Review of smart watches Xiaomi Mi Watch

Specifications

Screen	1.39 inches, AMOLED, 454 × 454 pixels
Frame	Polyamide
Protection	5 ATM
Connection	Bluetooth 5.0
Sensors	Ambient lighting, heart rate monitor, accelerometer, gyroscope, geomagnetic sensor, barometric pressure sensor
Navigation	GPS / GLONASS
Battery	420 mAh
Working hours	Up to 16 days
The size	45, 9 × 53, 35 × 11, 8 mm
The weight	32 g

Design

The Xiaomi Mi Watch comes in a narrow, long box, just like the Apple Watch. The packaging is pretty solid. Inside there is only a clock, a charger, a warranty card and instructions.

The body of the accessory is made of polyamide (read "plastic"). It has a tactilely pleasant matte surface that can be easily confused with metal. We tested the watch in black, there are also options in dark blue and beige.

The strap in all versions is made of thermoplastic polyurethane with a ribbed texture on the outside. It has a classic metal buckle and two taps, one of which has a small "tooth" inside for a more secure fit. Even with very intense workouts, the watch will definitely not fly off your hand. If desired, the complete strap can be easily replaced with a leather or fabric one.

There are two mechanical buttons on the watch case. The upper one opens the menu, and the lower one allows you to quickly go to the choice of the type of activity. Both buttons are labeled right on the glass of the round screen with a thin white outline. The glass itself has a slightly rounded edge, but there is no pronounced effect of 2, 5D, as on the same Amazfit GTR 2.

The watch is quite large and on a thin wrist it will seem simply huge, especially considering the thickness of 11.8 mm. This is worth considering if you are thinking about buying.

Screen

Xiaomi Mi Watch received a round AMOLED screen with a diagonal of 1.39 inches and a resolution of 454 × 454 pixels. The maximum brightness is 450 cd / m², which allows you not to worry about readability in the sun. The picture is always bright and contrasting. The characters on the screen are large enough not to look closely at the text.

The built-in light sensor is responsible for adjusting the backlight. There is also support for Always On for displaying the time in 24/7 mode and a function to activate the screen when you raise your wrist. The latter works quickly and almost flawlessly. Sometimes even a slight movement of the hand is read as a lift.

The watch can store 5-6 dials, and the rest are available for download and installation via the app. There are about 90 options in total, but many are very similar to each other.

Interface

Functionally, Mi Watch does not differ from inexpensive Amazfit and Huawei models, but the menu and interface on Xiaomi watches are arranged a little differently. When flipping through the main metrics, you cannot swipe down to see more data about the same weather or sleep session.

Details on all indicators of activity or sleep are available only by going to the corresponding mini-application from the main menu, represented by a set of icons.

Swiping up from the bottom of the watch face opens the quick settings screen, which also displays the status of the connection to the smartphone and the battery charge.

Swipe down from the top border of the dial displays a notification curtain (with an incorrectly translated “Empty” button for deleting all notifications).

The dials are changed in the standard way - by pressing. You cannot customize them from the clock, but there are several useful options in the application, about which a little below.

Functions

Immediately, we note that Xiaomi Mi Watch does not support contactless payment, like the Mi Band 4 NFC bracelet. However, there are tons of other possibilities:

calculation of steps, distance traveled and calories burned;
17 main sports modes (including yoga, triathlon and hiking);
sleep monitoring (the phase graph can be viewed directly on the watch);

GPS navigation during active outdoor activities;
measuring the pulse and determining the level of oxygen in the blood;
assessment of stress levels and physical energy expenditure during the day;
weather display;

breathing recovery function;
displaying notifications about new calls and events in applications on a smartphone (with the ability to read letters, messages in instant messengers and SMS);
control of music on a smartphone, including streaming services;

timer, stopwatch and alarm clock, which can be set directly on the clock;
altimeter with the ability to measure atmospheric pressure;
compass, smartphone search function and flashlight (screen glow).

In the watch settings, you can select the type of vibration for notifications, turn on the auto brightness of the screen or adjust it manually, assign a silent mode schedule, change the language and reset. The settings themselves are the last icon of the main menu, although you can also access them from the lower curtain on the dial.

As for determining the level of stress, everything is rather arbitrary here. The algorithms draw strange graphs of emotional stress that are often not true. The same goes for keeping track of the energy you store or expend throughout the day (not to be confused with calories). All such data are presented rather for show.

It is also worth noting that the gadget is able to remind you to get up and warm up. However, this function does not work quite correctly. The watch often misses the moment when you have already got up from the table and are heading somewhere. As a result, on the way, an alert catches up with you that someone has obviously stayed too long.

Application

The watch connects to smartphones via Bluetooth 5.0 via the new Xiaomi Wear app. The program is visually nice. It contains all the metrics and settings. There's even a funny 3D avatar to bring a boring set of numbers and diagrams to life.

All data about physical activity or sleep sessions can be viewed by day, week or month. You can also change the data source for each metric and display steps, for example, from the bracelet, and everything else from the watch. Very comfortably.

In many sections, a small reference is provided, which describes the principles of calculation and the conclusions that can be made based on your indicators.

In the profile settings, you can set your options, choose a watch face, set up notifications from applications and reassign the lower mechanical button. True, you can only choose a specific sport mode for it, but not other functions.

For some watch faces in the application, you can select the data to be displayed, changing, for example, the heart rate by steps or distance, and also customize the background. If you wish, you can put a photo from the smartphone's memory or any picture.

Xiaomi Wear makes a good impression, if not for one thing: slow data syncing. You can go to the application to assess your daily activity, and just see nothing. For some unknown reason, some information from the watch appears in the application only after some time.

We also note the strange work of the weather update function: when the temperature is synchronized, a second Xiaomi Wear icon appears in the smartphone curtain, which can be there for hours. And it cannot be removed in any way, unless you turn off the weather update completely.

Autonomy

The manufacturer claims 14-16 days of normal operation of the device. With constant heart rate measurement and automatic activation of the screen when raising the wrist, after 10 days, the watch has 27% of the charge left. That is, the promised two weeks are quite real, but it will depend on the number of notifications, screen brightness and the frequency of various measurements.

The Xiaomi Mi Watch is powered by the included magnetic dock. A full charge takes only 45 minutes.

Outcomes

Xiaomi Mi Watch is positioned as a sports smartwatch, and for a price of 9 490 rubles they have many advantages. A high-quality screen, a user-friendly interface for tracking activity and sleep, GPS for outdoor activities, an oxygen sensor and decent autonomy. The device is pleasant to use. For 10 days there were no problems with responsiveness and animation of the system.

Not without its drawbacks. The most critical of these is constantly trying to get you to stretch when you are already doing it. The second point is the application, which clearly requires improvement. This is clearly confirmed by his rating on Google Play. There are many complaints about synchronization, so I hope that the manufacturer will fix everything soon.

The Mi Watch is not a competitor for the Amazfit GTR 2 or the fresh Honor MagicWatch models. The Xiaomi model is comparable to the first generations of this watch, which did not support calls or offer users an offline player. Xiaomi is a little behind the trends here, but still maintains the usual balance for the brand between features and accessibility. Taking into account the price, the Mi Watch turned out to be successful in general, and it is quite possible to recommend them for purchase.