, or moving the watch around), it happens a lot less with the Fenix. The Fenix has great battery life too and does not drain nearly as fast during exercise tracking as this watch does. But Fenix also does not last as long in standby.Data sharing I have yet to really test on the Garmin either, and I’m worried because I know for sure they aren’t as easy as Withings is for exporting data. So I still use both (yep, two watches…).Overall, still think this is a great value HR tracking watch, especially at the new sale prices.
Demo318 –
This is an excellent watch for what I was looking for and I’m really glad I found it.The one remaining concern I have for it is longevity, because for $200 I expect this to last at least 3 years.But to sing some praises first:- Great battery life, quick recharge8hrs in exercise mode (continuous HR monitoring) takes about 40% of the battery for me. Otherwise the battery seems like it will last a month if I didn’t use that mode.- Looks goodI literally had someone comment on how they would rather wear this than an Apple watch because it looks like a normal, nice watch. I agree, although the Apple watch has a lot more features and I’d use one if I liked their phones at all.- Solid HR trackingThis was the reason I bought and kept this watch, the HR tracking is solid. The sensor could be better like the multiple larger lights in the galaxy watch, sure. But the galaxy watch and almost every HR monitoring wrist band on the market right now sucks. Either because they all skimp on the HR monitor or because the design doesn’t make effective use of the sensor (including algorithms to get accurate HR from the sensor) because they don’t think anyone wants to have accurate, continuous monitoring. But I do. I use this watch in workout mode to record my HR during exercise, where tracking can be hard for light based sensors. Other watches, including galaxy watch, suck at this. Sometimes sweat buildup messes up the reading on this one too, sure, but it happens way less often and swiping my finger under the reader fixes it right away. The watch itself is designed intelligently to push the sensor down onto your skin without pushing the entire watch body into it and causing chafing, unlike most other devices in this class. A simple yet effective as hell solution! Good job to the designers.- Water resistanceI have had several devices like this and this one really makes me feel good with its simplistic physical design there is only one place where sealing could be a problem and it looks thoroughly sealed (button). I have worn it in the shower, swimming, and sweat like crazy during workouts on it, zero signs of any issues.- Data is accessibleThe HR data is transferable to other apps easily too, unlike the garbage data hoarding most of these companies do (Samsung health, more like Samsung hell). This was another huge plus for me. I use Withings app only because it does have a few nice addons to it I enjoy, but I feel a lot better knowing that if I didn’t like how the company was behaving with my data they allow me to use the watch with other apps.- Sleep tracking is goodHonestly the tracker is really good, I wish it had stronger compatibility with Sleep for android because it does a great job of detecting when I fall asleep, when I wake up briefly, etc. But it isn’t compatible yet, so I use a Mi Band additionally for sleep tracking. I do like to compare their data, and this one is usually more accurate. The data IS accessible, it can be exported and then imported to Sleep, so that’s nice, but obviously not how I wanted to do it.For cons, I’ll have to think hard:- Stock band is a bit suffocatingI haven’t had a chance to try other bands but I know with other watches I haven’t had any instances of them trapping sweat under the band in a way that causes irritation the way this one has. It’s not hard to fix, just keep it clean. I might buy other bands to try out in the future.- Face is a little small for meI would prefer something the size of the galaxy watch, but that’s very much just a style preference.- Gimmick VO2 feature?I got this version thinking I’d like to use the VO2 feature but it ONLY works if you run outside where it can get GPS and elevation data during your run. I run on a treadmill, so I’m out of luck until I go hiking. That was disappointing to find out.- PriceOf course I wish I paid less for it. I could have got the non sport version to save money since I’m not using that feature. But overall I’m using this like a fitbit for twice the price. I don’t care about the notifications, it’s not really a competitor for smart watches… It’s a health tool and I have to admit it nailed that enough that I’m willing to pay for it. But I think if their competitors pulled their heads out of their asses for a day they could be quickly bringing the price down to something I’d be much happier with (like half..).That’s all I’ve got. Owned the watch about a month, so take that into account. Will be watching for battery life degradation, or other malfunctioning.8-month Update:Time flies! I’ve been using this watch for a while now. The company continues to support data migration which I LOVE, big props to them for putting in the support work to make it easy to use MY data with whatever I want to! This is probably the one thing that will keep me coming back to this watch. Oh, and my original review has some outdated information – the watch IS supported now in Sleep for Android, and a lot of other