Fitbit’s latest fitness band, Blaze, has a color screen and attractive, interchangeable bands and cases, but the device is missing some key features and would have been much compelling if it had advanced activity tracking features. Called the Blaze, it is the newest activity tracker/fitness watch of Fitbit.
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“There are 10,000 apps on the Apple watch, yet Fitbit counters that most folks use just three on average”, wrote RBC analyst Mark Sue. Definitely one of the blingy but stylish watches we saw on display at CES 2016. He also pointed to the increased competition in Fitbit’s category: “We are not necessarily anxious about the Garmin and Jawbones of the world, but large companies ranging from Samsung, Under Armour, Huawei, etc. are persistently trying to break into the market”.
Quite frankly, I feel blasé about Blaze ($200), Fitbit’s just-announced fitness watch.
For a device meant to be more fashionable than Fitbit’s usual rubberized fare – the Blaze features a removable core so users can customize the colour of the metal frame, as well as a variety of band choices – some reviewers labelled it ugly and clunky. The Apple Watch tops out at 18 hours. In “Multi-Sport” mode, you can select from a list of specific exercise types, like running, hiking, biking, weight lifting, etc. and, as you exercise, real-time stats like your heart rate, time elapsed, and distance traveled are displayed on the Corning Gorilla Glass face. It means you won’t need to charge your Blaze before going to sleep each evening, as the Blaze also offers sleep tracking technology to monitor how well you slept, and will provide you with a daily report via the Fitbit app on your smartphone. You can view the breakdown of that workout in the companion app, or you can also go online to the Fitbit server, which stores all of your data, and log a specific workout as a certain exercise type.
Aside from fitness, the Blaze hits all of the most important bits of smartwatch life.
We found operating the Fitbit Blaze to be fairly straightforward – swiping up from the watchface will reveal notifications, and swiping left and right will reveal the various menus available.
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The Fitbit watch costs $199 and is to be launched globally in March. The other Leerink analyst “sees the Blaze as an improved fitness band that the fitness consumer will like”. When you are at work, we have an accessory for you.
