Fitness watches provide important tracking of workouts, heart rates and sleep. Furthermore, they can offer helpful insights about what food you eat.
Some of the most sought-after fitness watches are waterproof and equipped with GPS tracking for outdoor athletes. Others come equipped with chest straps that provide more in-depth metrics such as recovery and training guidance.
It tracks your workouts
Fitness trackers can help keep you on the right track in terms of your workout regimen by providing educated estimates about your performance and habits, providing motivation and incentives to keep exercising (for instance many trackers encourage users to walk 10,000 steps daily as an example); though this figure should serve only as a general guideline; please consult your physician if concerned about how much physical activity is happening for best results.
Most fitness trackers feature sleep tracking capabilities as well as heart rate and blood oxygen measurements. Some can even monitor hydration, stress levels, menstrual cycles and menstruation cycles for you. Finally, many virtual personal trainers exist within some fitness trackers so they can help you meet your fitness goals more effectively.
GPS watches are specifically tailored for activities that rely on GPS functionality, like running, cycling and swimming. Typically boasting over three times longer battery lives than smartwatches as well as extensive ecosystems featuring apps and web portals; Garmin has one of the strongest sport-focused ecosystems followed by Polar, COROS Suunto Wahoo
It tracks your sleep
Sleep is essential to fitness and overall health, which is why fitness trackers use motion sensors to measure your REM cycles and give guidance as to how much uninterrupted rest you’ve gotten each night. They can also show how your sleep patterns might be disrupted by factors like caffeine consumption, stress levels or environmental influences.
At Beddit, they can measure how well you are sleeping by measuring heart rate variability, blood oxygenation levels and other physiological parameters. All these data points come together to produce a “sleep score”, giving an overview of your overall quality of restful slumber.
However, its accuracy can be limited due to relying on movement-based measurement; this type of actigraphy measurement method does not offer an accurate snapshot of how well one sleeps; fitness trackers could potentially record that you’re asleep even though they actually record that you’re lying awake; moreover it may not distinguish between different stages of restful slumber.
It tracks your heart rate
Tracking heart rate is essential for optimizing training and performance. A fitness watch equipped with an EKG sensor can take readings every second or more and offer you an EKG to detect irregular heart rhythms, while simultaneously helping optimize daily workouts by providing a Daily Readiness Score that informs when it is best to rest or exercise. Furthermore, some models even detect your VO2 max, or maximum capacity of your body to deliver oxygen during intense physical exertion.
To measure your heart rate, find your pulse on either the wrist or side of your neck and count how many beats per minute until you arrive at your resting heart rate – this will serve as the baseline to compare different devices’ accuracy. Some wearable devices can even record blood pressure, menstrual cycles and stress levels as well as helping track weight gain or loss.
It tracks your food
Fitness trackers not only monitor exercise metrics, but many also track calorie consumption through various partner apps such as MyFitnessPal and their built-in logging systems on certain models such as Nokia Steel HR. This feature can help those on a weight loss or management program.
However, according to a recent study, most fitness trackers had an error margin of 25% when it comes to estimating calories burned. While this may not be a major issue for someone primarily focused on basic fitness metrics, tracking food consumption may become problematic with such estimates being made inaccurately.
Garmin offers one of the strongest sport-specific ecosystems among fitness watches, followed by Polar, COROS, Suunto and Wahoo. Samsung Watch 6 Classic stands out as an example of an affordable full-featured smartwatch offering rich functionality within an extensive ecosystem.
