Huawei Watch Fit 3 review: One of the best-value smartwatches you can buy

The Huawei Watch Match 3 sees Huawei take its health tracker and smartwatch hybrid and make it extra smartwatch.

Together with a revamped design and an even bigger display screen, the Watch Match 3 will get new watch faces, richer sleep monitoring, an improved coronary heart price sensor and now provides extra sports activities modes.

Crucially, it doesn’t budge from its very affordable price ticket that received’t see it measured up towards the Apple Watch, Samsung Galaxy Watch or the Google Pixel Watch. Assume extra Xiaomi, Honor, Amazfit and CMF smartwatches.

On paper, the Watch Match 3 guarantees an entire lot for not a whole lot of your cash and with no single smartwatch maker absolutely nailing issues on the reasonably priced finish of the market, it’s there for Huawei to seize that greatest low cost smartwatch crown.

Try our chart of the perfect smartwatches to see alternate options.

Design & Construct

• New sq. design
• Out there in six colors
• 5ATM waterproofing

Huawei has primarily ripped up the script for the design Match 3. Whereas the Match and Match 2 regarded like health trackers with barely wider, Fitbit Cost-like formed screens, that look goes out the window.

As an alternative is a squarer design that immediately make the Match 3 appear like a daily smartwatch.

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

Many smartwatches are accused of being Apple Watch clones however that actually does apply right here with the Match 3. The 43.2mm sized watch contains a matte, aluminium alloy case with two bodily buttons on the fitting hand aspect, and it’s these buttons that scream Apple. The underside one is a flat sort that provides you fast entry to the Match 3’s exercise monitoring display screen.

The highest button is a purple watch crown that merely doesn’t really feel as elegant or pristine as Apple’s crown and barely detracts from what is essentially a pleasant smartwatch to take a look at.

The crown is beneficial not less than, primarily for scrolling by way of menu screens and can also be used successfully in situations like navigating the app launcher, the place a twist of the crown can shortly reveal the labels beneath app icons to assist determine what they do. You may also double faucet it to get into your most not too long ago used apps.

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

There’s a superb vary of colors you’ll be able to choose the Watch Match 3 up in. Take your choose of Gold, Silver, Pink and Tarnish case shades and there’s additionally the choice of fluroelastomer, nylon and leather-based straps. There are buttons on the case again you’ll be able to press to clip away the lugs to make it fairly simple to change up straps. These extra straps will value you £30.

Huawei sticks to the identical degree of waterproofing because the Match 2, so that you’re getting a 5ATM-rated design, which does imply you’ll be able to take it swimming and submerge it in water as much as 50 metres depth.

Display & Audio 

• 1.82-inch AMOLED display screen
• Helps always-on mode
• Contains microphone and speaker

As talked about, the display screen on the newest Match is larger than the one on the Match 2, leaping from a 1.74-inch AMOLED to a 1.82-inch one with a 480 x 408 pixel decision. Huawei has planted nice screens on its pricier smartwatches and it’s good to see that even the Watch Match 3 will get a superb one too.

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

In comparison with different screens on smartwatches at this worth, the Match 3 is likely one of the greatest. It’s sharp, colors are correct and with a 1,500 max nits brightness, it goes very vibrant too. After I’ve left it on almost high brightness at evening waking up the display screen appears like turning on a smartphone torch.

There’s some bezel across the show, although Huawei does an excellent job of masking it with the consumer interface and its assortment of watch faces. It’s a display screen that’s properly responsive to the touch and is all the pieces you’d anticipate finding on a smartwatch that prices rather more than the Match 3.

It’s a show that may be set to remain always-on, on the expense of the utmost battery life you’ll get pleasure from in between costs. When you can stay and not using a 24/7 display screen, the raise-to-wake gesture help right here is excellent.

Huawei has additionally discovered room for a speaker and microphone and that does imply you’ll be able to take calls when paired to your Android or iPhone over Bluetooth. It additionally means you’ll be able to play music from the watch sans headphones. It’s a surprisingly good performer, providing loads of quantity and good readability that makes it very usable for dealing with calls out of your wrist.

Software program & Options 

• Runs on Concord OS
• Works with Android and iOS
• Some options work solely with Android or Huawei telephones

Huawei employs model 4.20 of its personal Concord OS working system, in order that’s the identical software program operating on its Watch 4 and Watch GT 4 sequence smartwatches.