apps that didn’t support it at the time. Very cool having that compatibility across so many apps, I love to support this kind of product.They did a few firmware updates, not too many, and from what I can tell this improved the battery life in certain conditions (like in exercise modes). I do not like a recent update that added a “feature” to let you pause a workout, because I was used to just ending and restarting workouts whenever I needed and now I have to click through an extra screen to do that… but I see how others would want this. Overall I am really happy that they don’t push out updates too often, but they are also clearly still constantly working on improvements! Great job.One complaint I almost had was the button – it started sticking and losing the tactile feel to it, which made navigating menus harder. I was really annoyed at this because it signals to me that gunk (probably from all my sweating) is getting IN the button and that could even cause it to stop functioning eventually. However, I solved this… in the shower (which I take the watch with me in) when I was washing up, I got the lathered soap as much into the button as I could then pressed it a lot to try to work it in, then rinsed it and pressed the button a bunch more to wash out the soap. Worked. Button is working again like it used to. For now. Hopefully doing that doesn’t do any damage long term to the watch though.Oh, another complaint that other people have had. The watch face scratches easily. Mine has some nicks. =( Nothing that I can see without looking hard though, nothing functionally invasive. I’ve had plenty of surprised compliments from people who thought I was into the recent “vintage/classic watch” wearing fad, only to find out mine is actually fully functional! =)I also have recently purchased the Fenix 5 Sapphire watch from Garmin and can offer a comparison to this. An important note for comparison, on a black friday sale the Fenix dropped to $300. That’s the deep sale price for it. While of course, this watch has (since I purchased it for $200.. =( ) has dropped to around $120-$150 in sale prices. So literally comparing a watch that costs nearly twice as much. But still. The Fenix glass does not scratch almost at all, where this watch absolutely does. The Fenix is also a better HR tracker, sad to say. During heavy exercise I notice sometimes they both can run into issues losing tracking for a bit (usually cleared up by swiping sweat away from the sensor, or moving the watch around), it happens a lot less with the Fenix. The Fenix has great battery life too and does not drain nearly as fast during exercise tracking as this watch does. But Fenix also does not last as long in standby.Data sharing I have yet to really test on the Garmin either, and I’m worried because I know for sure they aren’t as easy as Withings is for exporting data. So I still use both (yep, two watches…).Overall, still think this is a great value HR tracking watch, especially at the new sale prices.
Demo318 –
This is an excellent watch for what I was looking for and I’m really glad I found it.The one remaining concern I have for it is longevity, because for $200 I expect this to last at least 3 years.But to sing some praises first:- Great battery life, quick recharge8hrs in exercise mode (continuous HR monitoring) takes about 40% of the battery for me. Otherwise the battery seems like it will last a month if I didn’t use that mode.- Looks goodI literally had someone comment on how they would rather wear this than an Apple watch because it looks like a normal, nice watch. I agree, although the Apple watch has a lot more features and I’d use one if I liked their phones at all.- Solid HR trackingThis was the reason I bought and kept this watch, the HR tracking is solid. The sensor could be better like the multiple larger lights in the galaxy watch, sure. But the galaxy watch and almost every HR monitoring wrist band on the market right now sucks. Either because they all skimp on the HR monitor or because the design doesn’t make effective use of the sensor (including algorithms to get accurate HR from the sensor) because they don’t think anyone wants to have accurate, continuous monitoring. But I do. I use this watch in workout mode to record my HR during exercise, where tracking can be hard for light based sensors. Other watches, including galaxy watch, suck at this. Sometimes sweat buildup messes up the reading on this one too, sure, but it happens way less often and swiping my finger under the reader fixes it right away. The watch itself is designed intelligently to push the sensor down onto your skin without pushing the entire watch body into it and causing chafing, unlike most other devices in this class. A simple yet effective as hell solution! Good job to the designers.- Water resistanceI have had several devices like this and this one really makes me feel good with its simplistic physical design there is only one place where sealing could be a problem and it looks thoroughly sealed (button). I have worn it in the shower, swimming, and sweat like crazy during workouts on it, zero signs of any issues.- Data is accessibleThe HR data is transferable to other apps easily too, unlike the garbage data hoarding most of these companies do (Samsung health, more like Samsung hell). This was another huge plus for me. I use Withings app only because it does have a few nice addons to it I enjoy, but I feel a lot better knowing that if I didn’t like how the company was behaving with my data they allow me to use the watch with other apps.