The Samsung Galaxy Watch Active2 drops the physical
rotating bezel in favor of a digital one. The revamped OneUI now uses a virtual
bezel on the Super AMOLED display, a design that maximizes the screen real
estate on your wrist. For comparison, the 44mm version has a larger screen than
the 46mm Galaxy Watch.
The Watch Active2 comes in two sizes – 40mm and 44mm
– and two styles. You can have a casual version with a lightweight aluminum
body and an FKM wrist strap or a premium stainless steel watch body with a
leather strap. In both cases you can swap the strap with any standard 20mm band. You
can even color coordinate the watch face with your clothes - just snap a photo
of your outfit using the new My Style feature of the Galaxy Wearables app.
The watch has an improved optical heart rate reader
with 8 LEDs for faster readings. This new model also gains an electrocardiogram
feature (ECG). As the name suggests, this watch is geared towards exercise, but
also wellness and sleep.
The Galaxy Watch Active2 can track 39 different
types of workouts, some of which have sub-categories. For example, the updated
Running Coach has 7 different modes with real-time tracking (helped by GPS, a
barometer and accelerometer). The watch boasts up to 5ATM water resistance (and IP68), making it
suitable for swimming. It can take a few knocks too (it’s MIL-STD-810G rated)
and features Gorilla Glass DX+ to protect the screen.
The Calm app offers guided meditation programs and
sleep tracking (it’s available in English, Spanish and German). The watch can
also keep track of your stress levels. Both sizes of the Samsung Galaxy
Watch Active2 have a Super AMOLED screen with 360 x 360px resolution. The 40mm
version has a 1.2” display, the 44mm goes for a 1.4” screen. The watch is
powered by the Exynos 9110 chipset with 768MB of RAM and it runs Tizen OS.
There’s an LTE version with 1.5GB of RAM (available
only in stainless steel), which allows you to stay up to date with your social
networking accounts. You can read, reply to and like tweets from the watch
itself and watch videos. There’s also real-time voice and text translation in
over 16 languages.
You can listen to music on the go thank to Samsung’s
partnership with Spotify. You just need to sign into your Samsung account and
start listening. The watch can also be used as a camera remote for your Samsung
Galaxy flagship (S9, Note9 or S10). You’ll find other features from
the Samsung ecosystem, including Samsung Health, Smart Things, Pay and Bixby.
We have some bad news - you'll have to wait until
September 6 to pre-order a Samsung Galaxy Watch Active2 and until the 26th to
receive yours. As for prices, the aluminum version costs $280 for the 40mm size
and US$ 300 for the 44mm version. Note that pre-ordering nets you a free Wireless
Charger Portable Battery. The price for the stainless steel version is still TBA. In the USA,
it will be available at AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, US Cellular and Verizon
starting September 27, 2019.
