The fitness tracker is gradually taking over the market as they are most needed in today’s busy world. It is almost impossible to maintain and think about health and fitness while being busy or in our personal lives!
So how do we select the perfect fitness tracker then? It is a drawing concept. You might find a fitness tracker that tracks almost all the activities but lack one that you need the most!
This is why you need to sort out the following questions in your head before you make a purchase decision.
Some of these may be your budget, the design, your lifestyle, the brand you find attractive, and much more.
What is the Budget? How Much Are You Willing to Spend?
First of all, the key to any purchase is your budget. The simple calculation of how much you want to spend on a product narrows down your choices to a very few. As easy as it may seem, it becomes harder to choose a product when there are so many choices that are a visual treat.
In fact, if you are a newbie in the fitness band sector, we suggest you try on the simple and bargainable fitness trackers first. You can gradually increase to understand how they work and what you require in the bands, then you can upgrade to a better one.
Since there are many fitness brands in the market, you will find fitness trackers of different prices. For the same brand name, you can easily assume that a higher priced product will provide you with better facilities.
However, if you consider two or three brands and try to compare their pricing, it might not be a good decision to assume that a higher price promises better facilities. It means that a lower-priced product can give a better user experience in some cases.
For example, the budget fitness band LETSCOM fitness tracker provides you with features that are unimaginable at such a low price. There are many such brands ready to amaze you with their absolute best.
What Are the Features You Need to Look for in a Fitness Tracker?
If you clearly want to know how to select a good fitness tracker, this is the most important part of the article. Any product that you buy must consist of the features you look for. If not for the features, they will merely be the fragment of your wasted precious budget, which could be utilized in other products of higher utility.
Display Quality
The screen of the fitness band must have a better display quality. Since you will be using such bands in any activity and outdoor adventures, you need to check whether the display is bright enough for you to assure readability. Moreover, if the display is colorful, then you will enjoy it much more.
Comfortability
A smart band is something you use every day. You might even use these bands while you sleep for sleep tracking. Hence it is essential to check the comfortability of such trackers.
The band must be lightly weighted as well as of a material that will not cause you any rashes or skin irritations. To ensure this, you can try it on for a day.
Health and Fitness Tracking
A major function of a fitness tracker is to track your health and other activities. This makes sure that you live a fit and healthy life as well as find out the truth about your daily activities that can cause you trouble later in life.
Activity Tracker
Various activities like walking, running, swimming, yoga, gardening, etc. can be tracked through fitness bands. It is amazing how your activities get sorted into graphs to let you know about your progress.
Moreover, you can set goals and then meet them accordingly. The fitness band will encourage you and motivate you time and again to reach your goals.
If you are more into sports, you can choose a fitness tracker that gives you facilities to track your favorite games like basketball, football, golf, soccer, etc. You will find fitness trackers that give you more than 12 sports modes. Some of the smart bands that give you this ability are LETSCOM fitness tracker HR, Fitbit charge 4, Garmin vivosmart.
Likewise, if you are looking to lose weight, some bands give you the same functionality of managing your diets, calorie counting, and much more.
Guide Your Breathing
Fitness trackers also maintain your breathing in control. Improper breathing can cause stress and imbalance your hormones. The main idea here is to maintain your proper breathing such that your stress is controlled.
Many meditation cycles focus on breathing for better concentration and balance in work life. This is what guiding your breath does to your life.
Fitbit Charge 3 and Fitbit Charge 4 give you such unique facilities. This assures you a better heartbeat, and helps you decrease tension, manage blood pressure as well as lower your anxiety levels.
Calorie Tracker
This is a major fitness tool. Not only does a calorie tracker track your daily intake of calories, but it also so takes into account the number of good calories and bad calories you are having in your food.
What’s more? You can check how many calories you have burnt with all the activities that you did throughout the day. Even more fun is the fact that you will get to know how much intensity your workout consists of.
The accuracy of the data will make it easier for you to plan accordingly as well as check the data to determine your success in fitness.