- Sleep tracking is goodHonestly the tracker is really good, I wish it had stronger compatibility with Sleep for android because it does a great job of detecting when I fall asleep, when I wake up briefly, etc. But it isn’t compatible yet, so I use a Mi Band additionally for sleep tracking. I do like to compare their data, and this one is usually more accurate. The data IS accessible, it can be exported and then imported to Sleep, so that’s nice, but obviously not how I wanted to do it.For cons, I’ll have to think hard:- Stock band is a bit suffocatingI haven’t had a chance to try other bands but I know with other watches I haven’t had any instances of them trapping sweat under the band in a way that causes irritation the way this one has. It’s not hard to fix, just keep it clean. I might buy other bands to try out in the future.- Face is a little small for meI would prefer something the size of the galaxy watch, but that’s very much just a style preference.- Gimmick VO2 feature?I got this version thinking I’d like to use the VO2 feature but it ONLY works if you run outside where it can get GPS and elevation data during your run. I run on a treadmill, so I’m out of luck until I go hiking. That was disappointing to find out.- PriceOf course I wish I paid less for it. I could have got the non sport version to save money since I’m not using that feature. But overall I’m using this like a fitbit for twice the price. I don’t care about the notifications, it’s not really a competitor for smart watches… It’s a health tool and I have to admit it nailed that enough that I’m willing to pay for it. But I think if their competitors pulled their heads out of their asses for a day they could be quickly bringing the price down to something I’d be much happier with (like half..).That’s all I’ve got. Owned the watch about a month, so take that into account. Will be watching for battery life degradation, or other malfunctioning.8-month Update:Time flies! I’ve been using this watch for a while now. The company continues to support data migration which I LOVE, big props to them for putting in the support work to make it easy to use MY data with whatever I want to! This is probably the one thing that will keep me coming back to this watch. Oh, and my original review has some outdated information – the watch IS supported now in Sleep for Android, and a lot of other apps that didn’t support it at the time. Very cool having that compatibility across so many apps, I love to support this kind of product.They did a few firmware updates, not too many, and from what I can tell this improved the battery life in certain conditions (like in exercise modes). I do not like a recent update that added a “feature” to let you pause a workout, because I was used to just ending and restarting workouts whenever I needed and now I have to click through an extra screen to do that… but I see how others would want this. Overall I am really happy that they don’t push out updates too often, but they are also clearly still constantly working on improvements! Great job.One complaint I almost had was the button – it started sticking and losing the tactile feel to it, which made navigating menus harder. I was really annoyed at this because it signals to me that gunk (probably from all my sweating) is getting IN the button and that could even cause it to stop functioning eventually. However, I solved this… in the shower (which I take the watch with me in) when I was washing up, I got the lathered soap as much into the button as I could then pressed it a lot to try to work it in, then rinsed it and pressed the button a bunch more to wash out the soap. Worked. Button is working again like it used to. For now. Hopefully doing that doesn’t do any damage long term to the watch though.Oh, another complaint that other people have had. The watch face scratches easily. Mine has some nicks. =( Nothing that I can see without looking hard though, nothing functionally invasive. I’ve had plenty of surprised compliments from people who thought I was into the recent “vintage/classic watch” wearing fad, only to find out mine is actually fully functional! =)I also have recently purchased the Fenix 5 Sapphire watch from Garmin and can offer a comparison to this. An important note for comparison, on a black friday sale the Fenix dropped to $300. That’s the deep sale price for it. While of course, this watch has (since I purchased it for $200.. =( ) has dropped to around $120-$150 in sale prices. So literally comparing a watch that costs nearly twice as much. But still. The Fenix glass does not scratch almost at all, where this watch absolutely does. The Fenix is also a better HR tracker, sad to say. During heavy exercise I notice sometimes they both can run into issues losing tracking for a bit (usually cleared up by swiping sweat away from the sensor, or moving the watch around), it happens a lot less with the Fenix. The Fenix has great battery life too and does not drain nearly as fast during exercise tracking as this watch does. But Fenix also does not last as long in standby.Data sharing I have yet to really test on the Garmin either, and I’m worried because I know for sure they aren’t as easy as Withings is for exporting data. So I still use both (yep, two watches…).Overall, still think this is a great value HR tracking watch, especially at the new sale prices.
