Fitbit has a brand new wearable on the market
called a Versa.
Is it a smartwatch?
Is it for fitness?
Who should buy it, and does it work with Windows 10?
All that and more in my full review.
Stay tuned.
(upbeat music)
(gentle chiming)
So here it is, the Fitbit Versa.
Let's give a quick tour of the device.
As you can see it's very thin.
It's also very light, coming in around 30 grams.
Now compared to an Apple watch, it's about
the third of the weight of an Apple watch,
and let me tell you that makes
a huge difference if you're wearing this
everyday, especially if you go to the gym.
Coming around to the side here,
you can see here you have the main power button.
And you have two other buttons on the side.
This is a familiar design for Fitbit,
they've been using it on their last few devices.
And you have a really nice display here,
specifically it's 300 by 300.
And that's actually a square resolution,
and it's the first time they're actually using that.
And we compare it to the Fitbit Ionic,
which came out last year, that's actually a
348 by 250 resolution, so it's more rectangle
as opposed to square.
That also means you get more pixel density here
on a Versa, and it totally shows when you're using it.
The display is very good and gets very bright.
Now, this device also does all sorts of cool things.
For instance, it has the heart rate beater
on there to give you all day measurement
on your heart 24/7, including sleep data.
And you have the charger on the back here,
and we'll show that in a few minutes as well.
And there are plenty of third-party bands
available for Fitbit, and that's one of the
big things I like is that they have a large ecosystem
and do a lot of work with different partners.
Having said that, I'm not a huge fan of this mechanism
now for changing the bands.
It works, it's a little pin, and it pops right in there
and you can hear it kinda clicks and you're good to go.
Not too bad, it takes maybe a minute or two
to change, but it's a little bit finicky,
especially when compared to the Ionic,
which just has a simple button release
and just clicks back in.
Way easier.
I wish they'd kept that along with the Versa,
but they didn't.
So I wanna talk a little bit here about lineage
here before I go into deeper features
here regarding this device.
The Versa, some people have thought of
as more of a sequel to the Ionic,
which came out last year.
You can go read my full review of that on Windows Central.
Having said that, it's more a sequel to the Blade,
which I've also used extensively for a long time.
I said the Ionic is more related to the Surge,
that came out a number of years ago, as well.
The main dividing line here:
This has standalone GPS, these do not,
these are what's called connected GPS, so they rely
on your phone to figure out where they are.
Does that matter for you?
Well, it really depends, do you run outside or not?
I never do, folks, I just don't run a lot at all.
I do use this, though, for bike riding.
In that case, I always have my phone with me,
and these devices are very good for that.
So what can you do with the Versa?
Well it is kind of a smart watch,
or at least has some smart watch-like features.
First of all, the main feature is gonna be exercise.
So you do have the ability to store
up to seven different exercises
that you use frequently, and it's just quick access,
tap on it, and you can go.
Now you can see it's trying to connect
to my phone for the GPS.
If, however, you don't want to use GPS,
you can actually turn that off in the settings,
for that specific exercise.
Other features include repeating alarms, music, weather.
And you can install a lot of different apps too,
including Pandora, you have a wallet, Deezer, Starbucks,
Yelp, and others.
Now when it comes to music it's really interesting,
you can have up to around 300 songs stored on the device.
Now, installing music on this is a little clunky.
I felt like I was installing music on a pre-iPod day,
so you've gotta do it through a PC,
that'll take around 30 to 40 minutes to install
all your music, but it's not a bad experience.
Once it's on there, you can stream to your favorite
Bluetooth headset while in the gym for a totally hands-free
experience, and it's a very liberating one as well.
If, however, you don't want to use your own
local music, you can also do Pandora so long as
you subscribe to their program, and you can download
the last three or four channels that you can
subscribe to, or you can pick specific ones
that you want to add to the device, and then just
stream music using that.
And new to Fitbit OS 2.0 as support for Deezer,
which if you're in the United States,
you've probably never heard of,
but they're very big in Europe.
You can think of them as another Spotify-like service,
a lot of people like using them.
You do need a subscription, of course,
to use it here, but it's nice to have options.
Still no support for Spotify on this device yet
but perhaps that'll come later on.
When it comes to charging the Versa,
you do get this really nice stand
that's included in the box.
