In this weekly column, Android Central Wearables Editor Michael Hicks talks about the world of wearables, apps, and fitness tech related to running and health, in his quest to get faster and more fit.
When it came time to reflect on my first full year as Wearables lead for Android Central, I thought about how I've been run ragged (literally) trying to test and review one smartwatch after another, but also how I didn't mind because, by and large, most of the watches I assessed were so darn good.
I reviewed (or will finish reviews for) watches from Apple, COROS, Garmin, Google, OnePlus, Polar, Samsung, Suunto, and Withings, plus my first-ever smart ring. And unlike my freelance days reviewing TVs, smart home tech, earbuds, and other hit-and-miss gadgets that I used and forgot about, there weren't any smartwatch "duds" where I had to find the silver lining amid the mediocrity.
None of my smartwatches were perfect, and several were good rather than great. Sometimes, they underwhelmed me despite being great. But all the brands I'd tested before improved in marked ways, and they all have a level of reliability that you can trust their sleep stats, heart rate zones during runs, GPS tracking, recovery time estimates, and other data that would've been erratic guesswork just a few years ago.
Basically, anyone short of a pro athlete can count on the health, fitness, and sleep data being good enough — and several options are trending toward true consistency. That's easy to take for granted! But for me to run a 20-miler wearing four watches and have all four watches' results be so similar is pretty amazing, showing that the core data can be trusted if you choose the right watch.
And outside of fitness, Wear OS watches are better than ever, while Apple continues to dominate the sales charts, keeping its fans happy by tweaking its familiar design to be thinner and improving its health analysis.
Smartwatches and rings played right into my expectations this year
Of course, it's easy for me to feel happy about the state of Android watches in 2024; these smartwatch brands catered to my needs and made me look prescient with their newest features.
At the end of last year, I argued that traditional smartwatches and fitness watches were trying to morph into each other, with Apple and Samsung focusing more heavily on fitness and brands like Garmin trying to make their platform more accessible to mainstream people.
This year, you had the Pixel Watch 3 lean fully into running coaching, cardio load, and other running perks that sure made me happy, if not my gym-loving colleagues. The same goes for the Galaxy Watch Ultra's dual-band GPS and extra HR LEDs for better running data, or the Apple Watch Series and Ultra watches adding training load. They played right into my expectations and made fitness the centerpiece of their marketing.
I argued that most fitness watch brands would stop using MIP displays and transition to AMOLED at lower price points. And just like that, the Garmin Forerunner 165, COROS PACE Pro, and Polar Vantage M3 all used AMOLED, abandoning MIP tech that was great for outdoor use but annoyingly low-res and dim indoors. It's obvious that these brands see better visual accessibility as the future.
In January, I also argued that Garmin needed to offer indoor workout coaching on par with its Garmin Coach for running and cycling. Wouldn't you know it, my Garmin Fenix 8 added a strength coach with auto-generated multi-month training plans, and the tool has since come to more affordable models like the Forerunners. Now, I have a useful way to get cross-training guidance using at-home weights.
Not every prediction and hope for wearables in 2024 came true; Google ignored my pleas for a "Fitbit renaissance" and effectively canceled Fitbit watches for good. But it certainly was the "year of the smart ring," with total sales literally doubling from 880,000 to 1,769,000, according to numbers IDC shared with Android Central.
We've only just begun to see the uptick of "AI on your wrist," as analysts assured me would happen, but Samsung's Energy Score, Wellness Tips, and auto-suggested replies on Wear OS 5 certainly qualify! And I'm confident that 2025 will be the year Gemini and Apple Intelligence make it onto smartwatches in some form.
Smartwatches have become essential to a lot of people
In 2024, companies sold 154.1 million smartwatches and 36.6 million fitness bands, per data shared by IDC. Canalys shows that fitness bands have bounced back slightly from 17 to 20% market share thanks to popularity in Latin America and EMEA. However, they've massively declined from their 50% share in 2020, falling short of smartwatches and basic watches.
Economically, companies like the bigger profit margins of smartwatches and have largely abandoned fitness trackers to Chinese brands like Xiaomi and Huawei. Generally, people prefer the look of smartwatches more than cheap fitness bands, and the stats show they'll pay for style.
But beyond that, I think the growing smartwatch sales numbers — and higher sales of premium "Ultra" watches — is the result of smartwatches being marketed so effectively as being life-saving. They signal 911 if you fall, notice if your pulse is erratic, tell you how long you need to rest after a run to avoid serious injury, and catch if you have sleep apnea or (for some brands) a fever.
It's not fun when your watch tells you something's wrong. But even if ignorance is bliss, I'd rather know about a problem ahead of time than have it blindside me when the problem gets worse. And I think consumers would rather pay $300 for a watch that's 90% accurate than a $50 band with hit-or-miss stats.
I'm excited to see what new tricks fitness smartwatches pull off in 2025. Some of them will undoubtedly be gimmicky, and not everything will work well. But the core experience is better than ever, and I'm happy that I'm privileged enough to keep testing those features and sharing my thoughts, guesses, and rants about wearables with you.
It's easy for tech categories to fall into ruts, and just a few years back, it felt like most smartwatches were these squircle clones of one another with little innovation. But now, a bunch of different brands are playing to their strengths and giving consumers a wealth of options.
Since my job is often about nitpicking or complaining about smartwatch features, it's nice to reflect once in a while that things are, on the whole, good.