hejrene –
I had a Fitbit with just outside the warrant period stopped working I wanted to try a different brand. Yes I considered an Apple Watch, however the constant charging would drive me mad!I had looked at Withings before when they first came out, but was aware they were very easy to scratch, then Nokia bought them and they were rebranded and after a while, they were bought back by Withings and rebranded back again!So here we are with the new Withings HR Sport. The watch is available with a black or white face, I went for the white as 1) I’d read the black hands of the watch were difficult to read against the black face; and 2) the white face reminds me of my old Mondaine watch which I loved!The packaging is first-class and you have the Apple experience as you open the box. The first thing I noticed was the strap, it has this lovely soft rubbery feel to it that is an absolute pleasure to both wear and touch!On the watch you have the standard hour/minute hands, below is a single red dial that moves round from 0-100% as you complete you said amount of steps and at the top is the digital display that is always off (to save battery) this mostly activates if you touch the single watch crown and then each press cycles you through a customisable menu that displays a range of options such as Date, Time, steps, heart rate, alarm, messages and battery life.I have to say I love this watch and the things that really stand out for me are:1. The battery life is amazing, I’ve had the watch for a month now, wear it every day/night and my battery is only at 50%!2. The watch has a gentle vibrate when you get a phone call or text message and displays details on the screen.3. Looks stunning4. A comfortable strap5. Super easy to setup6. Lightweight and slim profile.Overall I’m really happy with this watch and would highly recommend to anyone who’s after a conventional looking watch with smart features and has a long battery life.10/10 Withings!If you found this review useful then please click the helpful button, thank you.
Jonathan Millar –
I’ve had this watch for just over 3 months now and I have finally found a rhythm with this watch and feel like I can accurately give it a review. I have primarily used wear os watches in the past so the switch to this was a big decision. After using true smart watches since they hit the market I found a few things out. I don’t change my watch face very often. I don’t take phone calls or respond to text messages through my watch. I don’t control my music through my watch. I don’t like having to charge my watch every night and if I go out of town and forget my charger I don’t like wearing around a dead watch. What I do need in a watch is for it to tell the time accurately and always on. To be able to change time when my phone does (flying for business). Show me notifications in a subtle manner. To count my steps and take my heart rate as well as do some GPS tracking (biking). I would also like it to be somewhat water resistant because you never knowFirst the battery life is just as good as they claim. I charge this thing every 2 weeks and have gone on a 10 holiday and left my charger at home confident that my watch would last through the vacation and then some.The time face is nice and clear. I went with the white faced model so that I could see it in dimmer lighting and even when its dark out I just push the button and I can see the date and time right away. Also the hands are slim enough to not impede the reading of notifications but thick enough to tell where they are pointing at a glance its a very nice balance.The notifications are subtle enough. Like I said I don’t need to respond to notifications from my watch. I use my phone for that but its nice to be in a meeting and glance down to see what the notificaiton is. Sometimes the watch can’t scroll through the whole thing but thats fine it gives you enough information to know what its about. As for the big black whole on the white face. I got used to that very quickly and it doesn’t bother me as much as I thought it would.I love the look of the watch. It comes with a dark silicon band with is very nice quality. I wear the watch for work and in a more professional environment and this watch fits right in. I changed the band out for a brown leather one with silicon on the bottom for the best of both worlds. It looks very sharp and I can sweat with it on and it won’t discolor the leather. The operation of the watch is great too just one button to push. When I wore other smart watches especially with a touch screen my kids were constantly changing things and pushing things on it. With this I just get a simple easy to read face with the functionality I need.The step tracking. This is my biggest gripe about the watch. Don’t get me wrong the step tracking works its just not what I was used to. The step tracking is accurate only when you are able to walk and swing your arm. Please remember to swing your arm. If you are pushing a stroller or a grocery cart or carrying bags or even just walking your dog if you have the arm with the watch on not swinging your steps are very inaccurate. It was inaccurate enough that I contacted withings about this. I got a pretty generic response back about making sure to wear the watch correctly (eye roll) and to swing my arms. Now you might be thinking well steps don’t matter to me I want the watch for something else. I was the same way but the second dial on the watch is a progress dial towards your daily step goal and you see it everytime you look down at the watch. So it is very hard to ignore your steps. I’ve gone for long walks pushing my kids in a stroller and come back and it will say I’ve taken 4,000 steps. I’ve read on the withings forums about this and one customer complained they went to Disneyland for the day and didn’t get close to 10,000 steps because they were pushing kids in a stroller. Can you imagine going around a park like Disney and not hitting 10,000 steps? Like I said this is my biggest gripe about the watch. You have to remember to swing your arm.However now that I am aware of this I actively try to hit my step goal every day just to see the dial turn around to complete. I take walks knowing I need to have my arm free and I don’t have to think about swinging it anymore it just goes on its own. I have even increased my goal because I found I was hitting my old one 100% of the time and decided to push myself.The app for the watch is really great. I won’t go to much into it as you could just download it now and try it even without the watch to see if you like it.Overall I really like the watch. It is just smart enough for my needs and looks fantastic. If you are tired of charging your smart watch every night or not wearing it because you forgot to charge it then this hybrid smart watch is a very good choice.
