Apple Watch Series 6 or Fitbit Sense: Choosing the right smartwatch

The Apple Watch Series six and Fitbit sense, top smart watches. Both of them can do everything from tracking your steps to your sleep, keeping an eye on your heart rate your workouts, and of course your general health and well being. So let's work out which one is right for you. The Apple watch starts at $399 in the US with $100 more if you want to choose the LTE version, whereas the Fitbit cents is $330 US. Now straight off the bat the thing that you probably should know first off if you don't know already, Is that Apple Watch Series six only works on an iPhone and iOS, whereas the Fitbit sense works on Android, and iPhone. So in this comparison I'm going to break down everything about these watches from battery life to performance. Design and feel and of course health and fitness tracking. So let's get started. [MUSIC] All right, today smartwatches look fairly similar from the outside. Both of them feature a square Always-On Display with color. So that means that you don't necessarily constantly have to keep raising your wrist to see the time or your workout matrix. Although, you can turn off the Always-On Display to preserve battery life. Now, both of these watches are fairly easy to see in broad daylight which is An issue if you wanna do a lot of outdoor workouts for example, seeing the screen can often be a little bit tricky, but I found both of these to be pretty good. I would say that the Apple Watch just takes it in terms of overall brightness, especially When you are outdoors during a workout and you do have the always-on display active. The Apple Watch comes in two different sizes, a 40 or 44 millimeter version which is pretty much the same as all of the previous Apple watches that have come before it. The Fitbit sense comes in just one square watch face size. Now both of these also have interchangeable straps so you can completely customize the look to your liking. They have quick release buttons, so it's really simple to swap out the straps to either change the look up or change it to something like a silicon strap. For example, if you know you're gonna be doing an active workout, something that involves some sweat or some water and both of them are water resistant. Navigating these watches is pretty simple, especially if you've never used a smartwatch before, they both have touchscreens obviously. And you can also change settings and interact with the Apple Watch with the digital crown and side button. Or on the Fitbit Sense there is a side haptic button that vibrates to give you feedback. It's not a physical button So you might find that it takes a little bit of adjustment to get used to, but it does buzz when you do press it. Although I did find occasionally that sometimes it just activated on its own. So all of a sudden in the middle of a meeting, it said I was doing a 30-minute elliptical workout. I don't know what happened, but it's a little bit more temperamental than the Apple Watch buttons. The Fitbit sense has a variety of different third party watch faces to choose from, as well as the first party Fitbit options that you can change in and out in the app. The Apple Watch does have a few more default watch faces within watch OS7. However, they're not as extensive as the third party options on Fitbit because there just aren't any third party watch faces on the Apple Watch at the moment. That said, you can use what's called complications to add different things onto certain watch faces. So for example, you could put in a quick shortcut to start a workout or even check the weather on the side of the watch face. Now let's dive into the health features on both of these watches because that's probably a big reason why you're looking at buying one at phase two. So first up a big disclaimer. Please, please Please be aware that the only medically cleared sensor on both of these watches Is the FDA cleared electrocardiogram or ECG app. Now the other senses are not medically cleared. And it's very important to tell you that you should not use any of the data from these watches to substitute for proper medical care or medical advice. This is only just Guidance too. So to give you an idea of what might be going on inside your body. With that out of the way, let's dive into what these watches can do. Let's talk blood oxygen saturation or sphc levels because both of these watches do give you an idea of what that might be. So on the Apple Watch, there are a couple of ways the watch gives you an SPF to reading. Spot reading on demand background measurements throughout the day and also while you sleep. Now the Fitbit sense only takes SPR two readings while you sleep and in the morning, about 45 minutes to an hour after you wake up, you'll see a percentage on your screen, as well as a range of which the SPO to fall between as you were sleeping overnight. Now speaking of sleep, both of these watches also track your sleep when you wear them to bed. Now, the sleep tracking is probably the most substantial difference in the health tracking features that they both share. The Fitbit Sense is incredibly entailed in the information that it gives you. It has data on your breathing, heart rate and respiration, your heart rate variability, things like your restlessness. There's so much data in there to dive into and at the end of the night it also gives you a sleep score which rates your sleep out of 100 in terms of the quality. Now, the Apple Watch Series six It's not really giving you much information on your