Blood Pressure Monitoring
The basic step of any healthy activity is to maintain normal blood pressure. A fitness tracker that can measure your blood pressure will help you manage your activities as per your high or low pressure.
It will assist you in knowing whether the workout is more stressful for your health or less. You can even share this data with your doctor if need be.
Heart Rate Monitoring(HR)
Heart rate monitoring makes it easier to determine how your workout routine affects your health. In many exercises, the heart rate increases more than the maximum, which can be harmful to your body.
This is when the fitness tracker comes to your rescue. What majorly makes it more amusing is the fact that it will vibrate and alert you when you reach the maximum limit of your heartbeat.
You can measure your resting heart rate as well as the heart rate while you exercise such that the comparison becomes easier. Now, changing your workout schedules to the heart rate is effortless!
Amazfit Bip is the best in this case. It has the perfect design, an affordable budget, long battery life, and much more.
GPS Tracking
GPS means Global Positioning System. It tells you the locations of where you are and where you want to be headed.
Frequently asked questions:
Integrated vs. connected GPS: Which one to choose?
An integrated GPS allows you to check your pace, distance covered, and location directly from your smart band. Garmin products have such features lined up for you.
On the other hand, connected GPS does the same things, but it needs connectivity with your smartphone. Fitbit products give you connected GPS features.
GPS vs. GLONASS: What’s the difference?
GPS has 31 satellites, while GLONASS supports 24 satellites to track down your current position. You can say that GLONASS is a Russian GPS which may not be as accurate as GPS itself.
However, we recommend you to use smart bands which support both of them since such a smart band will be more accurate as well as faster. When the GPS fails or gets stuck, GLONASS supports it and tells you your exact location without any troubles.
Idle Alert
Fitness trackers also give idle alerts when you sit in the same position for a long period. It creates the need to keep on moving.
This makes you more flexible and active throughout the day. You can set the times accordingly so that you can choose which parts of the day you want to be more active.
Moreover, you can also choose the alert time to be from 2 minutes to 2 hours. Although it seems like a simple thing to do, it undeniably helps you in being more active and more fit!
Coaching On-Screen
An outstanding feature of smart bands is also onscreen coaching. This will be personalized according to your health and heart rates measured by your smart band.
You can engage in various exercises that are recommended and guided by the smart band itself. For this, Fitbit has launched the Coach app.
Oximeter
Many fitness trackers are increasingly using the feature of the oximeter. This makes the task of measuring the level of oxygen in your blood as well as seeking the saturation levels less challenging.
Garmin vivosmart, Vivofit series consists of pulse OX meters, which monitor your blood oxygen levels.
You can also find similar oximeters in Fitbit Charge 3 and Charge 4.
Period Tracker/ Ovulation Tracker
Some Fitbit products like Fitbit charge 3 provides women with the facility of tracking your fertility cycle. This makes you more cautious about your health. It also makes it easy to track your fertility, ovulation cycle, recording symptoms, and tracking your periods.
For women, this feature is more than a lifesaver but also a friend in need.
Real-time Heart Rate Monitoring
This feature is quite different from heart rate monitoring, as usual. If you are looking for a loss of weight or if you are more of a cardio fan, you will undeniably love this.
It will show you whether you are in fat burn, cardio, or peak zone. Such data will help you change your workout routines as per their effectiveness.
Moreover, you can even check how much time you need to return your body to enter a normal state after the workout.
Sleep Tracking
Tracking your sleep challenges your daily activities to increase its pace. We all have felt drowsy and irritated because of a lack of sleep or because we didn’t sleep well. Sleep tracking keeps the data on how much time you spent in bed and how much time you spent sleeping.
It even gives you different tips on how you can improve your sleep and what will help you to obtain a deeper sleep. You will undeniably understand the importance of proper sleep if you use sleep tracking and the suggestions that your smart band will give you.
Steps Tracking/ Pedometer
If you are a walker, you understand the importance of steps tracking. You set a goal of certain steps and then complete it to have a feeling of accomplishment. It is more helpful for people who want to lose weight and keep track of the calories.
