Brands in today’s time are not just stopping at smartphones. Their focus is shifting towards making an entire ecosystem. We have seen this happen by every significant OEM right now in the market.
One of the critical components in that ecosystem is the fitness-oriented products. Now this area covers a plethora of products, ranging from fitness bands to smart scales and hybrid smartwatches. Huawei has been leading the smartwatch game with its first WearOS smartwatch taking the community by storm.
Since then, the products have evolved, and the brands’ attention is shifting towards their own OS. Now we have the Huawei Watch GT 2e with us for review, which builds upon the Huawei Watch GT while keeping the affordability factor still intact. So let’s dive straight in.
Huawei Watch GT 2e Specifications
Before starting with the Huawei Watch GT 2e review, let’s have a look at the phone’s specifications.
Display: 1.39″ OLED, Resolution 454×454
OS: Huawei Lite OS
Memory: 2GB RAM + 4GB storage
Connectivity: Bluetooth 5.0 + BLE; GPS+GLONASS
Battery: 455mAh, 5W custom charger
Box Contents
Here’s a complete list of items you get inside the box:
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- Huawei Watch GT 2e
- 5W charger
- Documentation
Design
Unlike the Huawei GT, the GT 2e comes in only a single version – a 46mm with no smaller sizes in sight as of now. This could be an issue for people with smaller wrists as the watch could look and feel chunky for some. The watch, like the previous version, is made out of a combination of metal and plastic.
The crown and the outer chassis is made with a polished metal while the underside is made of plastic. Instead of using circular buttons, Huwaei opted for a near flushed two-button layout. The top button opens the menu, while the bottom one is programmable. The watch gets a pair of 22mm straps that are replaceable and come with a quick-release mechanism.
The watch is available in three color choices, with the Black one being the best option if you’re looking for something that you could rock in both formal and informal settings.
Performance
The Huawei Watch GT 2e acts more as a companion to your smartphone instead of a replacement product. This is the reason you don’t get to see the watch come with the support for an eSIM and other standalone product features.
The watch is a product more focused on sports, with more than 15 professional modes bundled into it. Over time the product has received significant updates that added nifty features. The watch comes with a heart rate sensor that has been updated to act as a SpO2 meter that calculates the oxygen in the blood and VO2Max that is used to check the lung capacity and endurance.
Apart from these functions, you get the standard kit of features like step count, sleep tracking, and more. Since there is no LTE capability on the watch, all the heavy lifting is done via Bluetooth and the Huawei Health companion app. The app has a very neatly laid out UI that covers all the functions this watch can perform.
To get the watch working, simply install the app from the playstore and follow the pairing process. On some smartphones, the app might not work properly, so in that case, you need to download the Huawei Mobile services package and should solve the issue. The Watch GT 2e is not like the OG Huawei Watch that ran on WearOS; instead, the watch runs on Huawei’s custom Huawei Lite OS. This is where you will lose out on certain options, like making calls right from the watch to replying to notifications, something you get to see on other high-end smartwatches.
To get the watch, we get to see Huawei’s new Kirin A1 SoC that has been designed especially for wearables. For what its worth, the chip does indeed work quite while pushing the watch through and providing up to two weeks on a single charge. Now the advertised two weeks battery life is achieved when you disable some features and with everything turned on, expect somewhere between six to seven days of battery life.
During our tests, we got roughly five days of battery life with everything turned on, and this includes outdoor runs and more. We also found the tracking algorithms pretty accurate in determining the stats.
Verdict- Should you buy it?
The Huawei Watch GT 2e is one of the best fitness-oriented smartwatch currently available in the market. The pairing process is easy. Watch is good-looking, has simple UI, and covers all the essential features.
It is something that will grow over time on you, but the only grip we have is the watch size, which could hold off some people’s buying idea. Perhaps a 42mm version of the watch would’ve helped the brand to penetrate the market even more, and we hope the next iteration comes in many more size options.
