Video Fitness Forum  

Go Back   Video Fitness Forum > Video Fitness Reader Forum > General Discussion

Reply
 
Thread Tools Search this Thread Display Modes
Old 09-06-19, 10:47 AM  
Vintage VFer
VF Supporter
 
Vintage VFer's Avatar
 
Join Date: Nov 2001
Question Apple Watch: Pros and Cons

Every year, when Christmas is on the horizon, I wonder if I would get much use out if an Apple Watch. I've never had a fitness wearable, other than an Old School pedometer. I don't wear a watch either.

Is it just an expensive gadget, or do you find it valuable for fitness uses? Does it have reliable sleep monitoring functions?

What are the Pros and Cons (besides price)?

How does it compare to other fitness wearables?
__________________
Goal:250 / Done:67

POSTURE CHECK!
Vintage VFer is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-06-19, 10:16 PM  
ksleeth
VF Supporter
 
Join Date: Dec 2001
Location: TN
Quote:
Originally Posted by Vintage VFer View Post
Every year, when Christmas is on the horizon, I wonder if I would get much use out if an Apple Watch. I've never had a fitness wearable, other than an Old School pedometer. I don't wear a watch either.

Is it just an expensive gadget, or do you find it valuable for fitness uses? Does it have reliable sleep monitoring functions?

What are the Pros and Cons (besides price)?

How does it compare to other fitness wearables?
Prior to my Apple Watch I had 2 fitbits which I loved but they both eventually died. The more pricey of the two was the Blaze which was my fav but the HM stopped working on it so it would no longer track exercise. The Fitbit customer service offered me 25% off a new one but it wasn’t much of a deal so I decided to get an Apple Watch (which was about the same price).

Some pros:
* You can get all kinds of bands (but of course I’ve had it for a year and still use the original black one).
* It’s slimmer and fits my wrist better than other trackers and looks more watch like.
* It picks up my HR perfect during exercise which the Blaze never did.
* You can easily see your workouts by day or month. And it gives a month breakdown of number of workouts, the overall and average time of workouts and the overall and average calories burned.
* You can select the type of workout you’re doing (i.e. step training, mixed cardio, hiit, strength training, etc.). There’s pretty much a classification for whatever you’re doing.
* You don’t have to wear a HR chest strap.
* It has an activity tracker app that you put on your phone. The tracker app has 3 rings which you can close every day. Ring 1 is for movement. The ring closes when you have met your calories burned for the day. So, for example, my goal movement calories = 450. You can set your desired number of calories.
Ring 2 is for exercise. The ring closes when you exercise for at least 30 mins.
Ring 3 is for standing and closes when you have stood for 12 hours. It doesn’t have to be a continual 12 just as long as it’s 12 or more overall.
In addition to the rings it also shows your workouts, the number of steps and the steps converted to distance.

Other fun things:
* You can choose numerous faces for it.
* You can see your text messages on it.
* You can use other apps on it.
* it syncs with my Lose It app (for food tracking).
* You can see all your calendar events for the day.
* it will alert you when a timer goes off and I can turn it off from my watch without hunting down my phone.

Cons:
* you have to charge it daily (the Blaze I charged about every 5 days)
* sometimes I don’t always get text messages on it.
* 3 times it has totally gone blank and I’ve had to re-pair it with my phone.
* sometimes during a workout it will lose your HR
* it’s pricey
* You always have to have your phone within distance to track exercise. (But I have the Series 1. The higher series are like an actual phone so if you leave the house without it you can still get texts, phone calls and use any app just like on your phone.)

Overall I am super happy with it. Especially that I can see my workouts by the day or month. I am not happy that it has died a couple of times and am afraid that eventually it will totally die and I’ll have to replace - but I guess that’s the world of fitness gadgets. The primary reason I use it is for tracking workouts. I don’t have any apps on it. Honestly it’s too small to see things or maybe I would use it more for other non-workout things.

I know you mentioned sleep tracking but I always take it off when I go to bed so I’m no help with that function. Hopefully someone else can chime in.

Let me know if you have any other questions. Hope this has helped one way or another.
__________________
Kim
ksleeth is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-07-19, 10:12 AM  
Vintage VFer
VF Supporter
 
Vintage VFer's Avatar
 
Join Date: Nov 2001
Wow, Kim, thanks for your detailed review!

My DH pointed out that Apple will announce it's new models in just a few days, so the Series 5 might be coming out soon.

I found out that current models don't have sleep monitoring functions, but the new one may.

