With the latest addition to its smartwatch lineup, Samsung is putting the focus on your health. Starting at $399.99, the Watch3 offers significant health-focused upgrades over its predecessors, including an electrocardiogram (ECG) app, trip detection (aka fall detection), new sleep insights, and more. In that regard, it's well stacked against the Apple Watch Series 5. It's also gorgeous, with a thin and light design, a rotating bezel for easy navigation, and a classy leather strap. It offers an excellent texting experience, a terrific Spotify app, and support for Samsung Pay contactless transactions. It's one of the best alternatives to the Apple Watch we've come across, though the latter remains our Editors' Choice for its superior selection of quality third-party apps.
Design, Price, Battery Life
The Galaxy Watch3 follows 2018's Galaxy Watch and 2019's Galaxy Watch Active and Galaxy Watch Active2. There was never a Galaxy Watch2; Samsung skipped right to the Watch3 moniker because it released a second-generation Active last year and this new model builds upon it.
The Watch3 comes in two sizes, 41mm and 45mm, with or without LTE. Price-wise, it starts at $399.99 for the 41mm Bluetooth-only model and $449.99 for the 41mm LTE model. The larger 45mm version costs $429.99 for the Bluetooth-only model and $479.99 for the LTE version.
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The 41mm watch comes in bronze or silver color options, and the 45mm version comes in black or silver. All models come with a leather strap with a traditional watch clasp, but you can swap out the included band for any standard 20mm watch band on the 41mm version or 22mm band on the 45mm model.
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For this review, Samsung sent me the 41mm Bluetooth-only model in bronze. The bronze color has more of a rose gold tone than bronze. While beautiful, it's not as versatile as the silver and black variants, which will match with pretty much anything. That said, the bronze Watch3 is one of the most beautiful smartwatches I've seen, rivaling the gorgeous Garmin Vivoactive 4s. I prefer its design to the Apple Watch, partly because I prefer a round watch face in general.
Since I'm vegan, I wouldn't normally wear a watch with a leather strap, but I must admit it looks classy. I do wish Samsung offered a similar-looking vegan leather strap, or even a textured silicone one instead. Ethical concerns aside, the leather strap isn't practical for sweaty workouts, showering, or my Florida beach lifestyle.
The Watch3 has a classic round watch design with a slim, physical rotating bezel for navigation. The original Galaxy Watch had a rotating bezel, which Samsung got rid of on the Galaxy Watch Active. The Galaxy Watch Active 2 included a digital rotating bezel, but I'm happy to see the signature physical rotating bezel from the original Galaxy Watch return here. You can turn the bezel to access apps, control music, sift through notifications, and toggle between widgets.
Samsung says the Galaxy Watch3 is 14 percent thinner and 15 percent lighter than its predecessor, but it has a larger screen thanks to a slimmer bezel. Without the strap, the 45mm stainless steel version weighs 1.9 ounces, and its titanium counterpart weighs 1.5 ounces. The 41mm version, which only comes in stainless steel, weighs 1.7 ounces. The 41mm model feels light and comfortable on my wrist.
On its official spec sheet, Samsung says the 45mm version of the watch measures 0.43 inches in depth, and the 41mm version is actually a touch thicker at 0.44 inches. According to my measuring tape, however, the 41mm is actually closer to 0.5 inches. The Watch3 is noticeably thicker than the Apple Watch Series 5, which measures 0.42 inches in depth.
Adding to the Watch3's thickness is a large tiered black back panel. I wish Samsung made the back the same color as the rest of the device on all models, because if you look at the bronze version from the side, the black bottom stands out. This obviously won't be an issue with the black model, but it's worth keeping in mind.
Aside from changing the band, you can customize the look of your device with many watch face options. Across the Galaxy Wearable app and Galaxy Store, there are more than 80,000 watch faces available, though you have to pay for many of them.
On the right side, the Watch3 has two physical buttons, in the form of a back button on top and a power/home button below, as well as a tiny hole for the microphone. On the left side, it has an inconspicuous speaker.
The 41mm has a 247mAh battery and the 45mm version has a 340mAh cell. Samsung says both models should get around two days of battery life on a charge, which is disappointing given the original model's five-day battery life. In testing, I couldn't replicate Samsung's two-day battery life estimate, even with light use and the always-on display disabled. Under these circumstances, the watch got close to two days, but died in the middle of the second night. With normal to heavy use and the always-on display enabled, it lasted less than 15 hours. The Apple Watch similarly gets around 18 hours of battery life on a charge. The Watch3 takes around three hours to charge from dead to 100 percent.