sleep at all. It's mostly concentrating on duration. So when you wake up in the morning, it'll kinda show you how much you slept. You'll also be able to see those SpO2 readings as well and your heart rate throughout the night, but you'll need 30% battery life left on the Apple Watch Series 6. In order to track your sleep, so for sleep tracking, you'll definitely get the most information out of the Fitbit sense, but it will cost you so there is something called Fitbit premium which is Fitbit subscription service that costs $10 a month and this is the only way that you're going to get the most metrics in terms of your sleep. So if you want There's really intricate variables like breathing rate, for example, that's only going to be if you have a Fitbit premium subscription. Fortunately, you do get six months free when you buy a sense but it's just something to keep in mind in terms of an ongoing cost. The Apple Watch is the only one that has sound detection so it monitors the sound around you and lets you know if the volume is getting a little bit too loud that might potentially damage your hearing. And it's also the only one of the two that has full detection and also the ability to call emergency services. If it does detect you taking a tumble, and then remain motionless. The Fitbit, on the other hand, is the only one that has two other senses that might be valuable to you. The first is a skin temperature sensor. Now this doesn't give you a spot rating like 98 degrees Fahrenheit or 36 degrees Celsius. Instead, it gives you an idea if you are above or below your baseline temperature. This might be useful if you're trying to detect something like potential famous rises in temperature or even cycle changes. For women, the other sensor that is the big selling point of the fitbit sense is something called an ETA or electrodermal activity sensor. Now this is interesting because it's actually detecting my new changes. In the sweats when you put your palm over the watch face to take an ETA or stress reading. Now the idea is that we'll give you a stress management score similar to the sleep score out of 100 to let you know how your body is responding to stress. This score takes into account things like your activity level and your sleep level as well as heart rate variability, and the results from that stress sensing. Now, it sounds great on paper, but really this information is kind of confusing because it doesn't tell you what to do with this information. Some days, I got a stress score of 78 and I was going that's It's not very good, because confusingly, it's not. The lower the number, the better the stress score. It's actually the higher number, the better the stress score or the better you're supposedly managing your stress. So with a high score, I was like, great, but I still feel stressed and with a low score, I was like, great. I know I'm stressed. What do I do with this? Now let's talk fitness, heart rates and workout tracking. So both of these smartwatches have the options to track a number of different workouts is around 40 on the Apple watch everything from dancing To yoga to curling. And on the Fitbit Sense, there are around 20 different workouts, kickboxing, pilates, running and all of the usual ones that you would expect. Both of them also have the option to automatically detect workouts, so you still get credit for them even if you forget to start a workout, like an outdoor run, for example. Or a nice gentle walk. These watches also have a built in GPS. So that means you don't necessarily have to take your phone with you if you wanna track your route when you do say an outdoor run or a bike ride. Now I tested both of these watches side by side, and the GPS on my outdoor run was fairly accurate. I couldn't see really any huge variances between the two. So that was pretty pleasing. It takes around 10 seconds or so, for the Fitbit sense to lock on to a GPS as long as you are in an outdoor situation, and the Apple Watch was almost instantaneous. When you're in the middle of a workout. You can also keep an eye on your heart rate on the Apple Watch. That's just your BPM reading Fitbit does the same, although it also gives you a notification when you enter into different heart rate zones. Now this could be useful if you're doing something like training for a high intensity workout. And you really want to make sure that your heart rate stays in, say, a cardio or peak for a set amount of time. The Fitbit will notify you accordingly when you enter into different heart rate zones. So let's talk about heart rate data during a workout. Now both of these watches obviously give you that heart rate information on your screen. But I was noticing after having done several outdoor workouts on both, that the Fitbit sense was definitely lagging behind what the Apple Watch was giving me for at least the first ten minutes of my workout. Now I plotted the heart rate data. On both of these devices and the heart rate strap on this tool, shout out to DC Rainmaker who makes an amazing tool for everyone to use. And lO and behold, it turned out that the Apple watch was definitely more accurate compared to the heart rate strap than the Fitbit sense. Even though at the end of the workout about 10 to 20 minutes into my workout, things did start to even up. The Fitbit center caught up but that's just something to keep in mind if you do a lot of cardio based workouts to see your workout stats at the end of a session, you can look into the apple fitness app, or you can also take a look in the Fitbit