I'm not sure if I want the model with cellular capability. Do you have to have a separate data plan for that?
__________________
Goal:250 / Done:67

POSTURE CHECK!
Vintage VFer is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-07-19, 08:37 PM  
ksleeth
VF Supporter
 
Join Date: Dec 2001
Location: TN
Quote:
Originally Posted by Vintage VFer View Post
I'm not sure if I want the model with cellular capability. Do you have to have a separate data plan for that?
Gosh I honestly have no idea. Best of luck with whatever you decide! And let us know how you like it.
__________________
Kim
ksleeth is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-07-19, 11:43 PM  
yogapam
VF Supporter
 
yogapam's Avatar
 
Join Date: Oct 2006
Location: West coast of Canada, eh. ;)
My husband has an Apple Watch and he loves it. He does have to charge it pretty much every day and he would like it to have a sleep function. He could live without the cellular function as it has to be near his phone to work. I have a Fitbit Charge 3, it’s very simplistic but works great for me....holds a charge for 6 days, is waterproof, and tracks my sleep. I struggle with poor sleep so the sleep tracking function is important to me. Hopefully the new Apple Watch will have it along with a longer battery life. And it’s definitely way more attractive than my black Fitbit.
__________________
*~*Pam*~*

Certified Level 4 Essentrics Instructor - March 2021

Hatha YTT - 2011

Your body keeps an accurate journal regardless of what you write down.....

"Take care of your body. It's the only place you have to live."
Jim Rohn

"It’s not what we do once in a while that shapes our lives, but what we do consistently.” - Tony Robbins

Check out my Instagram account, @fitness.ficti0n.inspirati0n
yogapam is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-08-19, 06:07 AM  
Lannette
 
Lannette's Avatar
 
Join Date: Nov 2001
Location: NH
You didn’t ask about knock-off watches but I bought THIS WATCH during amazon’s July sale for $39.99. I know, I know pretty ridiculous but it’s actually pretty sweet. I wanted to see if I’d even tolerate wearing a smart watch.

It tracks sleep, I can set multiple alarms and these were two things I wanted. I also didn’t know at that time that Apple watches don’t do sleep tracking. This thing is spot on with my sleep! Last night I was up once to check on the cat. That meant a trip downstairs and when I look at my sleep graph it’s there. The graph shows deep and light sleep and as I’ve used it to figure out my individual sleep killers and eliminated them my deep sleep has increased. If I need to wake to an alarm I prefer the vibration of the wristband to a regular alarm - who knew?

It tracks steps and fitness activities and will send the activities to the Strava app. I’m not sure how accurate it is because I’m not worried about each step I take.

I have a iPhone XR and the watch works well with it. It sends me text messages and my calendar notifications. This is important to me. It holds a charge for about 6 days and charges in a couple of hours max.

Supposedly it can do a lot more but I’m not motivated to use the other functions.

The app it uses just had an update and things got jumbled for an evening but were quickly righted the next day. When I contacted them they got back to me quickly. I discovered that restarting my phone can mess up my settings but nothing that can’t be fixed in a minute.

There are a lot of similar knock-offs. You may want to look for one that reviews say works with your phone and check it out.
__________________
Lannette
See my profile for info on relationships with various video distributors.

Do you really want to look back on your life and see how wonderful it could have been had you not been afraid to live it? - Caroline Myss
Lannette is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-08-19, 10:13 AM  
Dobby
VF Supporter
 
Join Date: Jul 2006
Location: N. Idaho
Just back lurking on VF and thought I'd reply. I got an Apple Watch Series 4 on Aug 1 so I am new to it still. I love it!

I'd used several FitBits over the years but the last one which was about 3 years old was so scratched across the face that I couldn't read the watch (or any readout) outside. The band (the 3rd one on this particular FB) was also getting ready to break.

I'd looked at Apple watches but couldn't decide if I could justify the cost, then realized a BIG birthday was coming up in August (gulp...70!!) so I went for it.

I love it.

-I wanted the pulse and EKG functions. I do not have a diagnosed cardiac arrhythmia but its the undiagnosed ones that kill you!

-I love the "ring" system for movement, exercise and standing and yes it is motivating for me to figure out how to close each every day. I'm retired and can easily sit at my computer for hours and yes, I like the reminders to stand. (You'd think I would have enough time to work out, right?)

-The 4 has a Breathe app loaded (but I'm sure the older ones can add it) and I like the reminders for focused breathing. You set the reminders to the # of times a day you want.

-It also accesses a number of apps on my phone. The only one I really use is my 10% Happiness app (which is a meditation app).

-The GPS seems to function better than the FItBit. Not sure HOW that can be but I walk the same paved trails most of the time and the Apple Watch gives me the mile marks at the same place whereas the FB had 1/8-1/4 mile differences on the same trail starting at the same spot.

-I love the elevation function and the continuous HR function. It also gives your HR over the 2 minutes or so after you finish activity so you can see your recovery rate.

-I don't have the cellular function as I have service thru a small local provider that doesn't support it. I also don't talk on the phone much and I'm not sure how much that adds.

