OnePlus Watch 3 Evaluation: WearOS Battery Life Champ, Nice Show

	OnePlus Watch 3: Beginning at $329.99 The OnePlus Watch 3 is without doubt one of the perfect smartwatches in the marketplace, and the brand new WearOS battery life champion.
	Excellent design and construct Stunning LTPO show Clean efficiency Excellent battery life Complete well being and health options Nice consumer expertise	Weak speaker and haptics No non-compulsory 4G LTE connectivity OHealth app wants enchancment

We simply spent per week testing the OnePlus Watch 3, however may this be the brand new Android smartwatch to beat? Learn our evaluate to seek out out.

OnePlus Watch 3 {Hardware} And design

By way of design and dimension, Watch 3 is sort of equivalent to Watch 2. The round case is product of stainless-steel, and options the identical satin end on the left aspect, and signature polished bump on the best aspect, which is dwelling of the crown on the 2-o’clock place, and a pill-shaped button on the 4-o’clock place. Talking of the crown, we’re completely satisfied to report that it’s now bigger, tapered, pleasantly knurled, and absolutely useful – eventually!

As a substitute of utilizing 2.5D sapphire glass that flows straight into the case like Watch 2, Watch 3’s sapphire glass is flat and surrounded by a slender titanium bezel with engraved labels on the 5-minute positions. Not solely does this look approach higher, but it surely additionally protects the perimeters of the sapphire glass. Like its predecessor, Watch 3 is rated IP68, MIL-STD-810H licensed, and water-resistant all the way down to 5ATM (50m).

Watch 3’s AMOLED show is bigger than Watch 2’s (1.5 vs. 1.43 inches) and brighter too (2200 nits peak), but it surely’s the identical 466 x 466 pixel decision. It’s an LTPO display this time round, with a 1-60Hz adaptive refresh fee and DC dimming. Across the again you’ll discover improved optical PPG sensors for measuring coronary heart fee and blood oxygen degree (SpO2), and the identical 4 charging contacts as on Watch 2.

As for the charging base, it’s nearly equivalent to final 12 months’s. It’s product of the identical white plastic and options the identical USB Kind-C charging port. We like this strategy higher than having a base with a captive cable because it permits us to cost our watch with out having to detach the charging cable from our current chargers. Notice nevertheless, that the round indent in Watch 3’s charging base is barely bigger than on Watch 2’s.

You may nonetheless cost Watch 3 with Watch 2’s charging base (and vice-versa), but it surely’s not an ideal match. As regards to match, we’re not the largest followers of the equipped fluororubber strap. It’s advantageous general, however it will possibly’t pivot round its lugs, making it nearly inconceivable to relaxation Watch 3 flat on any floor. A minimum of this smartwatch makes use of commonplace 22mm broad bands, so you might have a variety of choices relating to changing the strap.

Below the hood, Watch 3 is powered by the identical hybrid utility processor (SoC) + microcontroller (MPU) structure as Watch 2. It packs the identical Qualcomm Snapdragon W5 SoC, 2GB RAM, and 32GB of storage as its predecessor, however the MPU has been upgraded to a Bestechnic BES2800BP, a 6nm FinFET chip that boasts a 2x CPU and 4x NPU efficiency enchancment over the BES2700 in Watch 2.

This hybrid WearOS + RTOS combo permits Watch 3 to be extraordinarily environment friendly, with as much as 120 hours (5 days) of battery life within the default “Good Mode” (vs. 100 hours beforehand). More often than not, while you aren’t interacting with the watch, the MPU does all of the work – dealing with notifications, counting steps, measuring coronary heart fee and blood oxygen ranges, updating the always-on show (if enabled), protecting a connection together with your cellphone, and so on…

When you begin interacting with Watch 3, the Snapdragon W5 springs to life to provide the full WearOS expertise. This setup, mixed with improved battery capability (631 vs. 500mAh) – because of a silicon-carbon cell that isn’t bodily greater – provides Watch 3 its excellent battery life. And when it’s time for a refill, Watch 3 costs at as much as 7.5W, with a 10-minute cost including about 24h of battery life.

In terms of connectivity, Watch 3 surprisingly lacks 4G LTE (mobile), but it surely options Bluetooth 5.2, WiFi 4 (802.11n), NFC, and dual-band AGPS, Beidou, Galileo, GLONASS, QZSS positioning (utilizing Broadcom SYN4778 7nm chip alongside a brand new circularly polarized antenna for higher reception in city environments). In contrast to Google’s Pixel Watch 3, the OnePlus Watch 3 doesn’t help UWB.

The on-board mic and speaker are advantageous, however might be louder – first rate sufficient to take a name in a pinch, so long as you’re in a quiet area. Haptics on Watch 3 are okay as nicely however might be stronger. The Apple Watch’s Taptic Engine nonetheless has the sting right here.

OnePlus Watch 3 Software program, Options, And Battery Life

Like its predecessor, the OnePlus Watch 3 runs Google’s WearOS on the Qualcomm SoC, alongside a customized RTOS (real-time OS) on the Bestechnic microcontroller. The Watch 3 will get WearOS 5 out of the field, which is probably going additionally coming (hopefully quickly) to Watch 2. This implies you get all of Google’s software program goodness, with correct help for options and apps like Google Assistant, Google Pay, Google Maps, and so on…

As you’d anticipate, OnePlus’ construct of WearOS is flippantly skinned to resemble OxygenOS on the corporate’s telephones – with customized watch faces to match. Whilst you can set up and run nearly any WearOS-compatible watch face, solely OnePlus’ watch faces are optimized to run on the RTOS while you allow the always-on show or raise-to-wake. In different phrases, you’ll need to persist with OnePlus’ watch faces for one of the best battery life.