Meaning you get one thing which is appropriate with Android smartphones and iPhones. Most options can be found throughout these platforms with some exceptions. You possibly can’t sync music as an illustration when utilizing it with an iPhone, whilst you’ll must have an iPhone or a Huawei smartphone to make use of the distant digicam shutter characteristic.

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

Every part is about up within the Huawei Well being app, which is a bit busy and is price spending a little bit of time in to work out what’s truly going to be helpful every day.

The watch software program itself is not less than fairly simple to become familiar with as compared. Swipe left and proper to see your display screen widgets, swipe all the way down to see the settings menu and as much as see your notifications. I don’t have many complaints with how issues run on the watch and it runs good and easy as nicely.

There’s a pleasant array of smartwatch options. It gives strong notification help, well-optimised music playback controls, a pleasant bunch of pre-loaded watch faces and a pleasant climate widget.

There’s NFC contactless fee help by way of Huawei Pay, although not like Huawei’s different smartwatches doesn’t provide entry to the AppGallery storefront. When you’re searching for the fundamentals and people fundamentals to work in a reasonably slick method, the Match 3 delivers on that.

Health & Monitoring 

• Upgraded coronary heart price sensor
• Constructed-in GPS
• Calorie monitoring mode

Match is within the identify so it’s no shock to search out that Huawei guarantees to trace loads on the well being and health entrance.

It has the important thing sensors you’d anticipate finding together with ones to trace coronary heart price and blood oxygen ranges. It additionally contains built-in GPS, which is at all times a bonus to search out on an affordable smartwatch.

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

When you’re not the sporty kind and primarily wanting to make use of the Match 3 to trace your steps, sleep and perhaps pay a bit extra consideration to emphasize ranges and each day coronary heart price, the Match 3 performs nicely as a health tracker.

The improved Exercise Ring widget is now extra glanceable and fascinating than it was on the Match 2. Accuracy-wise, each day step counts had been usually inside 300-500 steps of two different health trackers I wore alongside it. It helps inactivity alerts and Huawei has gone large with awarding you digital badges for hitting main milestones, so get used to these showing every time you launch the Huawei Well being app.

Huawei helps you to swap between viewing your exercise rings and its wholesome clover, that are designed to mark if you’ve accomplished wholesome habits throughout your day. It’s an instance, nonetheless, the place Huawei tries to do loads, and the wealth of options will get a little bit overwhelming.

When it’s time for mattress, Huawei contains model 4.0 of its TruSleep sleep monitoring system, capturing insights like sleep period, sleep levels, sleep scores together with providing some sleep evaluation and proposals to enhance your slumber time.

Taking it to mattress with the Oura Ring Gen 3, I discovered sleep period and the time I fell asleep on most nights had been fairly comparable. It additionally did a pleasant job of capturing the additional naps I’d recorded when unwell throughout testing. The sleep evaluation and proposals aren’t something groundbreaking, providing suggestions like telling me to air out the room earlier than sleeping or to attempt a scorching foot tub or stretch earlier than mattress.

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

Huawei’s added some health-centric options it’s already rolled out to its different smartwatches and that features its scientific calorie counter which can immediate you to log meals all through the day within the app after which use your exercise monitoring knowledge with the concept of working in the direction of a calorie deficit to reduce weight.

Sadly, the idea of manually monitoring meals minus a database of meals to lean on makes it a little bit of a chore of a characteristic to make use of.

It’s additionally introduced in a TruSeen 5.5 coronary heart price monitoring setup to vow a lift in coronary heart price accuracy, and the velocity with which you’ll be able to take SpO2 readings as nicely. For on-the-spot coronary heart price readings, the Watch Match 3 felt fairly dependable on the entire and matched as much as two different health trackers I wore on the similar time.

It was an analogous story for common resting coronary heart price readings, although I discover the presentation of the information within the app not tremendous intuitive and a bit clunky total.

As a sports activities watch, you’ve obtained your choose over nicely over 100 sports activities modes, with core modes together with operating, biking and swimming each within the pool and open water. Huawei has added profiles for soccer, padel and e-sports, and now additionally features a new monitor operating mode.

There’s computerized train recognition for a few of these modes whereas Huawei has promised a brand new good options mode that recommends exercises based mostly in your exercise historical past and calorie consumption. These didn’t seem in any respect throughout my testing.

