eel like buying yourself a new gadget? Hold onto your current smartphone and buy a fitness tracker instead. They offer a fun and interactive way to make one fit and active whilst being a cool fashion accessory at the same time.
While the situation of wearables might seem quite gloomy currently with the demise of veterans like Pebble and falling sales, fitness trackers are not going anywhere.
With smartwatches not picking up as expected, the attention is now turning towards fitness focused wearables which are doing surprisingly well. Major manufacturers are realising the same and launching new fitness focused wearables or adding fitness functionality in their smartwatches.
The best example of this can be seen in the Apple Watch, whose second generation concentrated mostly on making it more attractive to fitness enthusiasts.
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So go ahead and channel your gadget craze into something constructive. Here are the top fitness trackers in India:
Fitbit Charge 2: Feature loaded
The Fitbit Charge 2 is loaded to the gills with features and makes a great choice for those looking for a relatively high-end fitness tracker.
It is a massive improvement over its predecessor and comes with a much bigger display and added smart features such as smartphone notifications and more. The Fitbit Charge 2 measures active minutes, calories burned, steps taken, distance traveled and also tracks your sleep.
The Charge 2 is more than just a standard fitness tracker though and comes with features such as multi-sports tracking through which you can track various activities such as walking, weight training, treadmill running, cycling and interval workouts as well as smartwatch notification support.The caveat here is that only Incoming calls, SMS and calendar notifications are supported. The Charge 2 does not support alerts from third party applications. With the notifications you do get, you can read them on your wrist but cannot respond or reply to them in any way via the watch.
The Charge 2 comes in a variety of color options and supports interchangeable straps. The straps come in light blue, dark blue, black and purple. Two premium options in the form of lavender/rose gold and black/gunmetal are also available.
Xiaomi Mi band 2: Best budget option
No other fitness tracker on the market can compete with the Xiaomi Mi Band 2 in terms of sheer value for money.
At just Rs 1,999, the Mi Band 2 comes with an OLED display, activity and sleep tracking functionality, smartphone notifications as well as a heart rate scanner.
The OLED display up front shows the time, heart rate, step count and so on and you can cycle between the various modes by pressing a button underneath the screen. A nifty feature is the fact that the Mi Band 2's display lights up to show the time every time you lift up your wrist.
No other fitness tracker on the market can compete with Mi Band 2 in terms of sheer value for money
The Mi band 2 also comes with a modicum of smartwatch functionality. Along with incoming call notifications, the band shows alerts from up-to five different user configurable applications. These notifications however are rather rudimentary, with the band only displaying the icon of the app on its OLED display. There is no way to see any details about the alert or read any text messages from the band itself.
On the design front, the Mi Band 2 is pretty basic and comes with a lightweight and slim design. With a water/dust resistance rating of IP67 and a hypoallergenic silicone band, the Mi Band 2 is geared towards heavy workout and gym sessions.
The Mi Band 2 is controlled through Xiaomi's Mi Fit App which is available on both iOS and Android. The application provides activity and sleep statistics in a slick manner and also allows users to manage alarms and notifications.
Fitbit Flex 2: The no-nonsense wearable
Notifications, fancy displays, workout monitoring - A lot of fitness trackers come with a lot of extra features built-in. But what does one buy when he/she isn't interested in any of that and wants just a no-nonsense fitness tracker?
The Fitbit Flex 2 comes to the rescue. It is a device which revels in its simplicity. It is just a fitness tracker and nothing else. The fact that Fitbit has also made the device look rather attractive is just cherry on the cake.
It records calories burnt, steps taken, hours slept and distance traveled. You have to open the Fitbit application on your smartphone to view this information though as the device does not come with a display. It interacts with you via a series of LED's on its front fascia.
The Flex 2 retails for around Rs 9,500 and is a perfect buy for those who just want a simple device that works well. It comes in a variety of colors and styles and also features interchangeable bands.
