REVIEW | Huawei Watch Fit 3 gets new look, better sensors

Is that an Apple Watch?

That’s what I thought the first time I saw Huawei’s new Watch Fit 3 when it was shown to me at the company’s headquarters in Shenzhen, China.  I thought to myself, why is Huawei copying Apple, but it’s no copycat at all.

The Huawei Watch FIT 3 was officially launched in Dubai a couple of weeks later.

Not an Apple Watch

Huawei has given the Watch Fit 3 a new look and better sensors. It has presented a very successful revision of the Watch Fit. It is comfortable to wear and very well made. The manufacturer also offers it in different colour variants.

But it’s not just the look that is impressive – the accuracy of the measurements is excellent. This makes the Watch Fit 3 suitable for monitoring body values. Thanks to the various training modes, it’s also impressive during sport activities. Compared to most brands, the watch is fitted with an amazing battery life.

Huawei has redesigned the Watch Fit for the third generation. It now has a more square shape. Huawei says the Watch Fit 3’s design has evolved from rectangular to square and while it is evident, others might still say and think it is a clone. It now looks more like a smartwatch and less like a fitness tracker.

While Huawei claims they did not copy the Apple Watch, the Watch Fit 3 has a striking resemblance to the Cupertino company’s wearable.  

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Features

The Watch Fit 3 features a 1.82″ AMOLED display with a 480 x 408 px resolution and 347 ppi.

Running on HarmonyOS 4, the interface has been redesigned to be bigger and brighter. The black model’s nearly invisible bezels make the watch face stand out, although lighter variants reveal a more prominent black line between the casing and screen.

In line with other Huawei wearables, the Watch Fit 3 has two buttons: a top rotating crown for scrolling and a configurable Down button, which we used for quick access to workouts.

The rotatable crown provides solid haptic feedback when twisted to scroll through the operating system, and animations are smooth.

Battery

The Watch Fit 3 has a 400 mAh battery, charged via two pogo pins and a proprietary USB charger that effortlessly snaps to the back of the watch. But it does take time getting used to as you need to align the pins. Perhaps, a charger like the Huwei Watch GT series would have been better.

Huawei claims the Watch Fit 3 can last 7 days on a single charge with typical usage and 10 days with stress detection and Auto SpO2 turned off.

In my tech review, I got nearly 8 days with active use and up to 11 days with less activity.

Fitness

For fitness enthusiasts, the Watch Fit 3 includes built-in GPS, which performed impressively well, often surpassing the accuracy of semi-professional Garmin smartwatches and flagship smartphones

The watch can track over 100 different sports modes. I have visited Huawei’s health and fitness lab in Dongguan, and have seen first-hand the number of high-tech equipment Huawei uses to track and analyze sports movements to build better algorithms.

With a retail price starting at R2 999, the Watch Fit 3 is not only beautiful, but it also measures body values extremely accurately. It is also inexpensive, but it has a frustrating charger that could do with a better design.

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