The 360-by-360 Super AMOLED display is bright, vibrant, and easy to read. The always-on option is a nice feature many people will want to use (myself included; it's disabled by default, and turning it on was the first thing I did when I set up the watch), but it drains battery life quickly. The good news is that when your battery starts running low, you can easily disable the always-on display via the quick panel, accessible with a swipe down on the watch face.
Specs, Setup, and Navigation
The Watch3 has 5ATM and IP68 ratings, meaning it's water resistant to a depth of 164 feet for 10 minutes, and can also hold up to dust, dirt, and sand. It has also passed military specification testing ensuring it can withstand drops from 4.9 feet, extreme temperatures, shock, vibration, low pressure, and high altitude. I swapped out the leather strap for a water-friendly silicone band, and wore it in the bath, pool, and shower without incident.
On the inside, the Watch3 runs the Linux-based Tizen 5.5 mobile operating system. It's powered by an Exynos 9110 dual-core 1.15 GHz processor, has 1GB of RAM, and 8GB of internal memory. It also has an accelerometer, a gyroscope, a barometer, a heart rate monitor, an ECG, and an ambient light sensor.
In terms of compatibility, the Watch3 works with Android phones running version 5.0 and higher with at least 1.5GB of RAM. It also works with the iPhone 5 and newer Apple phones running at least iOS 9.
After unboxing the Watch3, the first thing you need to do is place it on its charger and let it fully juice up. It comes partially charged, so it only took around 30 minutes to get to 100 percent. When you press the bottom button to turn it on for the first time, you'll see a yellow screen that says "Let's go!" Just swipe up, and the watch instructs you to open the Galaxy Wearable app on your phone to get started.
Samsung sent me the new Galaxy Note 20 Ultra to pair with the Watch3 for this review. Before I could even open the Galaxy Wearable app, I got a notification on the Note 20 Ultra saying it detected the wearable, which is a benefit of using the watch with a Galaxy phone. It then asked for permission to let the watch access my contacts, location, photos, media, files, and make and manage phone calls.
From there, a check mark appeared on the watch asking me if I wanted to connect the devices. I pressed it, and the watch told me to check my phone to complete the setup. I then pressed a check mark on my phone, and they finished pairing. After that, the app asks if you want to let the watch send and view SMS messages and access your contacts, calendar, and phone call logs.
Just like with any sophisticated smartwatch with a lot of features, you have to spend some time exploring the Watch3 to figure out where everything is and what everything does. You can swipe left from the watch face to see your widgets and right to see your notifications. You can turn the bezel clockwise for widgets, or counterclockwise to go back to the watch face and access your notifications.
To go back to the previous screen, just press the physical back key (the one on top). To go back to the watch face, press the home key (the one on the bottom). You can also press the home key twice quickly to access your open apps, or press and hold it to access Samsung's Bixby virtual assistant. After you set it up, you can also access Bixby by saying, "Hi, Bixby," when the screen is on.
Swipe down on the watch face to open the quick panel, where you can access Goodnight mode, Do Not Disturb mode, volume controls, settings, enable or disable the always-on display, adjust the screen brightness, connect Bluetooth headphones, and more. To turn off the screen, you can simply touch it with your palm.
You can also control the watch with a few experimental gestures. When enabled (in the Galaxy Wearable app, navigate to Labs and toggle on the ones you want), you can answer calls by clenching and uncleching your fist, and mute alarms and incoming calls by rotating your wrist.
After getting it set up, one of the first things I did was change the watch face. There's absolutely something for everyone in the watch face library, but I'll call out a few of my favorites. The customizable My Style watch face, also available on the Active2, lets you snap a photo or select one from your library and it will offer a selection of designs based on the colors in your image. You can take a photo of your outfit, for instance, so your watch face can match it. You can also customize the clock type, and add up to four complications that display information like your step count, the weather, the watch's battery life, or give you easy access to your frequently used features like the workout app.
Samsung also has a couple of beautiful Live wallpaper options that animate, and a My Photo+ watch face you can customize with an image you choose. In the Galaxy Store, there's tons of watch faces available for free and to purchase, including some new ones with MLB themes.
