A sleek, lightweight design, a much better display and new features – definitely a welcome addition to the Fitbit family, the Charge 3 is here to stay!
What stands out in the Fitbit Charge 3 is that it is completely waterproof! And if you are fond of swimming as an exercise, this one is for you! Although please note that this is only for pool swimming and not open water swimming or diving. But again, the convenience of being able to shower with the Charge 3 makes a big difference to me!!
Sleek and compact it looks good on the wrist. You can choose a woven band in purple (although I am not a big fan of the woven bands) with a rose gold case, or a perforated white sport band with a graphite case if you opt for the special edition device, while the standard Charge 3 comes with a black classic band and a graphite case or a blue grey classic band with a rose gold case. The strap design is more functional and all it takes is pushing a tiny button to eject and change the strap. Very useful! The screen is almost 40 percent bigger which makes it very easy to see when outdoors, and the device feels much lighter and sleek when worn as it’s made of aluminium, making it very comfortable to wear. But the screen is still monochrome as the one before.
The screen size and overall interface with easy to navigate menus allows you to tap and swipe comfortably with quick responses. I am on android so allows me to give quick replies to respond to messages too! You get a vibration when receiving an incoming call and you can answer and reject calls from your wrist (although you still need to use the phone to actually talk!). Disappointingly, there’s no music control from the Charge 3, which would have been useful, especially for anyone taking their phone along for a run. A swipe up shows you your day’s stats.
There are no pressable buttons on the Charge 3, you must use the touchscreen to do whatever you want to. But to aid to the functionality like going back to a screen or awakening the screen, there is an inductive button to the left of the tracker that can be a bit tricky until you get used to it! You may end up pressing it a few times before you get that vibration to know it is working!
Another noteworthy feature is the SpO2 sensor that could potentially be used to diagnose sleep apnea, a very important factor to consider. Fitbit’s Sleep Stages makes it easy to understand how much time you spend in each sleep stage – Awake, REM, Light, Deep – with straightforward bar charts, averages etc. This made me more aware of how poor quality my sleep was even thought I thought I was sleeping!
There’s also automatic exercise detection for activities like walks, running or the elliptical machine, so you can just set off and not worry about manually starting a new workout. There’s a whole range of other exercises you can otherwise start from your wrist, including weight training and an interval timer useful for HIIT workouts.
My favourite is the guided breathing exercise with a screen at the end of the two or five-minute Breathing sessions to show the effect of this on your heart rate. This goes a long way to make the feature feel more purposeful.
A 7-day battery life ensures that you can literally sail through a week on a charge, even with daily workouts! A big plus for someone like me who travels for a few days and forgets to take the charger and yes, the charger is unique to this one, so you must have it with you!
Again, there is no in-built GPS but it quickly connects to the phone’s GPS, but a built-in GPS would definitely be more convenient while jogging.
Verdict
The Fitbit Charge 3 is a wonderful fitness tracker for regular folk like me who are technically a bit challenged but want to take a careful approach to their fitness, but not needing anything too advanced or complicated and want it to look good on the wrist too!