For every step you take, certain calories are lost. For a long, people have been motivated by numbers, and that is exactly what the steps tracker or pedometer does for you.
Battery Life of Fitness Tracker
Battery life is often the most sought feature in any technical device. More battery life means a good device waits for you. Most bands have a battery life of 7 to 14 days.
However, some fitness trackers like Garmin vivofit 3 have a battery life of 1 year, and you have to change the battery after it stops working instead of charging it.
Your battery life can be affected by a larger display, a colorful one, or even the trackers you choose to use. If you use smartwatches, there are dual-screen smartwatches that give you higher battery life like the Casio Pro Trek series.
Ease of Payment
Some smart bands assure you payment of various goods and services through the smart band itself. It is similar to the techniques used in smartphones for payment.
Similarly, it seems easy to just use a band on your hand to pay, doesn’t it?
What’s more? It is made even more convenient by NFC payments. Some brands are even named your payment apps, such as Fitbit pay for Fitbit series. You can even use Paypal in smart bands.
Music Player
Do you ever feel drowsy while working out and then suddenly get energized when your favorite music turns on? Yeah, you’re not the only one. This is why there is a feature in your smart band so that you can play music while you work out.
You can even listen to music when you walk, run, or even while playing your favorite sports.
Connectivity
You have to be careful and check the connectivity of your fitness tracker. Most of the smart bands will provide you connectivity to the smartphones that support Android or iOS.
But some smart bands even support Tizen OS by Samsung. Mostly, if you want to utilize the iOS apps, then Apple watches are your go-to. Even though almost all smart bands connect you to your smartphone, you may not be able to use some inbuilt apps.
You might also have to check the connectivity through Bluetooth and Wi-Fi. If Bluetooth is enabled in your smart band, you will be able to connect with laptops and tablets as well.
Smart Notifications
Smart bands prepare your notifications of calls, texts, emails as well as in-app notifications regarding fitness. If your smart band is connected with an app, then it will also notify you to drink your water or have your food.
You can even reply to the messages directly from your smart band without having to check on your mobile or smartphone. On the other hand, for Android devices, you might need your smartphone to be near a certain distance to reply instantly.
Touchscreen
The screens of most fitness trackers are touch-sensitive. Though, you have to look for a quality that adjusts its brightness according to the place you are, i.e., indoor or outdoor. Plus, you have to check the response rate. Some touch screens are slower and take a lot of time to respond.
Supporting Health Apps
Next in line is supporting apps. You should also check which apps your fitness band supports. Majorly it is related to connectivity itself.
That is whether your fitness band supports Android, iOS, and Windows or not. However, we must check which health app it uses. Your fitness bands use a certain operating system that decides what health app it supports.
Furthermore, you will find Apple Watches supporting Apple Health while some bands with Wear OS like Garmin Vivofit, Xiaomi Mi Band 4/ Band 5, etc. use Google Fit. Samsung Galaxy Fit uses Tizen OS, which supports Samsung Health apps.
Water Resistant/ Waterproof Fitness Tracker
A waterproof smart band is a lifesaver. Since you use smart bands in various activities like swimming or even when you have to wash hands/ take a shower after every workout session, it is indispensable for your smart band to be waterproof.
Mini fitness bands like Jawbone liquidated because they lacked this quality. It is preferable because a smart band has to be smart enough for you to be carefree about its operation failing.
Frequently asked questions about this feature.
What is an ATM?
Majorly you can measure water resistance in two types. One of them is the ATM. It means Atmospheres Rating. You can check these out:
- 1ATM- This is almost as good as no water resistance. Hence, you should be careful around water.
- 3ATM- It means that you can use it up to 100 meters. Your fitness tracker will be safe from light rain or a few splashes of water, but it is still not protected completely from the water.
- 5ATM- It can be used up to 165 meters. That means you can use it for short periods of swimming.
- 10ATM- It is suitable for 330 feet, i.e., snorkeling.
- 20ATM- If you are a jetski or a surfing fan, this rating is essential for your smart band.
