I love simple product names and in a sea of smart wrist devices like the Gearfit 2 and Apple Watch series 4 and whatever Casio is calling its latest the name, the Samsung Galaxy Watch has the simplicity and the esteem of the Galaxy brand we have not seen on a smartwatch since 2013.

But such a dramatic renaming usually signals a very different product– and different this is not since I have owned its predecessor the Gear s3. So let dive deep in this Samsung Watch review.

Not many people own Smartwatches and frankly, I only own one for fitness purposes. The familiarity with Samsung’s previous gear devices starts right out of the gate. A big round smartwatch with a mostly metal body, changeable wristbands and two side buttons. For over two months now, I have used the Galaxy Watch, and in this review I used the 46mm black version the biggest of them all. The watch is big but not the biggest I have worn and it’s surprisingly lighter than you might expect.

The pixels that make up the watch face are arranged in a circular OLED panel with stunning scrip colors, plenty visible in direct sunlight but not overpowering when it fades to the always on display. This feature is not enabled by default by the way and when we talk about battery life at the end you will understand why.

Specs

Display – 1.3 inches 33mm OLED

Weight – 63g (without the strap)

Battery- 472 mAh

AP – Dual Core 1.15 GHz

OS- Tizen 4.0

Memory – 768 MB RAM and 4GB storage

Durability- 5ATM + IP68 water resistance /MIL – STD-810G

Smooth Bezel

It might seem as an over exaggeration to say that the best thing Samsung has done for Smartwatches was the rotating bezel, and we stand by it. Sure, you have the touch screen and the side buttons, but the moment you start surfing the app list by spinning the ring, the experience of using the watch flips from utilitarian to fun. It’s also a lot faster to use the bezel to do things like setting a timer and scrolling through an email is much easier when your finger isn’t blocking the text.

The bezel also has a satisfying snapping clicky action which reinforces the solid sturdy feel of the whole piece of hardware.

Speaking of clicks. This is the Galaxy watch’s most ridiculous feature and you either gonna love it or hate it. Hop into the settings menu on certain watch faces and you can toggle a ticking sound which is very subtle but its still the most over the top skeuomorphic touch I have ever seen in a wearable in a long time — and I actually love it.

Also an unexpected win– talking on this watch. Through the Bluetooth connection on my Huawei Mate 20 Pro, callers said they could not tell a difference in my voice whether I was on the phone or on the watch. And on a rainy day, one caller said the watch did a better job cancelling the wind noise than the phone did. Well done Samsung!

Other aspects am less a fan of, the notifications — you feel the vibration on your wrist that you’ve got a message, you raise your arm to read it you’ve got to wait for a weird animation to complete before you get to read the message. I know it might seem like I’m nitpicking but if this happens to you tens of times a day, it really adds up and this isn’t  a performance problem, the watch could be faster but this is a break put on it for what I would assume is for aesthetic reasons. Samsung also does this on its phones to an extent and I call this slow by design, and I hate it.

Then you get some little annoyances like Samsung’s refusal to preload the timer and stop watch so you have to go and download them from the app store. This is nuts, it’s a watch loaded with watch things so it’s supposed to be a no brainier to have these loaded by default.

Samsung pay

Well, this doesn’t work in Uganda but whenever i travel I find myself using it. There is no longer SMT support so if you want to use Samsung pay you have to settle for the tap to pay version.

Fitness

Every smartwatch has something annoying it does when it detects you are sitting too long and Samsung is no exception. With recommendations to twist your torso, somethings I’ve have to endure with all the time. Out in the world getting some steps, it is great to have everything from step count, heart rate, to estimated calories burned on one screen.

Then I also do enjoy the little pat on the back the watch gives me when it detects that am through with my gym session.

Samsung health might not be ideal for someone who is really hardcore about tracking fitness but for a casual tracker like me, it’s perfect. And features like GPS for jogs, and 5ATM water resistance for swims means that even intermediate exercisers will find what to like here.

Battery

Alright let’s come down to it, the larger of the two Galaxy watches packs one of the biggest batteries you can find in a smartwatch– and yes it delivers one of the best battery life you can find with 4 to 5 days if you leave the out of box setting alone. That means among other things — the always on display has to stay turned off. Which means you need to raise the watch or tap it if to show the watch face.

For me I tend to think a timepiece should always show the time. So I was pretty let down when turning on this feature means shaving off a full day off my battery life.

I also noticed that the watch charges bit slowly taking 2 hours to go from dead to 100%.

Finally

So, is the Galaxy Watch worth what Samsung is asking? Honestly if you are not a smartwatch fan don’t bother. If you are the type of person who expects a tonne of apps on the wrist probably this may not be the watch for you. The Tizen App store is well behind compared to Google’s wear OS and the Apple Watch, but it’s in the process of getting a big reboot. In the Apple camp, the latest Apple Watch Series 4 comes with some really impressive health sensors. Including a pseudo EKG that makes the Galaxy Watch health pack seem almost quaint by comparison. So definitely shop around before dropping over 1.4 million UXG ($349) on this thing keeping in mind that Google’s partners are probably poised to drop an avalanche of models at all price points soon.