I’m at Huawei’s launch event in Dubai for the Huawei Watch Fit 3 right now, having tried the smart wearable as my daily smartwatch for the past two weeks. As the name “Watch Fit” suggests, this device is a true smartwatch on the one hand, while having the light weight and features of a fitness tracker on the other. Normally, I’m a person who puts on a smartwatch as a fashion accessory when I go out or go to work, but I usually take it off as soon as I get home. Not to mention wearing it while I sleep. The Huawei Watch Fit 3 is the first wearable watch I’ve worn pretty much all the time, and I’ll tell you why in this review.
For a number of years, Huawei has had a varied selection of smart watches and fitness bracelets. On the one hand we have the exclusive and classically designed Huawei Watch series, while on the other hand we have a range of activity-focused smart bands. The new Watch Fit 3 is somewhere in between, but with a new design that makes it stand out more as a unique product. The design is obviously similar to the Apple Watch series. According to Andreas Zimmer, product manager for Huawei Europe, at a brief product presentation I attended, Huawei aims to offer a well-balanced alternative to both the Apple Watch SE and Fitbit Versa 4. And if you look at the specs alone, it does quite a few things better than both units.
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The Watch Fit 3 has a square 1.82-inch bezel-less AMOLED display with a resolution of 347 PPI and a refresh rate of 60 Hz. Together with a maximum brightness of 1,500 nits, the screen is very sharp and easily visible in all conditions, even in direct sunlight. The controls are via the touch screen, a new rotating crown and a function button. With a thickness of 9.9 mm and a weight of just 26 grams, the device is both smaller, thinner and lighter than both the Apple Watch SE and the Fitbit Versa 4, with which it competes. At the same time, it has the largest screen size, the highest resolution and the highest brightness. Coupled with a battery life of between 7 and 10 days and the possibility of fast charging, this impressive spec sheet made me excited to receive the test sample, and I was not disappointed.
In my opinion, Huawei has made a good choice by changing the design of the new Watch Fit. With a reduced height of 43cm and a larger width of 36cm, the device sits comfortably on my wrist, without feeling bulky like some of the larger smartwatches I’m used to. The smaller size makes the Watch Fit a smaller statement piece, but on the other hand, the Apple Watch form factor has proven to be popular, and from a distance it is difficult to tell the difference between the two wearables. I still appreciate the look of classic watches more, like the Huawei Watch GT that I own, but the comfort of using the Watch Fit 3 has convinced me that a lighter, square smartwatch suits me just as well.
With its 26 grams, the Huawei Watch Fit 3 feels very light on the arm. On several occasions in the last two weeks, I completely forgot I had it on. I think it is also due to the soft but robust material of the strap. I got the gray nylon strap version to test it out and I can highly recommend this version just for the comfort. This includes the fact that it doesn’t pull on the hairs on my arm (which are relatively hairy), which some polymer or metal straps tend to do. The smaller size, the lightweight materials and the soft strap make the Huawei Watch Fit 3 a perfectly balanced device to wear. You simply don’t notice you’re wearing it, illustrated by the fact that at one point I caught myself trying to put on one of my other smartwatches while I was getting dressed, bumping into the Watch Fit 3 which I was already wearing.
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Some may hesitate to look into a Huawei product for fear of incompatibility with Android or iOS. However, I did not notice any bigger problems than if I had tried a new Apple Watch as, for example, an Android user. When setting up the Huawei Watch Fit 3, it’s all quite simple. It requires you to install the Huawei Health App from either the Google Play Store, Apple’s App Store or Huawei’s App Gallery. Once you’ve done that, just follow the pairing instructions and you’re good to go. On the Health App, you can follow your sports activities in detail, read about the results of the sleep monitoring, see the oxygen level in the blood and choose new watch faces.
Wearing the device day and night has made me more aware of my sleep routines, with the help of Huawei’s TruSleep 4.0. I also take the cues to get up and move around a bit after sitting behind my laptop at work for more than an hour. I’ve also started monitoring my stress levels over the last few days to see if I can improve anything in that regard. I have no plans to become a health freak, but for someone who is usually busy with work, family life and gaming in between, the Watch Fit 3 provides some welcome reminders that I also need to take care of my mental and physical health. The only thing I find less accurate is the number of steps counted. They seem to be a bit optimistic, for example counting more steps when I only take one.
There are some smart features I’ve come to appreciate in the Watch Fit 3 as well. I haven’t owned a watch that can take calls before, but I’m totally used to it now. The sound when I take a call is clear and distinct, and people had no problem hearing me speak. I also use the Whatsapp message preview a lot. It is possible to reply to messages by selecting a number of pre-written responses such as “OK”, “Almost done” or by using an emoji. It’s less than the ability to actually type a reply on the Apple Watch, for example, but I can’t say I’d prefer typing on such a small screen anyway. I can always pull out my phone to do that. I haven’t used all the smart features yet, but I plan to when the need arises.
It’s also a bit of fun to play with the Watch Fit 3. There are already a number of watch faces available before launch. I don’t like most of them, but the ones I do like are really nice. The “Time Illusion” dial, for example, changes shape and color when you turn the rotating crown, which, by the way, is one of the few times I’ve used the rotating crown so far. The dial “Style” can be changed to different designs. And you can always add your own image as a background, such as a photograph or your own AI-generated image. Another nice feature is the ability to play music, either on the speaker or by connecting Bluetooth headphones. I imagine it’s also nice when you’re working out, as you can put your phone down and play music you’ve uploaded to the Watch Fit 3.
Battery life needs to be specifically mentioned in any review of this device. It is fantastic and allows for worry-free use. In my experience, the Watch Fit 3 uses an average of about 10% battery over the course of a day. That’s pretty much in line with what Huawei officially promises. The battery lasts for at least a full week before it needs to be recharged. Also, charging is very fast for a smart device. All of this means that features like health monitoring actually become viable, as you can wear it continuously. I also think this is where the Watch Fit 3 has a strong selling point compared to the competition, especially in the Apple Watch camp, which seems to have trouble lasting just one or two days.
So far, I have mostly focused on my experience of the Huawei Watch Fit 3 as a very comfortable smartwatch on a normal (working) day. But it also has many functions for training monitoring. I haven’t gone into these, and that’s because I have to admit that there was simply no sporting activity to monitor over the past two weeks. How you use this device will vary from person to person, with some using it as a daily smartwatch, as I do, while others use it for exercise monitoring, for example to track calorie burn, weight loss or increased fitness. For swimmers, it’s nice to know that the Watch Fit 3 is 5 ATM water resistant, so it can be used when swimming. Regardless of the application, I think people will appreciate the same things I like about it.
The bottom line is that I really like the Huawei Watch Fit 3. I own other smartwatches, including a Fitbit wearable and two versions of the Huawei Watch GT series, but because of the size and weight, I don’t like to wear them all day. Watch Fit 3 has changed this for me. I like wearing it all the time, because I don’t even notice it’s there when I don’t need it, and it has all the smart features I could want when I need a smartwatch, as well as the good battery life, which lasts for at least a full week. It has great specs at a lower price at launch compared to the competition, between €159 and €199, and I’d recommend it to anyone looking for a comfortable smartwatch that offers good value for money.