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

Mike Sawh

For a few of these core modes, Huawei retains its helpful warm-up and cool-down animations, although it seems to have dropped the flexibility to import routes like you may on the Watch Match 2.

There’s a single-band positioning setup right here versus the newer and extra correct dual-band one which seems on its different watches. When it comes to GPS accuracy, I discovered that on some runs, metrics like distance tracked and common tempo had been properly consistent with a devoted operating watch I wore on my different wrist.

On different runs, the Match 3 barely over-reported distance, but it surely wasn’t a horror present. Coronary heart price monitoring accuracy for exercises at a simple to reasonable tempo was usually strong, helped by the nice match I obtained with the nylon strap that’s out there for the Match 3.

There’s an array of coaching and evaluation out there on the watch and off it. You possibly can comply with structured operating classes or create your personal and comply with a spread of coaching plans that may be synced from the Huawei Well being app. You possibly can view your operating means index and coaching load and see your advisable restoration time after you’ve tracked a exercise.

Total, it gives loads in comparison with rivals and the core monitoring expertise is strong.

Battery Life & Charging

• As much as 10 days battery life
• As much as 7 days in heavy use
• As much as 4 days with display screen always-on

Huawei’s smartwatches usually put in a extremely robust efficiency right here and it’s no totally different with the Watch Match 3.

For the Watch Match 2, Huawei claimed as much as 10 days in typical utilization and seven days in heavy utilization. It’s quoting the exact same numbers for the Match 3, which packs in a 400mAh capability battery. It now moreover states what you’ll be able to anticipate when the display screen is on 24/7, with that quantity dropping to 4 days.

I’d say that these numbers ring true as soon as once more. I discovered that the battery lasted roughly every week, although with extra common exercise monitoring, that fell just under. Total, although the displaying has been superb, and whereas it hasn’t improved on the Match 2, it definitely has carried out worse, even with an even bigger display screen in place.

Mattias Inghe

Mattias Inghe

Mattias Inghe

When utilizing GPS, I discovered that an hour of monitoring noticed the battery drop by slightly below 10%. That’s precisely the kind of numbers I noticed with comparable monitoring on the Match 2.

While you do get low, you’re grabbing a proprietary charging cable to get it powered again up once more. There’s a quick-charge mode to provide you a day’s play from a 10-minute cost and it could get from 0-100% in simply an hour, which is spectacular.

Worth & Availability

The Huawei Watch Match 3 is on sale for £139.99 within the UK and €159, immediately from the Huawei web site. You may also get it from the likes of Argos, Boots, Currys and Amazon.

When you’re within the US and need the Watch Match 3, then sadly issues haven’t modified on that entrance. This hasn’t formally gone on sale Stateside, very similar to Huawei’s different smartwatches and health trackers.

To place the Watch Match 3 pricing in perspective, it’s firmly sitting in that reasonably priced smartwatch class, going up towards the likes of the Honor Watch 4, CMF Watch Professional and the Xiaomi Watch S3, with the Watch S3 providing a spherical case design in comparison with the squarer appears of the Honor and Huawei watches.

Try our record of the perfect smartwatches for the highest choices.

Must you purchase the Huawei Watch Match 3?

The Huawei Watch Match 3 is now very a lot a smartwatch and a really likeable one out there at a extremely good worth.

There are some design parts that work and a few that don’t for my part, with software program and efficiency that feels very a lot consistent with different smartwatches in and across the similar worth.

It definitely appears like a extra polished reasonably priced smartwatch than one thing just like the Honor Watch 4 and the Redmi Watch 4, whereas its health and smartwatch options really feel higher executed than they’re on the Xiaomi Watch S3.

Backside line, When you’re searching for an affordable smartwatch with an ideal display screen and you’ll stay with the fairly blatant Apple Watch-aping look, some fairly slick software program with some considerate touches, then that is nicely price a glance.

Specs

• 1.82-inch, AMOLED always-on show
• 5 ATM water resistance ranking 
• Constructed-in speaker
• Single-band, built-in GPS
• 400mAh capability battery
• As much as 10 days battery life
• Coronary heart price sensor
• Blood oxygen sensor
• Bluetooth calls
• Sleep monitoring
• Stress monitoring
• 26g (with out strap)