B. Normal –
I’ve been wearing the Steel HR Sport for over a week now and overall it’s been quite good. I wanted a hybrid watch that could do reasonable tracking but had excellent battery life. I’m a fairly casual non-sporty user but am using this to try and help improve and monitor things – I consider it a blend of two devices so I’ll discuss it in that context;As a watch+ It’s small, light, compact and discreet – that makes it comfortable to wear and pretty easy to get on with. The default rubber-type strap is very comfortable and has plenty of adjustment+ It feels well-made and premium and it definitely is physically very nice and well put together+ The battery life is excellent – I charged it 8 days ago and it currently reports 78% battery life. I’ve been using it moderately for tracking and activities, but I fully imagine even under heavy use, this will easily last 1-2 weeks between charges+ The top OLED screen is bright and clear and can display the date/time at a glance along with heart rate, steps, distance, calories etc- I don’t have big wrists, and this watch is probably about perfect. I would say however for a lot of men, this may feel quite small so definitely check measurements before you buy- As other reviewers have pointed out, the markings on the watch face can be practically invisible in certain light – the subtle font and colours are very cool, but sometimes you simply cannot read it. A single press of the crown will light up the OLED screen and tell you the date/time though, so at least you have thatAs a fitness tracker/smart device+ Step counting seems to be largely as accurate as other devices I have to compare with, so it certainly seems to be decent+ Heart rate tracking seems to be accurate when measured – I don’t have an ECG or similar to compare it to, but from my own approximations, it appears to be doing a decent job (although there are caveats, below)+ Sleep tracking is a cool feature and generally speaking so far it’s been broadly correct (start and end of sleep can be a bit fuzzy – it may think I’m in bed 30 mins before or after I actually am)+ The app is decent, well designed and ties into other tracking apps perfectly well~ I have not used the notifications feature at all, so I can’t comment on how well it works- So far, one of the days it got the sleep stats completely wrong – it thought I was sleeping between the hours of 19:00 and 03:00, when I was simply sitting at the PC until bed at about 23:30 and slept through to 07:00. This has only happened one day so far though- Tracking of heart rate during sporting activities can be very hit or miss. I’ve had 3 gym sessions so far while wearing it and there are frequent gaps in the measurements, with the most recent session being especially bad – it recorded heart rate for maybe 25-33% of the session, which makes the data kinda useless. I’m not sure if I need to have the watch more secure on my wrist, or if sweat is causing issues, but a little disappointing that it isn’t able to keep reading the data since the heart monitor does seem perfectly capable other timesSo overall, as a nice watch with some casual fitness tracking built in, it’s pretty much what I wanted.I feel that if you are serious about heart tracking and so on, you will want to spend more on the ECG enabled devices as I figure they will be much more reliable and accurate. As it stands though, the Steel HR Sport is solid for general fitness monitoring and it’s as good as other (cheaper) fitness trackers that I’ve come across.
Eduardo Haro –
Zegarek jest lekki i zgrabny. Super bateria. Nie polecam jednak wersji sportowej czarnej bo wskazania godziny na wskazówkach s? nieczytelnie. Przy s?abym o?wietleniu jest mia?em problemu z czytaniem godziny. Z tego powodu zwróci?em.
B. Normal –
Me gustó. Estoy satisfecho.