Samsung Galaxy Watch LTE ownership review, tips and tricks

Why did I buy Samsung Galaxy Watch LTE

I am a techie and an amateur runner.  What that means is that after an hour or two's run, I *need* to spend next 15 mins going through the data such as heart rate, speeds, elevation and splits. I do not like to carry my mobile with me during the run as any good new smartphone is 180gm+ in weight and is bulky to carry. Initially, I was using Fitbit Ionic watch which had great fitness related features with built in GPS. But, once in a while, I needed the phone connectivity during the run. Along came Samsung galaxy watch LTE with eSIM. I also saw 2 Indian operators Jio and Airtel announced that they would support it in their networks. I practically ordered it on the same day it was launched in India. I bought 42mm even though the 46mm had almost 40% bigger battery as bulkiness was a concern.  Now after few months of usage, here is my ownership review. Also, I would like to share some tips regarding battery saving and mobile service activation.

I have deliberately stayed away from the aspects like looks, design and other specifications. Already, there are good number of articles and you-tube videos for that.

Samsung Galaxy Watch LTE watch as Smart Watch

The Samsung watch beats the Fitbit ionic hands down as smart watch. It uses an operating system called Tizen which is similar to Android. Samsung has its own app store which has some very useful apps. But, no way close to Android app store. This watch needs an app (Samsung Wear) and two accompanying services (watch plugin and accessories plugin) running on your mobile phone to give notification access on your watch. The interface for notifications is just great. Even though there is no built-in whatsapp, you can read and reply to all incoming messages. At the time of writing, there was no way to initiate a conversation from the watch. Without the LTE services, the phone had to be in bluetooth's range for notifications to reach the watch. But, with LTE, the watch can be anywhere in the world. As long as both - your watch and the phone are connected to the net (samsung cloud) the notification will reach you - they call it remote connection. In technical terms, Samsung has created an equivalent bluetooth proxy by using LTE (or WiFi).  In its current implementation, this remote connection works 70-80% of the time. Perhaps the watch's auto switch logic to use WiFi or mobile gets stuck. Hope this will improve with the future updates. The watch tells you when it looses connectivity by displaying a watch icon at top of the dial - the standalone mode.

The Wear app is very well designed for you to configure and manage the watch. You can select watch faces, set vibration , ring tone, select what all notifications you want to send to the watch, install apps from the store etc..

You can make calls and send SMS too from the watch. When it is near the phone, it will use the phone and work as bluetooth mic/speaker. But, when it is away from the phone it will make calls and send SMS on its own. The speaker and mic are pretty good. I have made calls from a marathon finish line (very noisy - trust me) and it works!

The Samsung voice assistant (Bixby) almost is a joke compare to the Google Assistant. I have kept it off!

Samsung Galaxy Watch LTE watch as Fitness tracker

This watch uses Samsung Health tizen version. It has decent features. But, no way near the dedicated fitness tracker like Fitbit. I have found the heart rate is little bit on the lower side. But, the distance calculation is very accurate. You can run Strava natively on the watch. But, I found it was draining the battery very fast. Even Samsung health drains battery more than it should. Perhaps just enough to last a full marathon. So, if you do not mind big watch on your wrist, 46mm may be a better option.

One single feature that is really missing is synchronization of health data with any web portal. Samsung does not have its own web portal for health and they do not make it easy for data to be exported from the watch/phone to some standard portal like Strava. After much struggle, I have settled for SyncMyTracks app on my android phone to interface with Strava.



Samsung Galaxy Watch LTE Battery saving tips

My Fitbit ionic used to easily last 3-4 days. But, this watch needs charging every day and that too with some optimization -

• Keep Wifi and Mobile service on "Auto". Never use "Always ON"
• Bixby voice detect should be off.
• Do not use watch face with weather interface. It seems every time the screen comes on, it tries to update the weather data. Also, darker watch faces consume less battery.
• Watch screen always on ofcourse is a bad idea.
• Continuous heart-rate monitoring too should not be used. Somehow other fitness trackers consume less battery than samsung. During non-exercise default is every 10 mins. Which in my opinion is just fine.
• You may also switch off gesture wake feature. But, I like the watch to come on when I move the wrist.
• Samsung health tries to auto detect exercises. This consumes battery all the time. If you are like me- who does not mind starting exercise activity manually,  you can safely switch off auto detect and save bunch of battery!

Samsung Galaxy Watch mobile service activation

The watch does not have a physical SIM slot. But, it uses an eSIM which has to be activated using the smartphone samsung wear app's Add Mobile Network feature. I think Apple watch mobile service activation uses QR code scanning from the app, which is perhaps more robust. In India Airtel and Jio have announced support for this watch. This is what I have learned:

• Airtel SIM has to be postpaid.
• For JIO pre/postpaid both OK
• Airtel SIM activation only works from Samsung Galaxy mobiles.
• For JIO SIM activation- of-course it should work on Samsung mobiles. But, the following 2 devices also being confirmed to work
• LG V20
• Oppo F11 Pr

              Please keep your JIO profile email ID and password handy before activation as the process will require it.

• After SIM activation, you can switch to your original mobile. Make sure you take backup as switching mobiles resets the watch. You can restore settings after switching back
• Customer care at Oneplus/Jio/Airtel are clueless. All they know is to ask to reset everything in the damn world. Do not waste your time on them

The best part of Jio service is that it works with your existing service on your mobile phone. The same number gets extended to your phone with no extra charge.

Samsung Galaxy Watch is it worth the money

I will say- yes, it is worth the money. Having mobile voice/data connectivity during the run with form factor of a watch is a boon for us - the long distance runners. I would love to see the Samsung maturing the fitness related features and fix remote connectivity issues. Also, please make the mobile service activation feature available on all smartphones. Else, switch to Apple like QR code scanning for mobile service activation.