Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

9/18/21: Reducing review to 1 star. Watch began bootlooping last week and I wasn't able to revive it. I opened the watch this morning to find it full of water. Ive only used the watch as directed, and it doesn't seem to be up to the task. I love the watch functionally, but ultimately if it can't meet its own product description, it is useless. After researching the bootloop issue, it seems that water ingress is a common concern amongst owners. Skip to the "REVIEW" heading if you don't care about the factors at play that influenced my purchase. Update #3: Just about 7 months in of daily use by a very active user. I probably use watch GPS for 10 hours a week on average, and the watch has spent probably a hundred hours in the pool. My battery is at 22% with 4 days and 10 hours on the battery. My opinion of the watch has only improved. Despite daily use in rough environments (cramped car engine bays, chlorinated pools, etc) the watch still looks brand new. There isn't a scratch on the face, and battery life is still as good or better than new. I was concerned the lack of bezel would allow the face to be scratched more, but this watch is TOUGH. I know I've impacted it on tools, concrete, and other....cringe inducing materials and it doesn't show any wear. I've taken to swimming in our 12yd pool in the backyard since everything else is closed, and even with these super short laps, the lap counter function is still dead on. It helps keep me from going crazy counting out the 142 laps that equal a mile. I'm not sure what else I can share. This is definitely one of my all-time favorite gadgets. Update #2: Starting to regularly see battery life of 4+ days. Last two recharges went onto the charger with ~18% battery left after approximately 4d18h usage each. Given the fact that I use the watch for GPS related items almost every day I'm nervous to push it an extra day, but based on the way the battery life continues to increase slowly I'm sure I'll be there soon. I cannot express enough how pleased I am with this watch. Update: After about 3 weeks with the watch, I regularly get 4 full days to a charge with standard use. If I use the GPS for more than a few hours over that time I might find myself needing to charge after 3 days just to be safe. After 90 minutes with the GPS on (not tethered to phone) this weekend I had used 11% of my battery. Battery life is FANTASTIC. Easily double the best battery life I saw with my Gear S2. BACKSTORY: I've been using a Samsung Gear S2 Sport for a little over 3 years now. It's served me well, but even after a battery replacement I'm struggling to get more than 24 hours out of a charge, and little more than 90 minutes of GPS time. As an endurance athlete this won't cut it for me. SHOPPING: When I first got the Gear S2 the smartwatch was more of a fun toy, not something I 'needed'. I've enjoyed the conveniences its brought me so much that it is now a requirement and I found myself looking to replace it with an upgrade. My minimum requirements for a smartwatch narrowed options quite a bit. Probably my favorite feature is being able to answer calls (when connected via bluetooth to my phone) through the watch itself. As someone who is always keeping busy, its great to be able to answer a phone call hands free while working under my car, on a ladder, or on a bike ride. Having a built in microphone and speaker was a must. A battery with enough capacity for a 4+ hour run or bike ride was also an absolute must for fitness tracking. Water resistance was also important, but I already take my Gear S2 off when I swim, so it wasn't a requirement. I was willing to look at other brands/ecosystems, but I have thoroughly enjoyed my experience with Samsung Health, so I looked to Samsung watches first. Luckily they offered a watch that met pretty much all of my needs. REVIEW: As I write this review, I'm still on my first charge (55% left after 37 hours) so you may consider this a little premature. I'm writing this review because of the incredibly positive experience I've already had. I purchased the 44mm Aluminum version because the 40mm version was sold out and I wanted to take advantage of the Cyber Monday deal. I had seen in reviews that people regretted getting the 44mm because it was too large, and I do have smaller wrists. Coming from the 42mm Gear S2 I wasn't too nervous, but the idea of a smaller watch intrigued me as it would be less likely to get in the way. Size: See pictures for how the 44mm watch looks on a tall guy with skinny wrists. I think the pictures make it look a little larger than it actually is and feels. It's about 1mm thinner than my Gear S2, and despite supposedly being about 2mm larger in diameter, when the two are compared side by side they appear to be the same size. The band is definitely suited for people with larger wrists, when I have it on the second smallest size, its just a tiny bit loose, and the smallest size is right about snug. This band would likely not work for men of smaller stature or most women. I would assume the 40mm version has a smaller band, but I cannot confirm. I am very pleased with the size and weight. At right around 30g, its half the weight of the stainless Gear S2 I came from. I was concerned about durability upon discovering its an aluminum