Apple Watch Series 6 Review

By
Susan Giles
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Apple Watch Series 6

Ever since the release of the Apple Watch Series 3, Apple’s smartwatch has been considered the best smartwatch out there. It’s available now in Series 6, which most people claim is no different to the Series 5. The updates in the new Series are very mild and unnecessary for most people.

These updates include a 2.5 times brighter screen while on always-on ambient mode and a new blood oxygen saturation sensor on the back of the watch. The new Series is also a little faster than the previous one and comes in two sizes, 40 and 44mm. It is available in a few materials and colors, like the new red and blue, and you can get it in the most affordable material, aluminum, which starts at $399.

Hardware and Performance

Without identifying the slightly different sensor at the bottom of the watch, which looks different because of the new blood oxygen sensor, there’s no way you can tell if it’s a Series 6 or a Series 5 Apple watch. Well, except of course for the two new colors that tell the new Series apart. The updates start with a watch that charges faster than its predecessor.

Compared to each other, the Series 5 takes 2 and a half hours to fully charge while the Series 6 takes only 2 hours to go from 0% to 100%. The new Series comes with a new processor, but you will hardly be able to tell the difference. And both the Series 5 and Series 6 have the same battery life and speed, which leaves us wondering, because you can still use your smartwatch for about a day and a half without charging it.

The Series 6 lasts more than 36 hours between charges, including two manual ECG recordings and two manual blood oxygen recordings, not to mention the notifications. This is still a spectacular performance for a smartwatch.

But, other than these little updates, it’s still not very compelling for most people to upgrade to a Series 6 if they already have a Series 4 or Series 5. Especially with the other available new option, the Apple Watch SE. The SE supports all of these uses that come with an Apple smartwatch except for one feature, the always-on mode.

Watch Specifications

The new Apple Watch comes with a case size of either 40 or 44mm, and a thickness of 10.4mm. Its weight depends on the material you choose for your new watch. The starting weight is 30.5g and the heaviest one is 47.1g.

The watch is available with an S6 processor, 1GB RAM, 32 GB storage, and WatchOS 7 as the operating system. The sensors found in the Series 6 are gyro, HR sensor, ECG, light, blood oxygen, speaker, microphone, GPS/GNSS, NFC, altimeter, and compass. The watch can connect through Wi-Fi n, Bluetooth 5, Ultra-wideband, NFC, and 4G if you use an eSIM and a compatible plan.

WatchOS 7

WatchOS 7 is the new operating system that comes with the Apple Watch Series 6 and is available for Series 5, 4, and 3 along with the Apple Watch SE. The system offers many third-party apps, including trail maps, Google maps, bike ride tracking, and many weather apps.

WatchOS 7 comes with seven new watch faces in addition to sharing configurations of the built-in watch faces with other users, that is now available. It also comes with a full on-device voice dictation that allows you to quickly convert speech into text without any internet connection. This also works when talking to Siri and when replying to texts.

Other great features available in the watch include handling notifications, replying to texts and calls, and the smooth navigation between the watch and the iPhone. Setting a timer with Siri is a breeze, but you can’t set multiple timers which is annoying for some people who use their smartwatches while cooking.

Connecting the watch to the internet requires either connecting to the iPhone's Bluetooth, connecting to WiFi, or having an eSIM in the phone and connecting to 4G.

https://revyou.com/uploads/thumbnail-960/1609005221565606037.webp Apple Watch Series 6 Review

The majority of features and functions on the Apple Watch like health and fitness tracking work offline without internet connectivity. This means you can go for a run without taking your phone and the watch will still be able to track you and give you stats.

If you are wondering how you are going to listen to music on a run while wearing only your Apple Watch, don’t worry. All you have to do is download music from Apple Music onto the watch’s 32GB storage and listen offline.

WatchOS 7 also gives you a great feature called Family Setup. This feature lets you set up a cellular Apple Watch for one of your kids or maybe a parent, to let you use it as a managed device. It does need some time to configure this before giving your child an Apple Watch which comes with all these features and complexities.

Health Monitoring

The Apple Watch comes with a heart rate and electrocardiogram (ECG) sensor. In the Series 6, they added a blood oxygen sensor known as the SpO2, which is located at the bottom of the watch from the back. To use the SpO2 sensor, you need to activate it manually and keep your wrist still for 15 seconds on a table.

The best part about the blood oxygen sensor is that you can use it with other sensors on your watch while sleeping to detect breathing disturbances. In such a case, the sensor will record the readings without combining them with sleep data.

The Apple Watch also comes with a sleep tracker that tracks how long you sleep and allows you to set an alarm. The updated software now provides a very useful hand washing feature that detects when you are washing your hands with its on-device AI, based on your hands' motion and the sound of water.

This feature comes very handily if you need someone to remind you to wash your hands when you get home. This along with all the other health and fitness tracking features makes the Apple Watch incomparable to other smartwatches on the market.

Pricing

For the latest release (Series 6), the watch comes in two sizes and many different materials and models. The aluminum ones or the Nike versions in the 40mm size start at $449, and $485 for the 44mm size.

For the other Series 6 models that come with 4G, you will find the stainless-steel model at the price of $768 for the 40mm, and $827 for the 44mm size. The titanium model starts at $887, and the Hermes starts at $1325.

Verdict

It goes without saying that the Apple Watch is the best smartwatch for an iPhone on the market. It works smoothly with the iPhone and is very responsive and comfortable to wear, even while sleeping. For fitness and health tracking, the watch provides many functional features that are accurate and easy to understand.

The only disappointment comes from its sleep tracking features which are a little too restrictive and basic compared to other smartwatches. Other than that, the Series 5 and 4, and maybe the SE can still offer the same features and are just as good as the Series 6. The Series 6 is just, without doubt, the best smartwatch you can get for your iPhone.