Smartwatch Features
One of the best things about a smartwatch is being able to customize it with downloadable apps. In the Galaxy Store, you can find plenty of downloadable apps for the Watch3 like Strava (free), Yelp (free), Breathe ($0.99), Fruit Ninja Plus ($1.00), Galactica ($1.00), G-Maps Pro ($2.99), and many, many more. Still, some popular apps available on the Apple Watch are either missing from the Galaxy Store or don't work on the Watch3, including Citymapper, ESPN, Evernote, Facebook Messenger, Runkeeper, Shazam, and Uber.
As for the built-in apps, one of the handiest things about the Watch3 is that it puts Bixby on your wrist. With Bixby, you can use your voice to set reminders, pull up contacts, check the news and weather, make calls, send and check your text messages, set alarms, calculate tips, and more. Just remember that when you access Bixby via the home button, you need to press and hold the home key while speaking your request. Before I realized you had to keep holding the button down, Bixby kept saying, "Hmm, I didn't get that. Please try again." When you access the virtual assistant by saying, "Hey Bixby," when the screen is on, you don't have to hold down the home button when speaking your command.
The Watch3 offers an excellent texting experience. You can speak to text, write each letter by hand, or rotate the bezel to use the keyboard. The voice input option is definitely the easiest, and worked well in testing. You can also text with emojis and Bitmoji stickers. A smart reply feature analyzes incoming texts and photos, and offers suggested responses.
When you receive a text, it shows your chat history instead of a single message, so you don't have to manually look back if you forgot what you were talking about. It even shows images and emoticons, so you can view them right on the watch. Images look nice on the Watch3, but you'll probably want to grab your phone to see them on a bigger screen.
When you get a call, you have the option to answer it on the watch, decline it, or you can swipe up from the screen to quickly send a suggested text.
In testing, I was able to make and answer calls on the watch via Wi-Fi, but reception wasn't always the best. The calling feature works in a pinch, but I'd never use it for a long conversation. With the LTE model, you can leave your phone at home and make calls from the watch when you're out and about.
Meanwhile, if you have a Galaxy phone, you can take advantage of apps like Find My Phone, Gallery (to view photos from your phone on the watch), and Reminders (to keep tabs on your to-do list). With the SmartThings app, you can use the watch to remotely control smart home devices such as security cameras, thermostats, and lights from wherever you are.
With Samsung Pay, you can complete contactless transactions right from your wrist. Just keep in mind that the mobile payment system isn't available on iPhones.
For music playback, I love the Watch3's Spotify app. You can play your music directly through the watch's speaker or Bluetooth headphones. Samsung didn't send me a pair of matching Galaxy Buds Live to use with the Watch3, but I had no problem streaming music to my AirPods.
You can even stream Spotify over Wi-Fi on the Watch3 when you don't have your phone connected. The watch's speaker doesn't get super loud, but in a quiet room you can easily hear music and it sounds fine. If you're streaming Spotify on a different device, you can use your Watch3 as a remote to control the playback.
The Spotify app on the Watch3 lets you access your entire music collection, including all of your playlists and recently played tracks. You can also browse featured playlists, charts, new releases, genres, and moods, and access the Discover section. When you're streaming music, you'll see the cover art in the background with on-screen controls to play/pause, skip forward, or go back. You can also use the rotating bezel to skip forward or go back.
Health and Safety Features
The Watch3 offers automatic activity tracking for seven exercises, a digital Running Coach, new sleep analysis tools, support for a home exercise feature called Samsung Smart View, and trip detection.
Before the end of September, Samsung plans to release a software update that enables on-demand VO2 max and SpO2 readings. Used to measure cardiovascular fitness, VO2 max refers to the maximum amount of oxygen your body can use during intense exercise. SpO2, a metric that can be used to detect sleep apnea, measures your blood's oxygen saturation level. Since these two features aren't yet available in the US, I'm unable to test them at this time.
The Galaxy Watch3 also features blood pressure and electrocardiogram (ECG) apps, but only the latter has been authorized in the US. Samsung just received FDA clearance for the ECG monitor app, so it's not yet available on my review unit, and there's no word as to when it will arrive. The blood pressure app won't be available in the US unless Samsung receives authorization from the FDA.
With support for Samsung Smart View, the watch can sync with workout videos cast to your Samsung Smart TV from the Samsung Health app. The app offers more than 120 workout videos; just pick the one you want and cast it to your TV, then you can use the Galaxy Watch3 to pause, play, or stop the action. As you work out, you'll see your heart rate on the big screen in real time.
