Huawei Watch Fit 5 Pro

Huawei's Watch Fit 4 Pro has been my daily smart wearable for pretty much the past year. I've liked its comfortable fit and week-long battery life the most, allowing me to track several metrics without thinking, including sleep. Despite trying out more expensive watches from Huawei, I always came back to the Fit series and never thought about turning to another brand. That's why I was excited to try out the new Watch Fit 5 Pro, this time in a fresh white colour and with some updates to its features. I can already tell you, it's become my new daily device.

One thing I like about all Huawei watches is that they're not designed purely as a small screen on your wrist, or with a heavy focus on apps and tech. For Huawei, smart wearables are also fashion items, and that's why this time again, the design of the Watch Fit 5 Pro is immediately one of its strongest points. Huawei already started moving towards bolder colours and gradients, most notably on the bright orange, white, and blue gradient Watch GT Runner 2. The Watch Fit 5 Pro watches clearly continue in that direction and compared to the more muted colour options of the Watch Fit 4 Pro, the new colours feel more confident and trendy, especially the bright orange version of the Watch Fit 5 Pro.

Like I mentioned, I have been using the white Watch Fit 5 Pro, which in my opinion looks very fresh, without the white becoming sterile. There is a slight beige tone to the white, making it warmer and a little less sensitive to smudges and discoloration. I wear white sneakers often, and the white watch is a perfect match for those, especially with casual summer clothing, where the colour makes it feel less like a functional tech gadget and more like part of a deliberate outfit. Apparently this white version has got a micro-arc oxide surface treatment that boosts hardness and scratch resistance, which is a good thing of course. On the other hand, this was the first Huawei watch that had an explicit sticker on it, stating I should avoid wearing it while bathing and an icon warning against soap.

The colour isn't all that I like. The finishing of the watch helps with giving off a premium feeling and there's been more attention to the rotating crown that allows you to browse the menus, where around the screen there is now an interrupted white line. The latter is a small detail, but it gives the watch more character and together with the 2.5D sapphire edge screen, the Watch Fit 5 Pro feels wonderfully finished and more expensive than a basic fitness tracker. The display itself has slightly smaller bezels than before and remains very crisp to look at and it's also even brighter and remains easy to read in sunlight. The Watch Fit 4 Pro was bright enough, but the added brightness gives the flashlight mode a noticeable boost at night.

Huawei has also added an LTPO screen, a technology you usually hear about in smartphones, which allows the refresh rate to drop very low, even down to 1Hz. You don't really notice this while using the watch, but I suspect it helps with the strong battery life, especially when using the Always On Display. Even with Always On Display turned on, I got close to a week of battery life, but if you turn that off and use the screen less often, you can stretch it even further. This remains one of Huawei's biggest advantages over watches that need charging almost every day as charging is only necessary about once a week - even if you have the Always On Display enabled - and will only take around an hour to get you through the next set of days.

In terms of features, the Watch Fit 5 Pro is more of a refinement than a revolution, where a lot comes over from previous Huawei watches, such as golf and cycling tracking from the Watch Fit 4 Pro. There's also the running and marathon features of the Watch GT Runner 2, which carry over. For any outside workout, there's a colour map to show your location, which is tracked very precisely using the Sunflower positioning system. Uploading offline maps via Bluetooth was surprisingly fast and sleep tracking remains genuinely useful. My sleep has been poor over the past weeks due to being busy, and that was clearly visible in the Huawei Health app. The new nap tracking also worked well when I took a few naps, although I wish those naps were shown more clearly in the general sleep overview.

While the watch tracks your metrics, you'll need the Huawei Health app on your phone to bring it all together. This is where you can find the most comprehensive insights to your sleep, burned calories, running, or biking routes, etc. It's also where you can change watch faces, including with your own photos or videos as a background, or upload MP3 files. Installing is easy, though it goes outside of the Google Play Store or Apple's App Store and I found no limitations using an Android phone. There are a number of premium features inside the app, such as paid watch faces and workout plans, but they're fully optional and are not core to the product's experience.

One thing to keep in mind however is that there are now so many functions that you really need to go through them properly during setup. After a week and a half, I realised I had not even activated continuous heart rate monitoring, simply because I assumed it would already be on. For several health functions, you need to give permission both on the watch and in the Huawei Health app, even when upgrading from a previous Huawei device. That makes sense for privacy and battery life, but the first setup could be clearer, and maybe Huawei could allow you to select all permissions at once, now that the number of required permissions has grown.

There is also a new mini workout feature. Instead of only reminding you to move after sitting still for too long, the watch now suggests a short workout with a little panda. I tried it a few times and it does feel good to move for a moment, but I would call it more of a fun gimmick than a major new feature. It feels a bit like it's thrown in just for the sake of having something new and the panda can also be used as a watch face and becomes fitter or weaker depending on how much you move. Personally, I found the panda watch face too childish for such a good-looking watch, and I much preferred the standard watch face with its stylish, slightly icy look.

Coming to the comfort factor, this is simply excellent. I normally prefer nylon straps on smartwatches, but the white fluoroelastomer strap comes surprisingly close. It's light, flexible, and easy to adjust, and I only had discomfort when I accidentally wore it too tight for a day, which left rather deep marks in my skin and caused me to sweat. When worn a bit looser, the Watch Fit 5 Pro is so light that you barely notice it. It's comfortable enough also to sleep while wearing without any hindrance and I usually only take it off when showering or when charging.

As a smartwatch, Huawei still doesn't offer the same app selection as Apple, but it covers the most important functions for most people. You can make calls, view notifications from messaging apps which arrive promptly, and reply with pre-set responses or type on a tiny keyboard, although typing on any watch remains too fiddly in practice. There is also support for NFC payments in many European countries now, through Curve Pay. I tried getting this to work on the Watch GT Runner 2 before, but I didn't get through the KYC screening, so I haven't been able to try it on the Watch Fit 5 Pro either. There is a navigation app available and the odd, simple game, but otherwise no apps worth mentioning, which can be a disadvantage if you want near phone-like capabilities on your wrist.

In all, I'm again impressed with this Watch Fit Pro series device. It's the same comfort, great battery life, and convincing package of useful features in a smartwatch that I was already got used to on the Watch Fit 4 Pro. Still, I wouldn't say the panda workout or the addition of the Watch GT Runner 2's running metrics are reasons to upgrade. Feature-wise, previous generation Watch Fit devices are still very close, however, the exterior has received a lovely refresh, and I really like the white colour that I've been wearing over the past two weeks. The orange version is probably great-looking in real-life as well, and with a crisp display, great design, standout battery life, and all the basic functions you need, it's another very convincing package from Huawei. I'd recommend it to anyone basically, as it's a perfect bridge between functionality and style. The pricing is also a lot more interesting compared to the more expensive Huawei Watch GT series or Apple or Samsung's alternatives, as at €300 (or less with current discounts) I think it's very good value.