Fossil - Gen 6 Smartwatch 44mm Silicone - Black - (2021)

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• Rated 4 out of 5 stars

  Well balanced smart watch

  • Tech Insider Network Member
  • Top 250 Contributor

  I have owned many smart watches (Apple Watch Gen 1, Samsung Gear S & S2, Withings HR) and I am really impressed with the Fossil Gen 6. It is nice looking, light and comfortable to wear with solid performance, useful default apps and good battery life - making it my new go to. I have learned that every smart watch has compromises and the Fossil Gen 6 is very well balanced. Pros - I love the size and traditional/clean design. I have already gotten a few complements. - Light and comfortable to wear all day. - Fitness monitoring. Continuous heart rate monitoring, steps, and activity tracking (data linked to the Cardiogram app and/or Google Fit), and blood oxygen. - GPS for tracking work outs, apps, location-based alerts, and weather. - Quick charging and very good battery life. It last my entire day (5am to 10pm) with about 40% battery life remaining (using both the continuous heart rate monitoring and always on display). - Vibration pattern for notifications is configurable and works well to subtly receive notifications. - Sharp and bright display - 2 hardware shortcut buttons that can be set to quickly launch any app (mine are set to Google Pay and Timer). - Google Pay works great and is very convenient, especially when set up to launch from one of the hardware buttons. It even works without the phone. - Google assistant built in (I love the default inspirational quotes and quick access to bad jokes!). - Magnetic charger connection is easy to use. - Water-resistant (3 ATM) and is safe to use while swimming (per Fossil). Things to Consider - This watch is compatible with iPhone, but there are some minor issues and drawbacks. You cannot reply to messages - I would not normally try to type out a reply anyway so this is minor, but I do miss using quick replies like I could on an Apple watch. You also have to keep the WearOS app open in the background for the watch to stay connected (using a small amount of additional battery life - around 5% in my experience). I did not have any dropped connections, but I did have to restart the watch once in the past five days to get it to reconnect after being disconnected while charging overnight. I have experienced this same reconnect issue on other brands of watches with the same iPhone. Not perfect, but it has been very reliable overall. - Using the watch to take and make calls has been problematic. You can answer and make calls on the watch, but I experienced random disconnects and audio issues when trying to answer calls from the watch (no sound from watch). This is a minor issue for me, because I prefer to use a dedicated headset or the louder phone speaker over the watch. I have owned several watches with this feature and not used it. - This watch does not have the latest software (WearOS 2 vs 3). This is supposed to be supported in the future but could be a limitation for some (mostly related to new apps like Maps and offline Youtube music). The upgrade would not add much value for me as I am happy with the performance of the watch as is and the pre-installed apps, but it is worth a quick web search to look at the differences and app support. - No USB charger is supplied – only a charging cable. I know this is minor, but it is disappointing given the price of the watch. The charging adapter is also not inductive like some other brands - it relies on magnets to position the watch on a set of contacts. While the charger is easy to use and seems robust, the contacts could wear over time. - The default watch face selection could be better, but I found the included, configurable “Digital Dashboard” watch face very useful if only a bit plain. It displays digital time and data with configurable slots for other data and a background image. I prefer the default black background and I have mine set to display UV index (weather), heart rate (cardiogram), and steps (Google Fit).

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  This review is from Fossil - Gen 6 Smartwatch 44mm Silicone - Black - (2021)