app itself. Now I really prefer the way the Fitbit app breaks down the information. It's super visual, really easy to find all the details that you're looking for, such as your slip if you go on a run, for example. As well as an overlay of your heart rate zone on a map, which I really like. And also your heart rate zones in general, which is great. The Apple Watch does give you all the same data, it's just not presented as well. And I definitely prefer the way that the Fitbit does it. Moving on to smartwatch features. Now the biggest thing you probably noticed when using the interfaces of both of these watches is that the Apple Watch Series six feels really fast and really responsive. Whereas the Fitbit OS on the Fitbit sense, Is not quite as responsive. There's a little bit of a lag and especially when it comes to transferring things like new watch faces or even synching other apps to the watch, that can take up to 30 seconds. So the Apple Watch is much faster overall in terms of general performance. Things smart watches both of them can of course receive notifications from your phone. Whether you are on Android and IOS on the Fitbit, or obviously just on the iPhone on the Apple Watch Series six, that you can respond to notifications on the Apple Watch, using everything from emojis. To scribbling on a keyboard or even dictating with your voice on the Apple Watch. Now the Fitbit sense only lets you respond to notifications. If you've paired it with an Android phone, if you're on an iPhone, all you'll be able to do is just see calls and notifications come in, you won't be able to respond to notifications specifically. On Android though, you'll be able to respond with your voice thanks to the built in speaker and mic On the topic of Kohl's the Apple Watch is the only one that has a built in LTE option although it costs at least $100 more than the base model starting at 499 US dollars so this means you'll be able to take calls and say stream music for example, when you are out and about without your phone the Fitbit sense if you want to be able to receive calls, you definitely need to have your phone with you. You can also talk to a smart assistant on both of these watches, Siri on the Apple Watch or Alexa, or the Google Assistant on the Fitbit Sense. Now the Google Assistant hasn't rolled out yet. You'll probably notice there's a lot of things me saying that hasn't rolled out yet on the Fitbit Sense So hopefully by the time you watch this video, certain things might be active. It's okay, the Alexa application on the Fitbit sense, but doesn't really do that much and it's a bit slower. Siri is a little bit better on the Apple Watch. It just lets you do some more things and it's faster. Now the ways that both of these watches store music, Is different. So the big thing you need to know is that you can store your own music on the Apple Watch Series six. You cannot on the fitbit sense, which is a massive downside. I don't know who thought that that was a good idea to remove music storage altogether. But the only way you can listen to music offline or when you don't have a connection on the fitbit sense. Use when you have a visa or a Pandora premium subscription. Now there is a Spotify app on the Fitbit sense, but it only acts as a remote control for say your phone or other Spotify connect devices it does not let you store music offline. [MUSIC] I'll give you the bad news first. If you have the Apple Watch series 6, and you use the Always on Display, you're gonna be pretty much charging it every single day. The [UNKNOWN] sense will be always on display, will last you at least two days. Even longer if you turn off the Always on Display on both of these smart watches Now the Apple Watch Series six will give you around a day and a half of battery life if you turn the always on display off, and if you are trying to do sleep tracking. Now this is pretty much the same, maybe a little bit better than what the series five was giving me but overall, not much of an improvement at all still gonna be charging us all the time. The Fitbit sense gave me around four and a half to almost five days of use between charges including sleep tracking, stress tracking and all of the other things on board. So, that was pretty good even though it didn't quite meet the Fitbit claim of five to six days of battery life with the display off. This is normally the part of the video where I tell you which one that I would choose. This time. There is no right answer for me because they both serve different needs and they probably will for you too. If you want a smartwatch with the tightest integration with the iPhone, and you want the ability to do things like have an eye on your health features with an ECG Some blood oxygen ratings and be able to track your sleep although in a limited way, get the Apple Watch. But if you want something that is cross platform that has really deep sleep insights, as well as the option of having a continuous Sp02 tracking or blood oxygen tracking while you sleep, and stress tracking, although I don't know how useful that really is right now. Get the Fitbit since it doesn't offer you the fully fledged smartwatch experience like the Apple Watch. But it does a lot of different things that the Apple Watch doesn't just yet. Thanks so much for watching. I hope this episode was super helpful for you to break down the differences between the two watches and which one is right for you. As always, let me know which watch wins your votes in the comments below and I will catch you next time.