New Moto Watch 40 looks to beat Galaxy Fit 3 at its own budget game
Motorola's $65 fitness tracker has all the essentials, but Samsung's leaked tracker has some key upgrades to make it more compelling.
What you need to know
- Moto revealed its new Moto Watch 40 on its website on Thursday.
- The LCD watch has a 10-day battery life, IP67 water resistance, HR and SpO2 data, and it weighs 26g with a strap.
- Motorola promises in-depth sleep tracking and "deep integration" with Google Fit for Android fans.
- It costs $64.99 and should go on sale soon.
After months of leaks surrounding Samsung's new Galaxy Fit 3 band, another budget fitness tracker from Motorola has arrived with a very similar look and spec sheet: the Moto Watch 40.
The Moto Watch 40 store page shows reasonable specs for its $65 price tag, starting with a 1.57-inch LCD display, IP67 dust and water resistance, and 10-day battery life with continuous heart rate data active.
While other fitness trackers do better for battery life, the Moto Watch 40 makes up for it with an insane 25-minute charge time to go from 0% to 100%. Most trackers take two hours to charge, in our experience, whereas you can top the Watch 40 off quickly.
Running Moto OS, the budget fitness tracker doesn't have much in the way of smarts aside from a weather widget, notifications, and nightly sleep-stage summaries. You'll mostly use the Moto Watch 40 for tracking workouts, with basic data like step count, calories burned, and distance via your phone's connected GPS.
While it's narrow enough that it barely skirts the border between watch and band, the Moto Watch 40 will look very familiar to fans of trackers like the Amazfit Band 7 or Xiaomi Band 7 Pro, two sub-$100 AMOLED bands with core health and fitness tools.
That said, it most closely reminds us of the Galaxy Fit 3, recently leaked to have a 1.6-inch AMOLED display, IP68 rating, and three extra days of battery life — even though its 200mAh capacity is smaller than the Moto Watch 40's 240mAh.
Supposedly, the Fit 3 will cost about $99 or more, making the Moto Watch 40 the more affordable option. It also won't have built-in GPS or tap-to-pay, but it allegedly does have over 100 sports modes, SOS and fall detection, and may have a much higher resolution than the Watch 40, according to a recent SamMobile leak.
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Ultimately, the Moto Watch 40 has a competitive price, but there just aren't enough details on the site of what, exactly, it brings to the table in terms of sports tracking and software that competing fitness trackers don't. With Samsung pivoting to fitness AI and brands like Amazfit giving you a fitness score based on your workouts, the Moto Watch 40 has stiff competition.
Michael is Android Central's resident expert on wearables and fitness. Before joining Android Central, he freelanced for years at Techradar, Wareable, Windows Central, and Digital Trends. Channeling his love of running, he established himself as an expert on fitness watches, testing and reviewing models from Garmin, Fitbit, Samsung, Apple, COROS, Polar, Amazfit, Suunto, and more.