  MGoose Posted 4 years ago

• Rated 4 out of 5 stars

  Beautiful watch - limited battery

  • Tech Insider Network Member

  Watch arrived smartly boxed. Opened, charged to 100%. The charger magnetically couples to the back of the watch. Charging time is fairly quick. There are 2 tiny pins that serve as connectors. I would think these could be somewhat fragile and should be treated with care. Next, downloaded Google Wear OS. Took a few "do overs" to get app to pair with watch. Once that was accomplished, started in on customizing settings and watch faces. The 416 X 416, 44MM AMOLED display is awesome - sharp, bright, colorful and excellent contrast. The processor is a Qualcomm® Snapdragon™ Wear 4100. Along with 1Gb ram and, 8GB Storage the watch has a snappy performance and plenty of storage for additional apps. For sensors, it has accelerometer, altimeter, ambient light, compass, gyroscope, heart Rate, SPO2, along with a number of exercise metrics. Keep in mind, this is not a medical device, so readings may be inaccurate. I found it measured a few "steps" while sitting down.... Notifications include apps, text messages, receive and make calls, sync calendar and get reminders, etc. For connectivity, there is blue tooth, wi-fi, NFC. Has built in speaker, mic, and vibrate function. The band is a 22mm quick connect, and easily interchangeable. With all the excellent capabilities of the watch, why the lower rating you may ask.... There are 2 things I feel detract from a 5 star rating. One, Wear OS is a bit dated, and should be upgraded to have a better user interface. And next - and most importantly - I find it disappointing that such an excellent watch has such a mediocre battery life. It looks like this will need to be charged daily. This certainly makes the sleep tracking difficult or impossible due to battery life. I would sum up with this is an excellent watch, if you can work with Wear OS, and deal with daily charging....

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  This review is from Fossil - Gen 6 Smartwatch 44mm Silicone - Black - (2021)

  ebk02 Posted 4 years ago

• Rated 5 out of 5 stars

  A great watch now, could be epic with OS3

  • Tech Insider Network Member

  I was anxious to try the new Fossil Gen 6 because I reviewed the Gen 5E and well, it had its issues. The first watch I was sent was defective and the second one, while working nominally, was nice but it was a little underwhelming. Battery life needed work, it was on slow side performance wise and wasn’t really that comfortable to wear for long periods of time. I ended up going back to my cheap little fitness band for daily wear and only put on my 5E when I was going out and needed something with apps and a little more smarts. It was nice enough, but not something I always wanted on my wrist. The Gen 6 changed my perspective. Firstly, the performance is way more fluid thanks to the new processor. Swiping between screens fells silky smooth, like you’d expect from a much more expensive watch. The additional controls like the two assignable buttons and the twisting crown make it much easier to navigate through lists, prompting me to wonder how I could ever buy another watch that didn’t have one. And the battery life is an order of magnitude better than any smart watch I’ve owned. This is further improved by the fast charging and a new charging base that has additional contacts for a more positive connection. (They still do not provide the charging plug though!) And that’s important because I’ll be wearing this one much more because it’s super comfortable, which surprised me because it’s about the same size and weight as the 5E. But somehow it feels way more comfortable on my wrist; I can even sleep with it on. Sleep tracking is an important feature for me, but my previous smartwatches (including the 5E) got in the way of my sleep. I’d ‘feel’ the watch and constantly adjust the band or have it alert me in the middle of the night. The Gen 6 ‘disappears’ on your wrist and the Do Not Disturb setting works well – better than the 5E or my old Moto 360. I really liked the additional Pulse Oxygen sensor; it’s fast and can be set to run in the background and in concert with the sleep tracker can help you understand why you may be waking in the middle of the night (my Dad used to have sleep apnea, so I keep an eye on my sleep) and with the current pandemic it’s a metric many have become more aware of. I also was impressed with the default watch face. This is one of the first things I usually change on a watch but the one that came as default with the Gen 6 was truly useful with all the data I want either on the face or a single touch away. And though it only has limited customization options, I can’t think of anything I’d want to change on it. This is not to say there isn’t room for improvement. Onboarding the new watch, while MUCH better than the 5E, still had some oddness to it and it took me a bit of searching and adding accounts to get my watch to connect to my Google Fit account and display data correctly. Also, while I like the Do Not Disturb feature, there’s no way to schedule it for a time range – or at least I couldn’t find it in the time I had to submit this review. It may be there, but like a couple of things in the watch, it seems to be buried in the menu system. Also, in this age it should have wireless Qi charging – I mean it’s not even an expensive or space consuming option to add it. In the end though, this is the first smart watch that I can see myself using as a daily driver as opposed to using a fitness tracker most of the time and a watch on ‘special occasions. Fossil has put a LOT of work into improving the Gen 6 and it shows. Best of all, this watch will get the WearOS 3 update in a couple of months and that could promote this watch from great to epic. At the time of shipping, it’s still running WearOS 2 so I’ll have to take that on faith. But the improvements that Fossil has shown in the Gen 6 have restored that faith, and I’d recommend it highly.

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  This review is from Fossil - Gen 6 Smartwatch 44mm Silicone - Black - (2021)

  kaizen61 Posted 4 years ago