The Galaxy Watch Ultra 2 is easily the best smartwatch Samsung has ever produced and will appeal to everyone from endurance athletes and outdoor enthusiasts to casual everyday users who wants to effortlessly keep an eye on their health and wellness.
- RATING
The new Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra 2 is an absolute powerhouse that now has a brighter screen, a thinner design and a longer battery life.
Samsung has addressed the most common smartwatch pain points in one swoop.
The Ultra is the larger and more rugged model in the Samsung smartwatch portfolio and is aimed at the user who wants to stay fit, know when to push the envelope and stay healthy.
The Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra 2 can do all these things and do them very well.
Tech Guide spent a week with the new Ultra 2.
It tracked our steps, how much water we needed to drink, and provided suggestions on ways to stay fit and advice on how to improve our health.
Under the hood, Samsung swapped in Qualcomm’s Snapdragon Elite platform so app launches feel snappy, navigating is silky smooth and overall responsiveness has a noticeable improvement.
Priced at $1,299 the Ultra 2 is meant to compete against other fitness watches in this class, including products from Garmin, Suunto and the Apple Watch Ultra.
DESIGN
The watch is designed to deliver a top-tier experience and thanks to its rugged design it can handle anything you throw at it.
The first thing you’ll notice is the slimmer titanium chassis (12 per cent thinner in fact than the previous model) which fits comfortably on your wrist so it can be worn all day and, if you want to monitor your sleep, all night.
It also comes with a soft silicone band, which adds to its 24/7 wearability.
DISPLAY
One of the standout features is the stunning display, which hits an amazing 5,000 nits of peak brightness. Samsung says won’t find a smartwatch with a brighter screen.
The Ultra 2 can be utilised in the best way when you are outside, when you are training or walking, playing sport or swimming.
And all of that is usually when you’re in bright sunlight.
With the Ultra 2 you can see clearer than ever the information on your wrist, whether it’s a trail map, an elevation graph or your step count.
We wore this when we were in London for the Galaxy Unpacked event and the city was enjoying a particularly sunny period while we were there which made the ideal scenario to confirm just how bright and clear the screen is even in the brightest sunlight.
We were able to read the display with ease whether we were checking our progress or reading our latest notification.
One thing we would have improved is the screen lock.
Whenever you put on the Galaxy Watch Ultra 2, it still displayed the watch face but it was hard to see the tiny padlock symbol which indicated the watch was still locked.
It would have been better if all you could see when the device was locked was the keypad to enter your code.
Some days we walked around for hours not realising the device was locked and why we didn’t see any notifications in that period.
BATTERY
Another big tick for the Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra 2 is the onboard 800mAh battery.
Now we don’t profess to be long-distance runners or trail runners who utilise every feature of the device.
For us the battery ran over three days and needed charging on the third day.
Now if you’re running every day or hitting the gym or putting the device through its paces then this may shorten to two and a half days.
But for the most part we can safely say that battery performance is a noticeable improvement over the previous model.
And while the Ultra 2 can’t match some other brands whose battery performance is counted in weeks, it’s still quite impressive.
Usually we would charge our smart watch every night but with the Samsung we found ourselves charging it every third night.
This is helpful if you want to track your sleep – instead of charging it on the nightstand, you can wear it.
And when it came time to charge, we found differing speeds that claimed to be fast charging.
It averaged out to between an hour and a half and two hours to reach 100 per cent battery life again.
FITNESS
The attraction of the Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra 2 is that it’s just a dashboard displaying your numbers but it can be your coach as well.
And whether you’re a serious trail runner or someone who just likes to walk every day, the Ultra 2 provides equal coverage, helpful features, and guidance.
Serious runners and trail runners can see real-time metrics and track elevation changes.
There’s also a daily cardio load, which looks at all the exercise you’ve been doing and tell you whether you need to pull back or go for it and push yourself even harder.
The companion Samsung Health app has also been redesigned to give you an excellent look at all your vital stats and information.
This is where you can track your exercise access features like Running Coach so you can receive personalised plans and performance insights whether you’re a seasoned runner or someone who’s just starting out on their running journey.
Our running days are well behind us, thanks to our bad knees, but we did move the needle to count our steps.
The app is also where you will find the Fitness Index, which looks across your daily activity, body composition and exercise and puts you up against other users, anonymously, of the same age and sex before providing you with an overall score.
The app needs a few days of activities and exercises to generate a score but right from the outset you can get an overall picture of where you’re at with your fitness.
There is even a real-time hydration guidance calculates how much fluid you need to replace based on sweat loss relative to your overall body weight.
Naturally if you’re a swimmer, you can enjoy your dip and track your swim with the Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra 2.
And in great news for divers the watch is rated at 10ATM and IP69K with EN13319 certification.
As soon as you hit the water, the watch automatically kicks into dive mode and tracks depth, time and water temperature.
HEALTH
The Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra is not just about staying fit but also keeping an eye on your health.
It does the usual monitoring for heart rate, resting heart rate, and other stats.
It can even track your sleep if you are inclined to wear it to bed but we understand if you want to check if you’re a snorer or have signs of sleep apnoea.
You’ll need to set up your Galaxy smartphone beside the bed so it can record – as in sound record – these interruptions.
Users can track their heart health and even receive a score based on the data collected over seven days including sleep time, activity and vascular load.
Vitals can create a personal health baseline through five metrics that the Ultra 2 can measure while you sleep. These include your heart rate, heart rate changes, respiratory rate, skin temperature and how much oxygen is in your blood.
Samsung says vitals is a wellness score only and not a diagnosis or treatment of any kind of medical condition.
VERDICT
The Galaxy Watch Ultra 2 is easily the best smartwatch Samsung has ever produced and will appeal to everyone from endurance athletes and outdoor enthusiasts to casual everyday users who wants to effortlessly keep an eye on their health and wellness.