watch, but after wearing it the build quality feels excellent. Battery Life: The 44mm version has a battery that's approximately 30% larger than the 40mm, which was important to me in the interest of fitness tracking. I normally remove my watch every night to charge, but with my normal use it looks like I'll be able to get away with charging it every 3 to 4 nights. I'm at 55% now after 37 hours, and that includes an hour of auto detected workout, a run, and a swim. I do keep wi-fi off, I don't use the wake up gesture (watch face turn on when lifting wrist), and I keep default brightness low (but auto). Fitness tracking: Part of what prompted me to write a positive review so quickly was my morning run/swim today. The improvements over my Gear S2 are tremendous as you can now customize the data displayed for each individual workout type. Want to see heart rate, speed, and elapsed time? Ok. Want 3 different metrics? Also OK. Totally customizable with big text that is easy to read. This watch is supposedly waterproof to 5 atmospheres and has a swim tracker, so I had to try it out. I swam 56 lenghts in the pool this morning, and without any setup or configuration the watch also counted 56. I was astonished. There is an option to set your pool lenght so it can accurately measure total distance also. The data provided is also variable: time per length, strokes per length, time per 100yd, etc. It isn't 100% accurate, but 90% of the time the information appears to be spot on. I'm a casual swimmer who is always trying to get faster, so I'm really looking forward to using this on my intense workouts. Syncing Samsung Health with Strava couldn't be easier, and was completely seamless when switching from my Gear S2 to the Active 2. Other notes: The Gear S2 had a physical rotating bezel that sat proud of the watch face. The Galaxy Watch Active 2 has no physical bezel, just a touch bezel surrounding the display. I was (and still am) nervous to lose the protection provided by the physical bezel, and I also enjoyed being able to go right to the bezel to wake and control the watch. Thankfully, the touch bezel is just as intuitive as the physical one, with excellent haptic and visual feedback resulting in a level of control that feels completely natural, even after 3+ years of muscle memory built up from a physical bezel. I wear my watch 24/7, and totally use it as a fashion device when attending formal gatherings. I'll generally turn the watch face to always on and chose a neat face when I'm dressed up. The Galaxy Wear app will now allow you to take a picture of your attire, and provide you with a selection of faces that match your theme. This is REALLY cool and it works exactly as you would expect it to. The beautiful design of the watch only makes me want to show it off more. They've really improved the design from the earlier generations and it feels and looks less like a tech gadget, and more like a traditional watch. Really my ONLY gripe for this (and all Samsung watches) is the lack of 3rd party support. It is much better now than when I first got my Gear, but the Galaxy App store really feels like it is about 15 years old. Since apps aren't too big of a deal for me, I don't mind much but it did take getting used to (and eventually just ignoring) the app store and its limited options. I did find Strava, MapMyRun, Smartthings, Alexa, and other apps, but I haven't really found a need for them. Update: After about 3 weeks with the watch, I regularly get 4 full days to a charge with standard use. If I use the GPS for more than a few hours over that time I might find myself needing to charge after 3 days just to be safe. After 90 minutes with the GPS on (not tethered to phone) this weekend I had used 11% of my battery. Battery life is FANTASTIC. Easily double the best battery life I saw with my Gear S2. Update #2: Starting to regularly see battery life of 4+ days. Last two recharges went onto the charger with ~18% battery left after approximately 4d18h usage each. Given the fact that I use the watch for GPS related items almost every day I'm nervous to push it an extra day, but based on the way the battery life continues to increase slowly I'm sure I'll be there soon. I cannot express enough how pleased I am with this watch. Update #3: Just about 7 months in of daily use by a very active user. I probably use watch GPS for 10 hours a week on average, and the watch has spent probably a hundred hours in the pool. My battery is at 22% with 4 days and 10 hours on the battery. My opinion of the watch has only improved. Despite daily use in rough environments (cramped car engine bays, chlorinated pools, etc) the watch still looks brand new. There isn't a scratch on the face, and battery life is still as good or better than new. I was concerned the lack of bezel would allow the face to be scratched more, but this watch is TOUGH. I know I've impacted it on tools, concrete, and other....cringe inducing materials and it doesn't show any wear. I've taken to swimming in our 12yd pool in the backyard since everything else is closed, and even with these super short laps, the lap counter function is still dead on. It helps keep me from going crazy counting out the 142 laps that equal a mile. I'm not sure what else I can share. This is definitely one of my all-time favorite gadgets.