Samsung is taking on the Apple Watch's fall detection safety feature with a similar one it calls trip detection. If the watch's accelerometer detects you took a hard tumble outdoors or in your home during a workout, it will notify an emergency contact and share your location. On the downside, trip detection only recognizes falls when you're "engaged in dynamic motion," not when you're still. You'll also need an LTE or Wi-Fi connection to notify an emergency contact.
To activate this feature, go to the Galaxy Wearable mobile app > SOS. Here, you can add up to four emergency contacts, one of which can be designated as an automatic call contact. You can also enable a feature that will send your emergency contacts an SOS message when you press the home key quickly three times.
The watch monitors your stress level and offers breathing exercises if it senses you need to relax. I really enjoy the inactive time alerts. After about an hour of being in the zone at my desk writing, the watch urged me, "Get moving!" I ignored the suggestion, and an hour later, it encouraged me again.
It also asked if I wanted to try a stretch. I decided it would be a good idea, and it offered three options: torso twist, upward stretch, or squats. I selected torso twist, and it told me to do five reps while showing an animation on the screen demonstrating how to do it. When I started doing the stretch, it automatically counted my reps. After I finished the five, it congratulated me for being active. Another time I did the squats workout, which consisted of three sets of 10 reps with a one-minute break in between each set.
Fitness Tracking
Samsung advises you to wear the watch about a finger's width away from your wrist joint for the most accurate health measurements. You should also make sure it's tight enough so that the back of the device touches your skin and it doesn't move around.
In the workout app, there are tracking options for running, cycling, swimming (pool), Running Coach, other workout, walking, hiking, swimming (outdoor), treadmill, exercise bike, elliptical trainer, circuit training, weight machine, and more workouts. In the more workouts section, there are options for arm curls, arm extensions, back extensions, bench press, burpee test, crunches, dead lifts, front raises, jumping jacks, lat pull-downs, lateral raises, leg curls, leg extensions, leg press, leg raises, lunges, mountain climbers, Pilates, plank, pull-ups, push-ups, rowing machine, shoulder press, sit-ups, squats, step machine, stretching, and yoga.
See How We Test Fitness Trackers
The Watch3 can automatically detect walking, running, cycling, elliptical usage, rowing, swimming, and dynamic workouts. During a walk with my dog, it automatically detected the activity and started tracking it. For activities that it doesn't automatically detect, you can simply raise your wrist and say something like, "Hi Bixby, begin pull-ups."
It has a GPS, so you can track your hikes and jogs without needing your phone. Just keep in mind that using the GPS drains the battery quicker. When you're recording a run or walk, the watch will automatically detect when you stop, pause tracking, and ask you if you're done. After tracking a workout, it shows all sorts of stats right on the watch. The stats you see depend on the type of workout you're tracking, but for walking, it shows your duration, distance, calories burned, a graph of your speed and heart rate, how much time you spent in each heart rate zone, your average pace, average speed, average cadence, average heart rate, steps, the temperature outside, and a map of your route generated by the GPS.
In testing, I found the Watch3's fitness metrics to be accurate. During a one-mile run, I wore the Watch3 on one wrist and the Apple Watch Series 5 on the other. The Watch3 said I burned 143 calories while the Series 5 said I burned 136. The Watch3 said my average heart rate was 157bpm and the Series 5 said it was 162bpm.
During that workout, I tested the Watch3's Running Coach feature, which offers helpful tips as you run. You can hear these tips through connected Bluetooth headphones or the watch's speaker. When I first started out, the Running Coach kept telling me that I was running too fast, and repeatedly told me to slow down. When I slowed down, it said, "Looking good." It later said, "Using your arms helps you run more efficiently." When I was nearing the end of my run, it said, "Focus on your breathing and try to keep it rhythmic." Samsung says the watch will also offer post-run feedback, but that feature isn't available yet.
After a run, the watch currently offers insight about six advanced metrics, including asymmetry (the difference in how much time each foot is in contact with the ground), contact (the time your foot is in contact with the ground and exerting a force greater than what's needed to support your weight), flight time (when your feet are in the air or touching the ground but exerting a force lower than what's needed to support your weight), regularity (the consistency of your movements), stiffness (the vertical stiffness of your body as you run), and vertical oscillation (the up and down movement of your center of mass). The Samsung Health mobile app explains in detail what each of these metrics mean, and will tell you if you need to improve in these areas, or if you did well. With the exception of flight time, I need to improve in all. The app also offers running drills that can help build your skill level.
