Citizen - CZ Smart 41mm Unisex Stainless Steel Casual Smartwatch with IP Stainless Steel Bracelet - Black

The Citizen CZ Smartwatch is a stylish and well polished smartwatch in the tradition of the analog watches by Citizen. Good quality build that feels solid. The AMOLED screen is bright with rich colors. My model is black unisex 41mm stainless steel with a stainless steel bracelet. The bracelet can be changed and for my taste, I got the silicone band from Citizen that is also a stylish one. The watch is powered by Wear OS, however the setup is done through the Citizen Connected app built on top of it. The app has good options and is easy but with lots of information that can make it a bit confusing for some people. I wish the User Interface was simpler. The CZ Smartwatch has many features, among them the typical smartwatch features such as fitness tracking, heart rate monitor, watch face customizations, tiles configurations and notifications. It syncs well with my phone for notifications and the ‘do not disturb’ mimics the phone settings perfectly. It’s water resistant even though it’s not recommended for water sports. In addition, it has its own GPS which is a plus when you want to leave your phone behind. I’ve used it on many occasions and it works well. For the Alexa fans, it is built-in and setting it up is quick and easy. In my case, I have customized one of the buttons to call on Alexa. It also has an oximeter that is fairly accurate when compared to a medical oximeter that I own. The battery life is typical for a modern smartwatch. It lasts all day and I charge it at the end of the day. My settings are conservative with the ‘always on display’ feature turned off with adaptive brightness, however I have the heart monitor turned on. My experience with the Citizen CZ has been mostly good. It responds quickly to the touch and makes managing my phone easier. I just wish it had Google Assistant which I mainly use at my house. An issue that I have experienced is the ‘always on display’ feature keeps randomly reactivating itself even though it’s been turned off. The wellness section within the Citizen Connected app has been unreliable at times in reporting some activities. I’m also confused about the CZ Smart YouQ app that I thought would analyze my activities and habits and provide unique advice and ideas; I have yet to see any and, somehow, I thought the app would be available to download on my phone but it seems it’s only available on the watch itself. From exploring on the watch, it looks very limited to me as far as initial setup. Except for a few issues, I think the Citizen CZ Smartwatch is a modern looking and well built watch that offers many good and unique features. It’s not perfect, but it works well and the software is reliable. A bit pricey, but most Wear OS users will find many things to like and enjoy.

The watch comes in a nicely branded box with an image of the product on the front and “CZ Smart” printed on the bottom. When you open the box, you find the watch, its charging cable, and the documentation for it directly under a protective piece of foam. The user manual is multilingual and it directs the user to charge the watch before using it and to download the appropriate app for setup. A power adapter is not included with the cable and watch. This particular watch can be worn by men or women. It’s 41mm in size and looks a little large on smaller wrists, but its fits comfortable. The band is a standard flexible metal band that consumers would find on wrist watches with a similar style. The links can be removed if the band is too loose, but no tool is included with the watch for these adjustments. This was a little bit of a disappointment to me because other bands i’ve gotten like this usually come with a simple adjustment tool. I really do like the look of this watch. It has a classic style and can be worn with casual or formal attire. It’s not super flashy, but definitely makes someone take notice of it. The setup is fairly straightforward - especially if you have setup a watch before. After you download the app specific to your phone brand (iOS or Google) you follow the on-screen instructions. The user has to scan a QR code that appears on the screen of the watch with your phone. This action pairs the two devices together. Then you will be asked to add a pin number. If it’s required, a software update will occur. I had to restart the watch a couple of times after it was completed before the watch was working smoothly. In addition to these set up steps, you will also be asked to create a Citizen account, which is free but does ask for some personal information. The app could have a better experience and the on-watch interface is a little confusing to navigate through. There are lots of bugs in the app and one of the pieces of data that I want to track the most - sleep - takes a long time to update. As far as general functionality goes, I ran into some common issues that others have reports. The watch would freeze and sometimes the settings were saved between the watch and my phone’s app. The battery life is not as good as I was hoping for and there is a lack of customization. I could overlook those two issues, but the connectivity between the watch and the app is really inconsistent. The watch also provides limited data in comparison to other smartwatches and it doesn’t seem to record data accurately. I compared walking and bike riding distances that were recorded by the watch and the phone and they didn’t match. One other big con I have with this watch is that it is not water resistant. In this day and age, I expect any daily-wear watch to have some water resistance, but this one clearly states that it doesn’t have any within the specs. Overall, the watch looks great but could function better. In a world where there are some amazing smartwatches that work flawlessly with their respective devices, this one falls a little flat in terms of being ‘smart.’

I really like this Smartwatch. It is a solid and beautiful looking watch, with Citizen quality that I expected. In fact, when I turned 10 years old I got my first watch, which was a Citizen dive watch, and I still have it today. After passing 60 years of age, I felt it was time to monitor my health better. I noticed that my medical Doctor had a Smartwatch and he mentioned how he uses his to track his daily activity and sleep patterns. So, my primary reason for getting this watch was to help me set activity goals, remind me to work towards them, and show my how I did over time. I received this watch 5 days ago and at first had a difficult time setting it up. For some reason, it failed to pair with my Samsung (Android 13) phone. I retried it several times and twice the watch said it was wiping and restarting. But, for some reason, after the 6th or 7th try, it worked and successfully paired to my phone and continued with the setup. As soon as that completed through, it started downloading a firmware update and restarted again. Strangely, when it restarted, it detected another firmware update, downloaded it, and restarted again. So, when it finally finished and was up to date, the battery was low and I had to recharge it again. I even made sure it was fully charged before I even tried to power it on in the beginning. Since then I haven't experienced anything unusual about it pairing with my phone or connecting to my WiFi. Except, when you turn your watch off, the watch turns off it's Bluetooth, so when you turn it back on, it doesn't automatically reconnect to your phone's Bluetooth. (It may also do the same if you turn your phone off, but I didn't check that.) Other than that, overall I think the watch looks beautiful and has all the features and more, that I was looking for in a Smartwatch. It has the typical functions like; heart rate, steps, calories burned, etc. This is available in the watch and in the App Citizen Connected. But, the unique features of this watch is in the App CZ Smart YouQ. This App has the biggest benefits of this watch, if you want to use this as a health and fitness monitor. However, the CZ Smart YouQ App requires you to install and login to the Google Fit App too. The CZ Smart YouQ App tracks considerably more information. The Citizen information states it "helps wearers maximize their daily potential by learning the wearer’s unique Chronotype and daily rhythms and computes HR, SP02, fitness activity and sleep". This is the help that I am looking for, but I've only used this watch for 4 days. I still have a lot to learn about the CZ Smart YouQ App and what these terms mean before it will give me some meaningful figures. But, for now, I really love this watch. It looks great and is very comfortable to wear. I can easily get the basic health scores that I am looking for. As far as that is concerned, I can highly recommend this. I gave it a 4-star rating solely because of the quarks setting it up and the vagueness in the instructions about setting up the CZ Smart YouQ App.