In recent years, smartwatches have claimed most of the fitness accessory space and replaced conventional fitness trackers. Brands like Apple, Samsung, and Wear OS have their versions of a smartwatch.
But they are quite expensive and not everyone’s cup of tea.
However, Garmin combines the best of both worlds. The Garmin Vivosmart 4 is a stylish, multifunctional fitness and sleep tracker with sensors and is available at a very affordable price.
It collects and analyzes data relevant to your activity to help you get a better understanding of your health. It has features like Pulse Ox that analyzes how your body absorbs oxygen and a heart rate sensor that tracks heart rate and alerts you if there are any abnormalities.
Pros and Cons
Pros
- Slim and stylish design
- Battery life lasts up to seven days
- Can gauge blood oxygen saturation levels
- Safe for use while swimming
- Offers advanced sleep monitoring with REM sleep
Cons
- It doesn’t have GPS
- Disconnects the Bluetooth abruptly
Unique Features
Wondering what makes the Garmin Vivosmart 4 so special?
Here are some of its unique features:
Design
The Vivosmart 4 is the perfect example of a modern fitness tracker.
It has a stylish design with an aluminum bezel. It comes in a wide range of beautiful colors to choose from (gray color with rose gold hardware, black with midnight hardware, Berry with Light Gold Hardware and azure blue with silver hardware).
The band has a sleek and slim-looking construction and is available in two sizes: large or small/medium.
The Garmin vivosmart 4 features a bright, easy-to-read OLED display that comes with an auto-adjust option to decrease or increase the brightness levels to fit the lighting conditions. The OLED touchscreen is pretty responsive to touch.
The Garmin Vivosmart’s silicone band sits nicely on the skin, feels soft and doesn’t bite or chafe the skin, even if you wear it for an extended period.
The strap isn’t interchangeable as it is built in the screen, which means you can’t customize the color at all after buying the band, so make sure you select the band color wisely.
The Garmin vivosmart tracker has a sturdy, waterproof construction, and the best bit? You can even wear it in water like while swimming, doing the dishes etc.
Battery Life
With the Pulse Ox sleep tracking feature turned off, the Vivosmart can work for up to 7 days without a recharge. Even with all the features turned on, the battery life lasts about 4-5 days.
Plus, the Garmin smartwatch reaches full charge in a little over one hour.
Alerts
The Garmin Vivosmart 4 offers vibration alerts for all your phone notifications, including calls, text messages and more.
The Garmin mobile app allows you to customize this feature and select the alerts you want to receive. This feature is actually pretty useful for when you don’t have your smartphone in your hand, like when you’re running, working out, or swimming.
The device can’t read out the entire message, but it’s enough to help you decide if the message is important.
If you have an Android phone, you can even reply to any critical texts with a preset text. However, this feature isn’t available for iOS.
Sleep monitoring and Stress tracking
Sleep is an important aspect of your health, and this tracker allows you to monitor it.
The Garmin vívosmart 4 tracks the light, deep and REM stages of your sleep. It even tracks your movement throughout the night.
Plus, to get more insight, you can enable the Pulse Ox feature to get a view of your blood oxygen levels while you are sleeping.
The Garmin Vivosmart 4 can also help you monitor your stress level by tracking your HRV, which is the time interval between each heartbeat.
It also has an optional feature called ‘Relax Reminder,' which provides a vibration alert and displays a message on screen if your stress levels are elevated.
Daily Fitness
The Garmin Vivosmart 4 collects heart rate data from your wrist, and with a VO2 max estimate, it gives you an idea of your current fitness level. This is because the VO2 max tends to increase as your aerobic health increases. It can also estimate your fitness age.
In case your heartbeat rises above the threshold you set, the watch will alert you.
It also features a Pulse Ox sensor that estimates the blood oxygen saturation level of your body.
How Does the Garmin Vivosmart 4 work?
The Garmin Vivosmart 4 is an activity and sleep tracker equipped with an accelerometer and a barometer.
It has several prominent features, including a Pulse Ox sensor that estimates your body’s blood oxygen saturation levels, Advanced Sleep Monitoring that gives you a better idea of how you’re sleeping and tracks light, deep and REM stages of sleep.
It also tracks your heart rate and alerts you in case there are any abnormalities. This heartbeat data also helps keep track of your stress levels throughout the day.
If the stress levels are too high, the Garmin Vivosmart reminds you to stay calm in the form of an alert notification or guides you through breathing exercises.
It also provides a personalized step goal every day and keeps track of your progress.
Garmin Vivosmart 4 Vs. Competitors
The Garmin Vivosmart 4 is commonly compared with the Fitbit Charge 2, Fitbit Charge 3 and the Series 6 Apple Watch.
However, the Gamin smartwatch certainly takes the cake as it is not only equipped with a more functional design but it is also more affordable.
The Fitbit charge 2 and 3 don’t have an operational O2 sensor, whereas the Garmin smart tracker does. The latter is more comfortable to sleep with than the Fitbit charge 2.
The Garmin tracker offers a more accurate estimate of the steps you take or the floors you climb than the Fitbit 2 and Fitbit 3.
However, the Garmin Vivosmart 4 lacks the large and colorful display of an Apple Watch. It is also not equipped with a GPS, nor does it have a battery life as long-lasting as that of the Fitbit Charge series.
Issues & Concerns
The Garmin Vivosmart 4 is an excellent fitness tracker; however, it has a few design concerns.
It doesn’t have a GPS
This Garmin Vivosmart is not equipped with a GPS, which is a standard feature in smartwatches these days.
So, if you are going on a run or a walk, you cannot rely on this band to map it accurately. Instead, you will need our phone for that.
Bluetooth connection
The Vivosmart 4 has a poor Bluetooth range. It tends to frequently disconnect from the phone app and needs to be reconnected. This can be problematic for those who rely on its Bluetooth connection to check maps, get notifications, etc.
How To Use the Garmin Vivosmart 4?
You can track your daily activity and analyze your fitness routine better with the help of the Garmin Vivosmart 4.
For Setup:
- Download the Garmin app on your smartphone
- On your device is a charging clip. Pinch the clip and align it with the contacts on the back.
- Next, plug the USB cable into a power source to turn on the device (‘Hello!’ appears on the screen)
- You can pair this device to the app by following the instructions appearing on the screen
To use it:
- To wake up your device, double-tap the touch screen
- You can swipe up or down to see the widgets. The colored button at the bottom of the screen takes you back to the home screen.
- While you scroll through the widget loop, you will see the watch face, steps, floors climbed, intensity minutes, music controls, weather, etc.
- In order to get additional information, you can tap on each widget.
Specifications
- Size: Small/medium: 15 x 10.5 x 197 mm, Large: 15 x 10.5 x 223 mm
- Strap material: Silicone
- Bezel material: Aluminum
- Battery life: up to 7 days
- Water rating: Swim
- Display type: OLED
- Memory/History: 7 timed activities, 14 days of activity tracking data
- Weight: Small/medium: 16.5 g, Large: 17.1 g
- Touch screen: Yes
Where to Buy
You can order your Garmin Vivosmart 4 sleep and fitness tracker from Amazon.com!
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