WearOS on Watch 3 feels clean and responsive, similar to it does on Watch 2 and the most recent Galaxy and Pixel watches. Principally, you get the identical consumer expertise as every other WearOS smartwatch, and the identical UI as nicely. From the house display, swipe down for the fast settings, swipe up for notifications, and swipe left or proper to entry the tiles. Inside apps, swipe proper from the sting to navigate again.

The button assignments are equally intuitive however could be custom-made. By default, press the crown at 2-o’clock as soon as for the app listing, double-press for the newest app, and long-press for Google Assistant. Press the 4-o’clock button as soon as for exercises, double-press for Google Pockets, and long-press for the ability menu. You may long-tap the house display to handle watch faces, and long-tap any tile to handle tiles. Simple peasy.

As we’ve alluded to a number of instances above, battery life is the place Watch 3 actually shines. It’s what units it aside from the competitors. OnePlus advertises as much as 120 hours (5 days) of battery life within the default “Good Mode” with the always-on show disabled, and to date, in eight days of carrying this smartwatch, we’ve absolutely charged it solely as soon as – the night of day 4. We charged it once more on day eight (from 26 to 56%) to take photos for this evaluate.

For the report, we’ve been utilizing Watch 3 with the always-on show enabled, steady coronary heart fee and blood oxygen monitoring activated, and the “entry respiration issues” function chosen – all of that are energy hungry settings. Then once more, we didn’t spend a lot time working apps on the watch, doing exercises, making calls, or streaming music. We largely simply acquired notifications and tracked exercise and sleep.

Apart from monitoring sleep, exercise (steps, and so on…), stress, coronary heart fee, coronary heart fee variability, and blood oxygen degree (SpO2), Watch 3 additionally measures wrist temperature. Sleep monitoring additionally gives a sleep high quality rating and accesses respiration issues by monitoring loud night breathing period and loudness. As well as, the watch can warn you when your coronary heart fee is just too excessive or too low, or when your blood oxygen degree (SpO2) is just too low.

On the well being entrance, Watch 3 delivers a number of helpful apps and options. The 60s Well being Test-In app concurrently evaluates six key well being indicators – coronary heart fee, blood oxygen degree (SpO2), psychological wellness, wrist temperature, sleep high quality, and vascular age – in lower than 60 seconds by merely holding nonetheless and touching the 4-o’clock button. This gives a fast and straightforward well being examine, anytime anyplace. 

The Thoughts and Physique app analyzes the latest watch knowledge to ship a holistic evaluation of your emotional and stress ranges, and show the consequence with an emoji and a easy rating out of 100. The Vascular Well being app estimates arterial stiffness, and the ECG app (which isn’t licensed to be used within the US) can assist detect arrhythmia and atrial fibrillation. Each work by holding nonetheless and touching the 4-o’clock button.

By way of health, Watch 3 helps over 100 sports activities and actions, plus eleven skilled exercises, which embrace working, strolling, biking, swimming, climbing, snowboarding, tennis, badminton, desk tennis, soccer, basketball, boxing, and yoga – to call a number of. To make issues extra handy, the watch can auto-detect six of those actions: working, strolling, rowing machine, elliptical machine, biking, and swimming. 

We solely scratched the floor when testing exercises, however – for what it’s value – we didn’t expertise any issues with strolling. In apply, the OnePlus Watch 3 seems to trace exercise, sleep, stress, and different vitals about in addition to the Galaxy Watch Extremely and Google Pixel Watch 3. To validate this, we’ve been carrying an Ultrahuman sensible ring alongside Watch 3, and generally, the watch knowledge matched the ring’s inside 10%. 

A pair distinctive Watch 3 options value mentioning are Video Watch Face and Simple Management. The previous helps you to create a singular watch face utilizing a 5 second video clip because the background. Simple Management permits you distant management TikTok and YouTube Shorts from the watch through the use of swipes and double faucets on the watch’s show. It additionally doubles as a digicam distant, however solely with OnePlus and Oppo telephones working Android 15.

The OHealth app is OnePlus’ companion cellphone app for Watch 3. It gives an in-depth have a look at your well being and health knowledge, and allows you to handle private and smartwatch settings. More often than not you’ll be utilizing this app to handle watch faces, parental controls, apps, tiles, notification settings, plus well being and health settings. It additionally syncs well being and health knowledge with Google Well being Join, Google Match, and Strava.

OnePlus Watch 3 Evaluation Abstract

With Watch 3, OnePlus has taken the already glorious Watch 2 and made it even higher. It delivers a extra refined design, very good construct high quality, an improved show, clean efficiency, excellent battery life, complete well being and health options, plus a terrific consumer expertise because of WearOS. Extra importantly, the $330 value stays aggressive. This smartwatch isn’t low cost, but it surely gives stable worth.

Nonetheless, there’s room for enchancment. The speaker and haptics are a bit weak, and the dearth of (non-compulsory) 4G LTE connectivity and UWB help are a miss. As well as, OnePlus’ OHealth app doesn’t match the breadth and high quality of Samsung’s Well being app or Google’s Fitbit app relating to performance, presentation, suggestions, or teaching. So preserve that in thoughts if well being and health monitoring are paramount to you.

Regardless, the OnePlus Watch 3 is without doubt one of the perfect WearOS smartwatches in the marketplace, and we extremely suggest it. It’s obtainable for pre-order right this moment on-line from OnePlus for $329.99, with basic gross sales beginning February 25. It can save you $30 through the use of low cost code TIME1010 at checkout till provides final, and commerce in any gadget in any situation for a further $50 off as nicely.