Hi, this is Wayne again with a topic “Galaxy Watch 6 review: better battery, better bezel, but is it enough?”.
So, what’s new with the Samsung Galaxy watch 6 series? Well, you can do this with the temperature sensor now it says the water is 70 degrees. Fahrenheit and the cooking thermometer says 59 degrees. So it’s just wrong cool, very cold. If you were looking for something to upend the entire Android wearable landscape, these smart watches ain’t, it Samsung’s, basically taking the watches you know and repackaging them into something slightly better.
So for this review I figured we should address the main questions. People have asked me about these watches, namely, what’s actually new. How well do these work with a non-samsung Android phone and has the battery life improved? First, here’s a quick run through of what Samsung’s change from the Galaxy watch 5 to the Galaxy watch. 6.. We’Ve got the return of the rotating bezel, oh thinner, bezels, on both the regular watch 6 and classic a new processor. That’S a smidge better than the old one, where OS 4 and one ui5 watch slightly bigger batteries, minor health and sleep tracking updates and a new strap mechanism. That’S about it. Samsung is a bit like apple and that its products always work best within its own ecosystem. So in the past, when I’ve tested Galaxy watches, I’ve always paired them with Samsung phones, but Google overtook Samsung and wireless Smartwatch sales with the pixel watch last year and the pixel watch is going to get you the same experience regardless of what phone you use.
So this time I wanted to see what it was like to pair the Galaxy watch 6 series with a pixel 7 Pro. For the most part, the experience is very similar, but you do miss out on a handful of things. Setup is a bit more tedious because you have the extra step of downloading two or three separate Samsung apps, creating a Samsung account yeah.
This part is just a lot simpler on a Samsung phone 6 minutes versus 15.. Can’T really argue with that, and that’s just for basic stuff, I’m not talking about downloading your third party apps downloading, all of that sort of stuff, it’s just always a little better with the Samsung device. You also miss out on EKGs and the new irregular heart rhythm notifications, which passively monitor for afib. In the background for that you’re gon na need the Samsung health monitor app and that’s a Samsung phone exclusive, Samsung’s camera controller. App is the same way.
You need a Samsung phone to use it. You can’t even download these apps from the Play Store on other Android phones. My other pet peeve is reprogramming the bottom button, which is unchanged from last year’s Galaxy watches. A long press is hard-coded to bring up Samsung wallet and you can’t even switch it to Google Wallet. That said, these are minor issues. Setup is mostly a one-time thing.
If you don’t care about EKGs you’re, not gon na miss the health monitor app. There are third-party camera controller apps in the Play Store, it’s all just mildly, and annoying last year Samsung introduced a temperature sensor on the Galaxy watch 5 Series at launch. It did diddly squat, but now you can use it for advanced period tracking. But if you don’t have periods you can download the thermo check app, it’s a third-party app that uses Samsung’s API.
So you can measure the temperature of things in your surroundings, fun and very silly, and not really all that useful. So we have this cold soda can whoa. Well, I can tell you that as well.
I can just touch it and tell you that it’s low it’s 32., it’s not freezing 28. It’S it’s! 20 degrees! You, okay, watch, hot ft. 121! That’S pretty close! A book 73.4 versus 70.
still pretty close Okay as fun as this is. This is more of a hey. You can do stuff with the temperature sensor than a super useful feature. It’S not that it’s wrong! It’S just that! Are you going to use a Smart Watch to measure the temperature of these things? Probably not still, I can’t deny that it’s fun and hopefully other third-party app makers can figure out slightly more useful applications for the temperature sensor. The big new thing is: wear os4, but so far where OS 4 on the Galaxy watch 6 series looks fields and functions. A lot like wear OS 3 on the Galaxy watch 5. Samsung says that the exynos w930 chip delivers 18 faster performance, but I really didn’t notice much of a difference. What Ware OS 4 brings to the table is cloud backups, because finally, you don’t have to factory reset your watch.
If you get a new phone and better battery which Samsung has struggled with in the past, I’m not gon na lie. I was really cheesed last year when Samsung made a big deal about improving battery life and my regular 40 millimeter Galaxy watch 5 couldn’t even last the whole day. Subsequent software updates made it better, but it was never what I would call amazing the watch5 pro fared better, but still never really hit Samsung’s 80 hour estimate. So with that in mind, the Galaxy watch 6 series has improved, but your mileage will vary.
This is true of every smart watch, but your individual use is going to heavily impact. How much stamina you get off of a single charge and in Samsung’s case there are a lot of settings that can impact your battery. For example, the first full day I wore the regular watch six, I still had 78 left by 5 PM, but that was a sedentary day with barely any notifications enabled and the more battery guzzling sleep tracking sensors turned off once you turn on the continuous spo2 sensing Overnight and all the other stuff it does take a hit.
I went to bed with about 35 to 40 battery and woke up eight hours later with 15, I did notice a big Improvement on the 40 millimeters battery with GPS tracking. I went on a 45 minute run and it only lost 12 percent of charge and that’s really good compared to last year. It’S the same story with the 47 millimeter classic, though, because of the bigger watch size, you do get an even larger battery and a little extra oomph.
Yesterday I woke up with about 88 battery. Did a bunch of testing, including a 30 minute? Gps run got a ton of notifications reply to a few messages and by 4 pm I still had 59 battery left. I didn’t have to charge before bed and because I enabled the new sleep mode. I woke up with 28 battery and just popped it on the charger. While I got ready for the day overall I’d say, I got pretty close to Samsung’s battery estimates on both watches but you’re still, basically charging every day or at the very least every other day. It’S now good enough for me that I’m a lot less anxious about the battery dying on me at An Inconvenient moment, but you’re gon na have to go with the watch5 pro.
If you really want multi-day battery life, while not a ton has changed on these watches, meaningful updates, don’t have to be big or splashy. There’S a lot to like about the Galaxy watch 6 series. I really dig that Samsung didn’t have to turn either the Galaxy watch. 6 or the classic into a hockey puck just to increase the display size or pack in larger batteries, the 47 millimeter classic is probably the most comfy Big Boy watch.
I’Ve ever tested. I’Ve already said a lot about how stoked I am to see the rotating bezel. Come back so I’m not gon na repeat myself other than to say that if you’re a watch for classic owner, I think you’re going to be happy upgrading. If you have the regular watch 5 and are thinking about the standard watch six, I mean it’s great, that the bezels are 30 thinner on the six.
But the majority of the watch faces have a black background and just about everything else is going to be the same thing. Basically, if you’ve ever had a Samsung Smart Watch before you already know what you’re getting here, depending on your perspective, that could be a good or a bad thing. Personally, I don’t know that Samsung can afford to Coast like this for much longer, just as there are more foldables than there used to be. There are a lot more wear OS smart watches too rumor has it that a pixel Watch 2 is coming and all it really needs to do is fix battery life.
To give these watches a serious run for their money. So it’s okay for Samsung to stick with a tried and true formula this year next year. Maybe not so much hey guys thanks for watching and yes, I am always double wristing and guess what I have the double watch, Tans to prove it: occupational hazard, .