The Withings ScanWatch is a hybrid smart watch which has been designed to keep your health in check, whilst also looking rather stylish doing so. I was sent a Withings ScanWatch to review, so here are my thoughts on it. Prices for the Withings watches do vary, but I’ve found a really good price here.
Withings ScanWatch Review
Disclosure: This ScanWatch was gifted, but as always my opinions are my own. This post contains affiliate links.
Look and Feel of the Withings ScanWatch
To kick off this Withings ScanWatch review, I’ll start with the aesthetics of the watch, as this is one of the most important features. I think you have to love something you are going to wear all day, every day. The ScanWatch I have, the Withings ScanWatch Horizon is a beautiful rose gold watch, with a white face and a light grey strap. It’s very much to my taste and looks so pretty on. I’ve had fitness watches for many years and this is by far the nicest to wear and look at. I love the way that the design on the face is the perfect combination between a traditional watch and a smartwatch. The hands tell the time, yet the small screen at the top will give you the information you need. The small dial at the bottom tells you how close you are to achieving your step goal for the day. It’s quite amazing to look at.
I wear my watch most of the day, so for me, comfort is very important. I find this watch really comfortable, even when doing things like working on the computer where my wrist presses into the desk.
Health Features – Withings Watch Review
There are so many great health features to the ScanWatch. The first and foremost is the step counter. Not only can you use the dial on the side to look at how many steps you’ve done, but the small dial on the bottom will also tell you (in percent) how much of your daily goal you have reached. If you continue to scroll through, you can also see how many miles you have walked and how many flights of stairs you have done. I like to see the stairs as I’m constantly running up and down the stairs checking on or trying to resettle sleeping children!
The watch will give you your heart rate, which when you connect to the easy-to-use app, also gives you your heart rate whilst asleep.
There are a couple of other great features which you may not find on other watches. There is a clinically validated oximeter, which allows you to check your blood oxygen levels in 30 seconds. There is also a feature to run an electrocardiogram (ECG) on demand. So alongside recording your heart rate day and night, you can look at what your heart is doing in more depth. These features allow you to be more in control of your own health and be aware if you think there is an issue and seek medical advice. All this in a watch – that’s powerful!
Battery Life – Withings Scanwatch Light Review
The one thing I must press home in this Withings ScanWatch review post is that this watch boasts a 30-day battery which I for one think is a really good selling point. My previous watch had a battery of around 5 – 6 days depending on how much I used the features. My husband’s smartwatch has to be charged every 2 days, which I personally would find really annoying. I’ve worn this watch for almost a year and I can tell you it really doesn’t need charging very often and when it does, it’s done in a couple of hours, so you can easily pop it off at dinner time, charge it and have it back on your wrist by the time you go to bed.
Fitness Features – Withings Smart Watch Review
The ScanWatch can also track your activity. It works with Strava which I am pleased about. Although I’m not running or cycling at the moment (I’ve got a new baby), this will come in handy when I do. It has a feature to detect activity automatically. I will say this is one area the watch has fallen down slightly for me. It keeps detecting that I am cycling, every time I go for a drive in my car. It’s probably because we live off country roads and so the speed I am going is more akin to a speedy cyclist rather than a road car, but even so, it’s a little off in terms of its tracking here. I am looking forward to using it to track runs and cycle routes as there are some good ones around here. It’s also water resistant up to 50 metres.
Added Features of The Withings ScanWatch
When I did the initial setup of my ScanWatch it asked me which of my apps I wanted to send notifications to my phone. This was super easy to set up and I feature that I’m really pleased about. My previous watch used to receive SMS messages but not Whatsapps – which is my main form of communication these days. But if you wanted to, you could also get your notifications from your social media or other apps on your phone. It’s brilliant. The watch has this lovely feature that the hands will move to the 10 past 10 position if they currently fall over the screen, so you can see the message clearly. Someone has thought that through.
There are so many great features to this watch and the accompanying app, I could honestly write a huge blog post. But instead, I’ll point you to the Withings website to have a look at the ScanWatch and perhaps the other products in their range.
One feature that I’ve found I’ve used the most is the sleep tracking. I’ve been using it in a way that I’m sure Withings didn’t imagine people would when they created this watch, but it’s become a really useful feed tracking tool for me and my newborn daughter. As it tracks when I wake during the night and how long I’m awake for, I can use the information the following morning to keep a track of how many times my daughter is waking during the night and how long she feeds for, as she literally feeds and goes back to sleep – it’s the perfect tool for this. As any sleep-deprived Mum will tell you, the nights all seem to blend into one and it’s hard to recall whether you fed 2 or 3 times during the night and to be honest, 10 minutes of feeding can feel like 50 minutes when you are tired. I can also see how much sleep overall I’ve had and the quality of the sleep. I’m actually fairing quite well considering!
The sleep tracker is really good and the days when it reports I’ve had a really bad’s night’s sleep are pretty accurate. It comes up as a red circle on your calendar view on the app if you’ve had a poor nights sleep. When I get a couple of those in a row, I know it’s time to head off to bed early for the next couple of days to catch up on my precious sleep. If I’m rocking a whole row of green circles, I know I am also doing something right as far as sleep is concerned. I normally can tell what quality of sleep I’ve had by how I feel in the morning, but cumulative sleep debt can creep up on you and sometimes you don’t really know why you are grumpy or irritable. The Withings app will tell you this. It’s one of the best features and allows me to stay in control of how many early (or late nights) I’m getting. It’s the one feature that I feel is really key to highlight in this Withings ScanWatch review post.
The ScanWatch is on sale at an amazing price now, which for all the features and the loveliness of the watch is great value for money. The app is included in the price and there’s nothing else to pay. The app even guides you through the initial setup and how to use all the different features and it was a breeze – one of the best app experiences I’ve had.
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