Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

Alright, let’s just go ahead and talk about the elephant in the room. The Yunmai Premium Bluetooth 4.0 Smart Scale & Body Fat Monitor (herein just referred to as Yunmai scale because typing all that is just too much!) is an obvious clone/knockoff of the Fitbit Aria, right down to its near identical looks. Don’t believe me? Go ahead and look it up on Amazon. Go ahead; I’ll wait while you do… …oh you’re back? Awesome! Now with that said, being a clone or a knockoff isn’t necessarily a bad thing. I myself am not a Fitbit user and I doubt I’ll be one in the near future. For me personally, I just can’t justify spending over $100 on a bathroom scale no matter how many features it touts. This is where the Yunmai scale comes in. For half the price, the Yunmai scale seems to bring the same features (if not more) that comes with the Fitbit Aria. To preface the reason for my purchase, I’ve been using the same bathroom scale Weight Watcher Scale by Conair WW89T Weight Tracking and Body Analysis Scale with Color Bar Display for about ten years now. I never really had a problem with the Weight Watchers scale but being ten years old, it is long in the tooth so I believed it was time to upgrade which is what led me to my search. Needless to say the bathroom scale industry has definitely changed from the last time I purchased one, which was in 2006. In upgrading to a new bathroom scale I wanted something that was modern, up to date with the current technology and more importantly wouldn’t break the bank. After doing a pretty exhaustive search, I really feel the Yunmai scale fits the bill. The Yunmai scale came packaged quite nicely. Despite being shipped to me in an Amazon box, I was surprised to find when I opened the Amazon box that the scale was then packed inside of another unmarked box, which in turn contained the box for the actual scale. I can say I appreciate the attention to detail and how the company wanted to make sure their product got shipped to me damaged free. Taking the Yunmai scale out of the box, it is a really nice looking weight scale. I chose the classic black finish to go with the décor in my house of (mostly) black appliances. There’s no assembly that needs to done. It comes with foot pegs/pads for the scale but I’ll touch on that a bit later. The Yunmai scale also came with 4 AAA batteries in order to power the scale (it’s back illuminated so it works in the dark). This for me was a little surprising since my Weight Watchers scale uses one of those coin type lithium batteries that I only had to replace once in 10 years. I’m interested to see how long the battery life lasts in the Yunmai scale with an average use of 2 - 4 times per week. Once you put the batteries in the scale you are pretty much good to go for your basic body weight measurement. In fact, the scale will only show your body weight until you actually set the scale up for proper use. Setting the scale up for a user requires the use of a smartphone with Bluetooth connectivity. I believe the minimum Bluetooth update required is 4.0. I assume just about every smartphone has this Bluetooth update as my Samsung Galaxy S3 is almost 4 years old and had no issues connecting to it. First thing first, download the app for the Yunmai scale from an online app store, either Google or Apple depending on your phone. You need the app installed on your phone before you can set up the scale. There are no buttons or toggles on the Yunmai scale in which to set it up. Everything is done through the mobile app. Once you install the app you get the run through the process of setting it up by providing basic information such as your gender, height and a couple other parameters I do believe. You don’t have to worry about pairing the phone with the scale. That happens automatically, just be sure that you have the app open on your phone and wait for the app to state that it’s connected to the scale. Once that happens, you should step on the scale for your first reading. This will give you your basic information based on the information you entered when you first created your profile. Once you get your first readings recorded to the app, you are then able to set your goal for weight whether it’s to lose weight, maintain your current weight or to gain weight. Measurements are executed using bioelectrical impedance analysis (BIA) and as with these types of weight scales, are not recommended if you have a pacemaker. When you set up the scale and created your profile through the app, the scale will now show your weight and body fat percentage all in one showing, which when compared to the Fitbit Aria scale, I find to be a lot better since the Aria show weight first then body fat percentage second. The rest of the readings on the Yunmai scale are then displayed through the mobile app. There are 8 – 10 other parameters that are displayed through the app, however I won’t run through them here. Compared to my old Weight Watchers scale, the Yunmai scale reported my body weight about 1 – 1.5 pounds lower when I did a side by side comparison. The real big discrepancy came when doing a body fat analysis through both scales. I was surprised to see the Yunmai scale list my body fat percentage almost 10 points higher than what was listed on the Weight Watchers scale during a comparison reading. Funny thing is that I don’t know if my Weight Watchers scale has been wrong all this time or if the Yunmai scale is way off when it comes to body fat measurement. I mean 10 points is a huge difference in body fat percentage. I will monitor this as time goes along and get my body fat measured the old fashioned way the next time I have a physical checkup. As stats begin to build and create a log from your weigh-ins on a regular basis, the Yunmai scale app will give you words of encouragement to help you reach your goals. Keep in mind the app was probably written by a team where English isn’t their primary language so some words may seem off when you’re reading the words of encouragement as you review your stats through the app. Also the app will send a push alert asking you to “try” the Yunmai scale on a daily basis. I’m sure this can be turned off in the app itself but it doesn’t really bother me at the moment. The foot pegs/pads that come with the Yunmai scale are meant to be used if you’re using the scale on carpet. The scale is already elevated a little bit off the ground without the use of the foot pegs/pads. My carpet isn’t that thick but I found as much as a 9 pound discrepancy between weighing myself on the bare floor without the foot peg/pads and weighing myself on carpet with the foot pegs/pads attached. I just took the pegs off and measured myself on the bare floor. It’s the best route to go in my opinion. Overall and after a couple weeks of use, I can say I’m very satisfied with this purchase. The only minor issue I can think of in addition to the potential body fat discrepancy between my old scale and the new Yunmai scale is the lack of a desktop app. The mobile app is nice, no complaints there but I wish there was a companion app that could be connected to a desktop pc or laptop through a Wi-Fi connection as an alternative for those who may not want to go through their phone all the time. On a five star scale, I'd give it a solid 4.9