- RATING
The Samsung Galaxy Watch8 Classic is an excellent smartwatch that’s not only sleek and stylish but also packed with sensors and features to provide one of the most comprehensive overviews of your health and wellness.
The Samsung Galaxy Watch8 Classic is so much more than just a watch – it is a smart device that can keep track of your health and fitness as well as keep you connected to what’s important to you.
We love that Samsung’s Galaxy Watch8 Classic stuck with the traditional watch design with a circular face that rests on squarer surface that was inspired by its Galaxy Watch Ultra which was released last year.
And what sets the Watch8 Classic apart from the regular Watch8 is the rotating bezel that offers another way of navigating the menu and features on top of the actual touchscreen.
The Galaxy Watch8 Classic is only available in one size – 46mm – which was the perfect size for our wrist.
There are smaller sizes with the regular Galaxy Watch8 – 40mm and 44mm – and apart from the design – the features are identical to that of the Samsung Galaxy Watch8 Classic.
The watch has a fairly low profile so it sits snugly on your wrist – this is important because the sensor has to rest on your skin to be to deliver its insights.
Naturally it does a great job tracking your activity, your sleep and your exercise and even your food and water intake (which you have to enter manually) and body composition.
And this is on top of things like your resting heart rate, blood oxygen level and, for the ladies, even tracking your cycle.
The watch can also offer advice and tips on how to improve your sleep and other aspects of your life.
It also has a way to monitor your mindfulness and stress levels and take you through breathing exercises if you’re feeling stressed.
But the Samsung Health Monitor – one of the watch’s companion apps – can also keep an eye out for sleep apnoea, do an ECG and monitor your blood pressure.
For sleep apnoea, users have to wear the watch to bed for two nights so it can check for disturbances in your breathing and see if you have signs of the condition.
Interestingly, the Apple Watch which also has this feature, requires 10 nights of readings to see of you have signs of sleep apnoea.
You can even do an ECG (electrocardiogram) on the watch – you simply hold your finger on the button on the top right and sit still for 30 seconds and it can complete the test that used to require a trip to the doctor’s office to perform.
It told us we have a normal heart rhythm and we could also take see the test in the Samsung Health app and share this information with a doctor.
If you need to keep track of your heart rate, the Samsung Galaxy Watch8 Classic can help you do that.
But you do need to calibrate the watch with a cuff-based blood pressure monitor. You need three measurements with the monitor while wearing the Samsung Galaxy Watch8 Classic.
This way the watch can establish the parameters of the reading and then reflect those parameters when you use the watch to measure your blood pressure.
Galaxy Watch8 has introduced a new antioxidant index which allows you to measure carotenoid levels in just five seconds to help you make important lifestyle choices to help with healthy ageing.
Users simply hold their thumb on the sensor on the bottom of the Watch8 or Watch8 Classic to find out your antioxidant index.
Samsung says antioxidants can go a long in preventing chronic illness by removing free radicals and reducing oxidative stress.
One of the things it can determine is if you are eating enough fruit and vegetables.
On top of the health and wellness features the Samsung Galaxy Watch8 Classic is also an assistant on your wrist and you ask Gemini your queries through the watch in the same way it would be received on your smartphone.
You can also see your notifications from apps and messages and know when you’re receiving a call.
For us the Samsung Galaxy Watch8 Classic helps us never miss a call – we can see who’s calling on our wrist and decide if we can or want to answer the call.
You have access to the media you’re playing on your phone and can control that playback through the watch too.
There are a great selection of watch faces for the Samsung Galaxy Watch8 Classic so you can choose between faces that offer lots of information at a glance or just the essentials like the time and the date.
The battery onboard the Samsung Galaxy Watch8 Classic easily lasts the whole day.
We use the device as our alarm clock every day and when we go to bed, the watch often has more than 50 per cent battery left.
This is helpful for those using the Samsung Galaxy Watch8 Classic to track their sleep when they are wearing it when others usually are charging it.
The Samsung Galaxy Watch8 Classic is available now in 46mm in either black or white with both models also match with a range of stylish bands. It is priced at $899 (46mm BT) and $999 (46mm LTE).
VERDICT
The Samsung Galaxy Watch8 Classic is an excellent smartwatch that’s not only sleek and stylish but also packed with sensors and features to provide one of the most comprehensive overviews of your health and wellness.