I bought mine thru Costco on the last sale they had. If you are a member check the emails and then set your alarm to purchase at 12:01 Pacific time on the day it goes on sale. They go fast. The last 2 sales have had $55 off of the 40mm GPS. I wanted the silver case. It comes with a white band which I didn't like but I bought a silver one thru Apple for $49 ($49 for a flipping band? yikes)

I agree with Kim's assessment of the pros altho my only con is the expense. Mine does a good job on HR tracking and no problems with it going blank but it's only a month old so it shouldn't! No issues at all and even a non-tech person can set it up and figure it out. Well, except my nephew and I could NOT figure out the walkie talkie function.

There are sleep apps you can download for the 4. I just charge mine overnight although I think some people charge it at the end of the day as they prepare for sleep, then put it on for a quick boost at the beginning of the next day. It's not a big deal. I charge my phone every night so this just goes on at the same time. I had the sleep tracker on the FitBit which did a pretty good job but I never used any of the information to try and make changes so it doesn't matter to me.

Enjoy your discovery process!

~Pam
Dobby is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-08-19, 10:39 AM  
Usia
VF Supporter
 
Usia's Avatar
 
Join Date: Feb 2008
I have AW 4 which I purchased in March of this year. I purchased it because I was feeling down and needed to treat myself to something (which I haven't done in a long time) and not because I thought I "needed" it. It was an extravagance on my part, but I absolutely love it and find it very useful for all the reasons already mentioned here and just for pure fun factor.

I no longer have landline at home but I have 4 floors so for me to hear my cell phone ring, I would have to have it in my pocket at all times. But since I have my AW on my wrist, I no longer have to carry my phone with me as I move around my home. I hear the phone and can answer it through my AW and I find it very helpful. My AW has cellular capabilities but my service provider currently does not support that function. However, as long as my phone is within 330' (I think) range of my AW, I'm good.

I've never had my AW go blank on me or malfunction in any way. I like the EKG function as well as heart rate monitor. The fitness functions are way better than any other I've had in the past on other devices. I bought mine at Sam's where they sold it for about $15 cheaper than regular price and my DH had $60 bonus cash-back accumulated which he contributed it to the purchase of my AW.

This is my first smart watch so I can't speak to other and cheaper versions. My DH has a Samsung watch (he's android guy) that was much cheaper and he is quite happy with it.
__________________
Dana
Avatar: Oliver!
Usia is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-08-19, 10:41 AM  
Cerulea
 
Join Date: Dec 2003
Location: Denial
I just bought a series 3 several weeks ago from Amazon -- it was far cheaper than the 4 and the differences in function didn't matter to me. The apps it comes with are the same, but the 4 is slimmer and has different heart rate tracking. I wasn't sure if I'd like the watch but it's been very useful. I really like it.

I bought it primarily so I don't miss texts and phone calls (my phone is on silent and usually in my bag, not on my person, so getting the alerts on my wrist really helps), but the workout tracking is excellent, and now I'd say that's its primary function for me. I've found the HR tracking to be particularly useful. Closing those rings gets kind of addictive!

My 3 does not have cellular (so it needs to be near the phone to receive texts and such) but it does have GPS, so I can take it by itself for a run or whatever and it tracks it. If you get one with cellular capability it costs more and you'd incur a monthly charge for the cellular service, but then it kind of functions like a mini phone even if it's out of range of your iphone. My friend who trains for marathons has the top of the line model with cellular and she gets a lot of use out of it.

If your watch will be near your phone most of the time, though, I think the cellular feature is unnecessary. My watch gets texts and phone calls unless I go pretty far from the phone (like, out of the house). That's really rare for me so not having the cellular works fine.

As others have mentioned, it doesn't come with sleep tracking at the moment. There are 3rd party apps you can put on it that will do that, but charging will be an issue. Mine runs down about 60% over the course of an average day.

Last edited by Cerulea; 09-08-19 at 10:42 AM. Reason: Spelling
Cerulea is offline   Reply With Quote
Old 09-08-19, 11:01 AM  
Cerulea
 
Join Date: Dec 2003
Location: Denial
One more thing I forgot to mention: 3rd party bands are inexpensive and readily available on Amazon, and I've found the quality to be pretty close to Apple's bands. They're not 100% identical, but you'd have to really inspect it up close to be able to tell.

So there are lots of options to change up the band without breaking the bank.
Cerulea is offline   Reply With Quote
Reply

Tags
apple watch, fitness tracker, fitness trackers, fitness wearables

Thread Tools Search this Thread
Search this Thread:

Advanced Search
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

BB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off

Forum Jump


All times are GMT -5. The time now is 04:51 AM.


Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.3
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.
© 2009 Video Fitness