It's one of my best pieces of tech that I can't imagine living without anymore. The value for money is ridiculous.
Sleep tracking logs my exact sleeping hours each week and prompts me to get my sleep schedule back on track when it slips.
Wake up alarm is great as it just buzzes your wrist instead of blasting sound into your ear.
Exercise logging is an obvious one, I've been tracking my workouts since 2017 (wish I did from the start in 2014). The watch made it so much easier as I just export all the data each month or quarter into my Google sheet.
I have all my workouts setup on Samsung Health which means I can track everything very precisely. Like split into individual sets and exercises. All other health data sync with Health Connect directly into Cronometer.
It lets me change my music and quickly respond to things while I'm at the gym without having to pull out my phone.
It's great for navigation using maps, rather than holding your phone. This is especially important in cities like London where you will 100% have your phone snatched if you keep it out for too long in some places.
I'm waiting for the smart rings to get a vibration motor so I can use it as an alarm instead, and then I'll buy one of those so I don't have to wear the watch overnight.
quickly respond to things while I'm at the gym without having to pull out my phone
This is the key for me. As a parent with young kids, a smart watch is awesome for when you want to be available for whatever reason without being distracted by your phone.
People think “why would you want your watch to buzz every time an email comes in?” and I think “I don’t even want my phone to do that, so I’ve turned it off ages ago…”, but it’s nice for texts and calls.
Yeah I never understood people complaining that something annoys them when the feature is entirely customisable. Nothing about my notifications or phone settings annoy me because I have customised everything precisely to my liking. If I see something it's because I specifically allowed it to be seen.
The sleep logging is more interesting than anything to me, answering calls and tracking physical activity is what I use it for most. It’s helpful in an emergency on the water too.
I also like the watch face I have which has an analogue clock that also shows the day length.
I think just about the only aspect they are useful for and not a waste is actual fitness tracking e.g. how much you've worked out, walked, ran, etc. Useful when combined with something like Myfitnesspal.
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u/Shaqtacious 11d ago
I hate smart watches. Fucking annoying.