What are IP Ratings?
This is the Ingress Protection Rating. This is the rating of your smart band being protected from dust and other unwanted materials entering and damaging the smart band functions.
You might have observed ratings like IP67 or IP68 in smart bands and smartwatches. The first means solid protection, while the latter means liquid protection.
Frequently asked questions:
What Should I Buy: Smartwatch or Smart Band/ Fitness Tracker?
Basically, there is very little difference between a smartwatch and a smart band or fitness tracker. Some smart bands provide you with time as well as activity tracking. Smartwatches do the same thing. So, which one do you choose or even specifically need?
Does the answer lie within the choices of what you want to do? Yes definitely! Do you want more than just fitness, like adding notifications of your apps to your band directly? If so, you are searching for a smartwatch instead of a smart band.
The basic difference between the two is that smartwatches provide more than just fitness and time. It gives you the ultimate chance of mixing basic smartphone features like texting, emailing, making phone calls, etc.
Smartwatches thus consume more battery in such regards as they have in-app features. Similarly, you will find the cost of smartwatches is slightly higher than that of the smart bands. Smart bands are specifically made for your fitness and activity tracking only.
Therefore, they provide you with somewhat more accurate and expert advice in heart rate monitoring, sleep monitoring, and another activity tracking in a bargainable amount!
What Designs Should I Choose for My Fitness Tracker?
The designs you choose are completely dependent on your taste and preference. For it, there are many choices in the market for you.
Most smart bands with touchscreens have fairly bigger displays so that you can easily jump through the fitness trackers. It might also be the case to show you around all the stats of the activities and health data it has covered.
Moreover, there are smart bands which have a bigger screen than the others like the Fitbit Charge series have a little bigger screens than Xiaomi Mi Bands.
It is a better choice to have a bigger screen if you have bigger wrists and a smaller screen for a smaller wrist. Though, the sizes are not much of a concern here. Some bands even have different shapes like circular or square sized to determine the uniqueness of the brand.
However, you will observe that most bands are oval-shaped such that they look attractive in your wrist while also giving you more readability of the data.
Which Fitness Tracker Should I Choose for My Lifestyle?
The thing with smart bands is that more features do not mean better user experience. Some features might not be your concern at all. It all comes down to what your lifestyle is like?
Do you like sports and play often? If so, you will definitely love the idea of a smart band that gives you multi-sports modes like LETSCOM fitness tracker HR. There are fitness bands that can help you track your golf, soccer, basketball, football, and many more games.
Likewise, are you an outdoor adventurer instead? If so, you shall find interest in the fitness trackers which track your steps, provide GPS, running, swimming, skiing, etc. as their major tracking features.
Although you might find it amusing to own all the features, it will affect your overall battery strength as well as your budget.
So, we suggest you choose the features you will often be using in your daily life than store the tracker for some adventure of once in a lifetime.
After all, the smart bands are meant to make your lifestyle better and easier than to wait and see what life has to bring in the future. Besides, the technological world is changing rapidly.
You will always find something more interesting in the coming years if you seek to store the bands for some adventurous trip.
Is GPS Important in a Fitness Tracker?
It is not the most important thing in your smart band, but it is something that will increase the value of it.
You can gain a lot from GPS by tracking your exact current location as well as looking for the place you want to go next. With GPS, you will never lose your trail, and it will definitely be easier to work out without stressing on other minor facts.
Most importantly, if you are an outdoor adventurer, you will always find yourself seeking this feature at best since you require your maps and locations to be tracked.
Last Words on Fitness Tracker Selection
A smart band definitely helps you to maintain your fitness and health intact and strong. It is completely your choice, but if you consider the facts that we have mentioned above, you will find the most suitable smart band for you.
We hope when you decide to buy a smart band, you will take into account the features that you want in your fitness band. We have also explained which feature means what and how to check what you want in your fitness tracker.
This was all about a helpful guide to your questions about how to select the perfect fitness tracker. We hope you have a good experience with your smart band!