In the Samsung Health app on the watch and your phone, you can see a log of all of your workouts and stats for each one. On the watch, the Samsung Health app lets you quickly see your progress toward your activity, workout, and hourly movement goals, and you can adjust the goals as needed. It also shows your step count, workout duration, sleep duration, heart rate range, stress level, and blood oxygen measurements. Here, you can also keep track of your food and water intake, compare your weekly step count with friends, and track your menstrual cycle if you have one.
If you accidentally start tracking a workout, as I did when swapping out the watch band for a water-friendly alternative, you can't delete it from your log on the watch. You have to go to the Samsung Health app on your phone.
Also keep in mind that if you use an iPhone, you won't be able to sync your fitness data from the Galaxy Watch3 to Apple Health. Instead, it will live inside an iOS version of the Samsung Health app.
Sleep Tracking
While the Apple Watch is finally getting a sleep tracking feature this year, Samsung first introduced this feature in 2014, and has always offered it on the Galaxy Watch. This year's model generates a sleep score in the Samsung Health mobile app based on your heart rate and motion data. The app also now offers insights from the National Sleep Foundation to help educate you about the importance of sleep.
The tidbits from the National Sleep Foundation are interesting, but I wish they went into more detail. For instance, one says, "Sleep is an important part of a healthy lifestyle. Research suggests that brain toxins are removed twice as fast when asleep compared to when we're awake." It would be nice to know a little be more about this.
At night, the watch automatically tracks your sleeping and calories burned. In the morning, it shows your total sleep duration, and how much time you spent awake, and in REM, light, and deep sleep. It also shows your average bedtime, average wake time, and average time slept. You can view this information on the watch itself, and in the Samsung Health app.
I noticed that if you wake up during the night and get up, the watch will split up your sleep records. The first night I wore it to bed, my dog Bradley, a 50-pound pitbull, moved to lay on top of my legs at 4 a.m. and woke me up. After he woke me up, I went to the bathroom, then went back to sleep. In the morning, I had two sleep records: the first for 5 hours, 5 minutes for the first part of the night, and a second for 3 hours, 6 minutes after Bradley woke me up.
For that night, it gave me a sleep score of 30 out of 100. The average for women in my age range is 70 out of 100. Despite that 4 a.m. disturbance, I actually felt like I got a good night's sleep. The watch said I got a total of more than 7 hours, so a sleep score of 30 seems too low.
Comparisons and Conclusions
If you're a Samsung Galaxy phone user in the market for a smartwatch, the Galaxy Watch3 is absolutely worth considering. The main draw is its expansive selection of health features, including automatic activity tracking for select exercises, a Running Coach, sleep insights, and a home exercise feature that works with your Galaxy phone and Samsung smart TV. The addition of an electrocardiogram (ECG) app and trip detection capabilities make it a compelling upgrade over its predecessors, and a strong competitor against the Apple Watch.
Aside from its ample suite of health features, the Watch3 offers an excellent texting experience, a very good Spotify app, and easy contactless payments with Samsung Pay. It's also a gorgeous accessory you'll enjoy showing off, and it offers tons of watch face customization options.
That said, the Watch3 doesn't offer quite the selection of high-quality third-party apps that you get with Apple Watch. If you're an iPhone user, you'll probably want to stick with Apple's wearable, given that Samsung Pay doesn't work on iOS and Watch3 data doesn't sync with Apple Health.
Overall, though, the Galaxy Watch3 is one of the better Apple Watch alternatives we've seen so far, and definitely worth considering for all Android phone users, not just Samsung fans. That said, we also highly recommend the Fitbit Versa 2. It's not nearly as fancy as the Watch3 or the Apple Watch, but it costs less than $200 and features an always-on AMOLED display, a microphone for Amazon Alexa, Fitbit Pay support, and extensive health tracking features. It even has a solid selection of apps, earning it our Editors' Choice for more affordable smartwatches, especially for Android users.
With an ECG app and trip detection, the Samsung Galaxy Watch3 offers significant health-focused upgrades over its predecessors, and is one of the best alternatives to the Apple Watch.
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