Withings Activité Review

Introduction

Wearable fitness trackers, for the most part, don’t differentiate too much from each other when it comes to their designs. The majority of them, in fact, favor sporty styles meant to be worn around the wrist – much like the stuff from Fitbit, Jawbone, Misfit, and the bunch from smartphone companies. It makes plenty of sense, seeing that they’re meant to keep users active.

It’s been a while since we’ve seen a new fitness tracker from Withings; almost two years now. However, with their most recent offering in the Withings Activité, it’s out to separate itself in the fitness tracker category with its stylish and discrete looks – one that appears to an ordinary timepiece on the surface. Not everyone fancies the sporty look, so with that in mind, the Activité distinguishes itself from the pack.

Packaging contains:

• Withings Activité
• French leather strap
• Silicone strap
• Battery removal tool
• Spare battery
• Quick start guide

Design

The Swiss made design is premium, showing it’s more watch than a fitness tracker.

Classic timepiece first, fitness tracker second. That’s essentially the premise of the Withings Activité’s design, as it looks like your classical round faced watch. Simple and elegant, it surely doesn’t scream the design we’d think of seeing with a fitness tracker. That’s good and bad, depending on what style you favor. And boy does it feel like a premium thing!

First, let’s talk about the materials that comprise it. The 36.3mm case is made from 316L polished stainless steel alloy, closed together by sapphire glass on the front – giving the entire package that premium look and feel. The included leather strap definitely complements the elegant design, but for those who still have an itch for the sporty style, it can easily be swapped out with the included silicone strap. Adjusting it is pretty effortless, since it’s the same kind of strap you’d find in an ordinary watch. For fitness junkies, they’ll like the silicone one because it’s more resistant to sweat.

On our wrist, its size is proportional to not make it look too overbearing – much like how the Moto 360 seems obnoxiously large on someone with a small wrist. The Swiss designed Activité is also resilient to corrosion, so it’s constructed to withstand submersion under water up to 50 meters. In terms of color options, it’s available in white or black, though, the latter option gives it a more modern look.

Clearly, the folks over at Withings didn’t want to follow the trends with its latest fitness tracker. Can we even call it a fitness tracker, especially when it’s discretely incorporated into a watch design? Maybe it should be classified as a watch first, with the fitness tracking portion being complementary. Either way, it’s not your typical looking tracker – more so when it’s more than a few steps ahead with its premium looks.

Display

Minimalist, it’s great at time telling and that’s all.

There’s no fancy LCD-based display here, nor is it an OLED screen either. Rather, the Withings Activité features a mechanical timepiece display – you know, the same internals in an analog watch. Continuing with its premium nature, the hands and tick marks are aluminum, contrasting nicely against the white background. Naturally, you have the hour and minute hands, but nearby there’s another hand to indicate our goal progress for the day.

As we’ve mentioned, it’s all protected by scratch-proof Sapphire glass; also Swiss made. Sturdy for sure, it’s a pleasant complement once again to the Activité’s overall styling. However, as much as it’s handy for telling the time, there’s no backlighting or illumination – so it’s almost impossible to tell time in pitch black.

The styling of the watch face, by itself, is minimalist and simple. It’s tough to say whether we like it or not, but of course, much like anything visual, it’s a matter of personal preference – to each their own!

Withings app

Data is dissected to offer a comprehensive view of our activity.

Since we’ve last encountered the Withings app, it’s taken on a major redesign. Gone is the menu driven interface from before, replaced by a timeline-esque layout that’s complemented by the bright and bold colors employed by the app. There’s another pane that breaks down the other views of the app, which include the dashboard, friends, profile, reminders, and much more.

Using the Activité specifically, we’re shown information from our sleep and running data, and once they’re clicked, we’re given bar graphs that further go into detail. For example, the steps data are broken down to an hourly basis – while conversions for distance and calories burned are given. With sleeping, it’s nice being told at approximately what time we’re in bed, and what kind of sleep we’re getting.

It’s really good and comparable to what Fitbit offers with its ecosystem, though, we prefer Withings’ app layout.

Connectivity

Connectivity is all handled by its Bluetooth LE radio. There’s no interaction needed through the Activité itself, but the setup process requires the app. Specifically, the initial process includes pressing the pinhole sized button on the back of the unit to activate it, and from there, use the app to pair the Activité with your phone – in our case, an iPhone 6 Plus.

Synchronizing data can be done manually by launching the app, but it’s something done discretely in the background.

Performance

It’s one of the most accurate fitness trackers we’ve come across.

We have little complaints about the Withings Activité’s performance, since the data populated by the app is able to provide us some insights to our daily activities. Steps are monitored accurately, but it’s also smart enough to distinguish running as well. The same thing goes with sleeping, because the sensors used for it are able to differentiate light and deep sleep – as well as knowing when we wake up. And from our experience, it’s pretty spot-on in accurately knowing that timing.

Using the app, there’s an option to set an alarm, which causes the Activité to vibrate when the time comes. A cool, neat feature is double tapping the sapphire glass on the unit – where the hands move to indicate our preset alarm time, and then they go back to the correct time afterwards. Certainly cool, but that’s basically the extent of its features set.

Comparing it to other dedicated fitness trackers, it lacks the diversified tracking that we get from other sporty units. For example, there’s no heart rate sensor to deliver a more accurate calorie burn during workouts – while the watch face is limited to telling the time and our percentage progress. No, there’s no telling of the temperature, date, or notifications – just time telling and that’s all!

Battery

8+ months of battery life means there’s no worry of nightly or weekly charging.

Powered by a single CR2025 battery, it’s nice that the Activité doesn’t require nightly or even weekly charging. Withings boldly claims that the single battery can deliver as much as 8+ months of usages, which is undoubtedly outstanding – so there’s no worrying about replacing it for a long while. Of course, it’s still ticking on well after 2 weeks for our review, which is already more than anything produced by other fitness trackers with rechargeable batteries.

Conclusion

Ultimately, it boils down to whether or not you like the styling of the Withings Activité – by far the most discrete and unconventional looking fitness tracker. It absolutely breaks the mold when it comes to the visual design of a fitness tracker, but it makes us wonder why more watches don’t simply incorporate the hardware needed to make them fitness trackers as well. If you do fancy the design, it’s an elegant and premium looking thing that’s great to wear for formal and business events – whereas sporty styled fitness trackers look out of place.

As for the pricing, not everyone is going to be thrilled paying $450 to pick up the Withings Activité for fitness tracking. Add to that, it lacks the diversified features set that other models offer – like GPS, heart rate monitoring, and much more. The pricing, obviously, is justified due to it being Swiss made, so it shows with its meticulous construction and high-quality materials. Essentially, you’re buying the Activité merely for those qualities.

Alternatively, there’s the Withings Activité Pop, which follows the same watch-style as this one, but swaps the premium materials with Swiss mineral glass, brass hands, PVD-coated metal, and silicone strap. In addition, it’s available in three colors – azure, shark gray, and sand, each one selling for an easier $149.95.