Samsung Gear S2 Smartwatch - Classic

My use case was simple. Notify me of text and email (because I keep my phone muted to not interrupt meetings), pedometer and heartrate, lots of cool watch faces, and other cool and smart features (timer, calendar, weather, news, sport game alerts, etc...) This does them all. The ease of telling my child I am pulling in to pick them up, just with a few clicks. Seeing who is calling by glancing at my wrist, and possibly sending an autoreply text. Responding to my wife's text during a very engaging meeting without pulling my phone out. Once again having the one easy to lookup on my wrist and lots of elegant, sporty, and entertaining watch faces to choose from. I load plenty of images on it, and music, so I can stream music to my Bluetooth headset. Works great, but the music seems to really drain the battery. Speaking of battery, I charge it every night (charges very fast... Faster than my phone). I tracked my battery consumption in detail for weeks, to make sure it would not die on me. I have had this for 6 months, and never had my battery die on me yet. Several days were close, because I was playing with it, testing it, running really long days, or using it extensively. It has a battery saving mode when it gets down to around 15%. I would use that, if I was out and really needed to save battery, but I usually just opt to keep it in normal mode. I run my brightness at 3, which is plenty bright. I leave my watch on always on mode, which always displays he time. It takes more battery, but like that feature, so I can glance down for the time without flicking my wrist. I know some watch faces that burn more battery, and others that are good battery savers. I keep tabs on battery life and toggle them as needed. I sometimes use the flaunt app, that leaves the full watchface on, when I have lots of extra battery and want to show off some extra fun watch faces. I don't use the Mic a lot, but is is handy. For example, had my hands full defrosting a freezer, so used hands free Mic to set a timer. Asking quick questions is cool, and getting an answer if the wrist. I was interested in a smart watch since they first came out, but I waited for years. This one had 2 strong features. First, it is not nearly a bulky as the competitors, and I prefer the round face. Second, it is the most intuitive design I have her seen. The spinning bevel edge is delightful to spin through screens or increment up and down. A speaker would be cool, to take a quick call without pulling my phone out, but when I have my Bluetooth headset, that's not an issue. The watch band was ok. I got a metal black band instead and definately prefer that. Big fan of this product. Read more

To be clear, this review is for the Samsung Gear S2 Classic smartwatch... the one with the leather band (and not the one with the synthetic/rubber band). (Unfortunately, at the time of this writing, Amazon lumps the reviews of the Classic and the standard together, although they are distinctly different enough to to generate different review statistics and reactions.) BOTTOM LINE: I think this is a great smartwatch. It does what it is designed to do and does it very well. No major complaints. PROs: + Great software and hardware interface. Utilizing the bezel is genius. + Snappy software. Virtually no lag when switching between screens/apps. + Interfaces very well with my Samsung Galaxy S5. + Great industrial design. It wears/feels and looks like a "traditional" watch. Most people don't realize its a smartwatch at first. (Upon further examination, the glowing watch face gives it away.) It is not bulky; it fits under my dress shirt cuff just fine. + The fit and finish of the watch case and band are excellent. The case finish seems durable, also. (No scratches or scuffs yet.) + Fitness tracker is a nice feature. Quick & accurate heart rate tracking and step counter. Syncs with S Health on the phone. + Notifications work well. Easy to view and either dismiss or not dismiss. + Easy to read and compose SMS messages from the watch. + It stays connected to the phone as long as both devices have an internet connection, are on the same wifi network, or are within bluetooth range. This means that I can leave my phone in the building but not need to carry it around with me if I am expecting a nonverbal communication, as the watch will alert me and allow me to respond without the phone. + Battery life: lasts a full day (6am to midnight) with the screen on all the time. (it dims, but stays on when it doesn't think you're looking at it.) + Battery life: lasts two days if you let the screen turn completely off when not looking at it. + Nice inductive & magnetic charging stand. Charges quickly, also. + S Voice (the speech recognition system) seems to work fine. CONs: - Lack of apps. Full support for Samsung apps, but not much else. This is not a big deal to me because I use the Samsung apps that came with my phone. I do not long for more apps, because the Samsung apps cover the key functions very well. However, I am ultimately curious as to how this platform could develop and would love to see some 3rd-party innovation in the wrist space. Also, by not providing their own apps, other platforms (Google, etc.) are forgoing an opportunity. - I would not mind more choice in case colors/finish. For example, how about the same shape/design, but in plain stainless steel (versus shiny black ceramic)? I realize the version of the Gear S2 with a synthetic band has a plain stainless steel finish, but that version also has a major design flaw with the band attachment method and is therefore not within consideration. Read more

I have always been on the side that smartwatch are kind of pointless, but after being told my blood pressure was high I needed to keep track of my Fitness on some levels Like my walking and my heart rate. I was trying to get a watch to monitor some stuff for me like my walking my exercise my heart rate and such. This watch turned out to be a great Delight, I had no idea you can receive your text on this watch, see a text, read it, and even respond to it all from the watch this is the Wi-Fi version not the LTE version, the same goes for emails as far as I'm concerned this is better than Fitbit's best watch because as far as I know on Fitbit you only get notification you cannot see or respond to texts and emails and such, whereas on the S2 you can however I cannot track my weight lifting on this watch, where Fitbit will keep a track of that kind of an exercise, otherwise this watch can do a lot more. I get my ESPN updates and news on my watch, my UFC updates and news a notification from any app on my phone I want on the watch. For my use with a lot of notification and such like recording my exercises, the battery lasts about almost 2 days which is OK, I have had the watch for about a month now and if anything changes when something breaks or something I like, I will report back here but so far so good very happy only wish Samsung would add the ability to keep track of things like yoga weightlifting and weight training. If you have any questions please feel free to ask. Warm regards Taz Read more