Garmin Vivofit 2: A hassle-free option
Like almost all fitness trackers in the list, the Garmin Vivofit 2 also comes with activity and sleep tracking, calorie monitoring, as well as the ability to display the time.
Where the Vivofit 2 distinguishes itself from the crowd is when it comes to battery life. While most fitness trackers need to be recharged once every 5-7 days, the Vivofit 2 is powered by a regular coin-cell battery that allows it to be used for 1 year on a trot.
The cherry on the cake is the fact that the Vivofit 2 also comes with a display that shows you the time, calories consumed, steps taken and so on. This allows it to be also used as a watch.The display is an extremely low power dot matrix panel reminiscent of earlier digital Casio watches. It also has Garmin's trademark 'Move bar' which notifies you if you haven't moved at all or have been inactive for more than an hour.
In order to save battery, the Vivofit 2 is not permanently connected to your smartphone. It syncs data across only when you open the GarminConnect application. It can store up to 7 days of data on its own.
The Vivofit 2 does not offer any smart features and retails for around Rs 6,500 on e-commerce websites.
Garmin Fenix 3 HR: The ultimate fitness tracker
At Rs 50,999 for the base variant, the Garmin Fenix 3 HR is not cheap. But it is the ultimate tool for the hardcore fitness enthusiast - the kind of person whose life revolves around terms like VO2 max levels and daily intensity minutes.
The watch comes with a 1.2-inch 'Chroma' display which the company promises is visible even in intense sunlight, a wrist based heart rate monitor, wireless connectivity and in-built GPS.
The strap is made of flexible silicone that lets your skin breathe during intense workouts. Additionally, the watch can be used while swimming as it is water resistant up to 100 metres/10 ATM.
It also supports Garmin's Connect IQ feature which lets you customize the Fenix 3 with a variety of downloadable watch faces, data fields, widgets and activities.
Garmin Fenix 3 HR is the ultimate tool for the hardcore fitness enthusiast
The additional fitness focused features is where the device earns its price tag and rises above the rest of the options in this list.
It comes with an altimeter, barometer and a compass which are used to measure elevation data, predict weather changes and keep track of your bearings respectively. The in-built GPS works in tandem with GLONASS and EPO to provide extremely precise positioning while using navigation.
While a lot of fitness trackers come with activity tracking modes, the Fenix 3 also has profiles for relatively obscure and difficult to track activities like rowing, skiing and paddle boarding. It also analyses and displays your daily intensity minutes.
The device also lets you measure your oxygen levels during exercise. The VO2 max estimator analyses data, including your running speed, beats per minute and heart rate variability to estimate the maximum volume of oxygen you can consume per minute.
On top of all that, the device also comes with certain smart features. It lets you receive emails, texts and alerts right on your watch when paired with a smartphone.
Samsung Gear Fit 2: A 'smart' fitness tracker
The Gear Fit 2 will appear to fitness enthusiasts as it comes with a heartbeat sensor as well as an inbuilt GPS sensor that negates the need to carry your smartphone with you on runs.
Additionally, it also features a fairly robust notification system which allows any notification that comes on your Android smartphone to appear on the device. It is not restricted to calls/messages or certain applications. If an app can send a notification to your smartphone, it will appear on your wrist.
The icing on the cake is that unlike the Fitbit Charge 2, you can also reply to notifications straight from you watch using canned replies and emoji. Voice dictation however, is sadly absent.It coes with a 1.5 inch sAMOED touch sensitive display ith a relatively crisp resolution of 322 ppi, the dual-core Exynos 3250 processor, 512MB of RAM and 4GB of internal storage.
The Fit 2 can track activities like walking, cycling, running and even obscure ones like a rowing. It is water resistant but does not support swimming.
An improvement over the original Gear Fit is the addition of an auto activity feature which automatically tracks your activity without having to manually turn on tracking every time you start a run, jog or a session on the elliptical machine.
At Rs 9,999, the Gear Fit 2 doesn't break the bank either and comes in 3 color options, namely dark grey, blue and pink.
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