It is USB.
And Fitbit always changes the connectors
on how they use these devices.
It's a little bit annoying if you collect
all of them, like I do.
But this actually is one of the best stands
I've seen from them.
First of all, it's an actual stand.
If you've seen the Ionic, it's just a plug
that basically just connects to the back of it,
it's magnetic, and it's not a very good experience.
This instead, you squeeze the bottom,
it opens up, and you drop in the device,
and now it starts charging.
Really nice, permanent stand that even has a little
bit of a bottom here so it doesn't slide around too much.
So one of the reasons I'm such a fan of Fitbit
is they've been a big supporter of Windows 10.
In fact, they've been there since day one.
This is the Windows 10 app.
It also runs on Windows 10 mobile,
HoloLens, and including Xbox, as well.
And it allows you to sync up everything
to the device through Bluetooth on your PC,
and it's a very convenient experience.
Now of course you can do this on Android and iOS, as well,
but it's nice to be able to sync
across all those devices and be able to check in
on your stats whenever you want to.
As you can see here, I have my full footsteps,
I have my resting heart rate, my weight,
how did I sleep, and all of that other information.
Very good, and you can even track things
with your friends, and that's really
the big selling point with the Fitbit is,
all your friends are probably on it as well.
It connects up through Facebook and pulls in
their data, and you can do fun things like challenges.
Okay, time for some real talk.
So I've been using the Versa now for the last week,
I've used the Ionic since last summertime,
and every other Fitbit since 2012.
I really like this Versa.
First of all, it's very comfortable to wear.
It's very light, it's one of the lightest devices
they have made so far, and it's just a very
nice-looking device too.
I've had more people excited about the looks
of this device and interested in buying it
than say, the Ionic, which was very divisive.
A lot of people just absolutely hate the way it looks,
that's totally fine, but this is a really good one.
Now when it comes to battery life,
it's not as good as the Ionic.
The Ionic's gonna get you around five days,
this is more around three.
Now I should put that a little bit into perspective,
too, that it also depends on how much you're working out.
So if you're gonna be working out every day,
that'll be a little bit less.
And if you're also gonna be streaming music
from it, it can be a little bit rough.
For instance, a two-hour workout
while streaming music the entire time
will knock about 25% of battery life off.
Overnight, just by sleeping, you're gonna
take around 5% as well.
So you can do the math there.
It depends on how much you're going to be using this.
Still, I'm very happy with it.
It charges very quickly, too.
So, overall, for what it does,
it gets very good battery life.
Don't forget, the Apple watch only gets
a day and a half on a new one,
and that's not nearly as good.
In fact, it doesn't do any sleep recognition, either.
And that for me is a selling point here for the Versa.
This sleep data is absolutely incredible,
and I say that as someone who used to do
sleep science and sleep studies in New York City.
Also, there's very good heart rate stuff.
Again, comparing it to the Ionic, the heart rate
here seems to update a little bit more quickly
than the Ionic does.
And due to its size and being smaller,
it hugs the wrist better; it gets better data.
The Ionic sometimes would lose contact with me,
I would have some issues.
I don't have that as much here.
So the next question we have is,
is this a smart watch?
I get Fitbit is calling it that,
and there's some truth to it.
It's more of a smart watch than, say,
the Blaze was last year.
There's a lot of good stuff here.
There's Deezer, there's Yelp, they work okay.
But if you're buying this because you want
a smart watch first and fitness is just not
really a thing for you, you probably should get
something else, including the Android Wear
or maybe an Apple watch if that's your thing.
If, however, fitness is your first priority,
or you're looking to get into shape
and start something new, I suggest definitely
getting this device.
Now, I'm not a huge smart watch person.
This does do notifications, especially on Android,
they come in, and you can do it
for all sorts of apps.
In fact, you can go through your entire list
and pick what app you want to have notifications from,
and they worked very well.
Later this spring there'll be an update
that allows users to respond to notifications,
which up until now has been missing
from the platform, and that's pretty exciting as well.
But I wouldn't buy it just for that.
Those are cool little bonuses for me,
and it's nice to have.
If you really want that stuff, though,
you would probably want to get something different
as this is more of a smart watch second.
Having said that, I really do like the fact that
they bought Pebble a few years ago.
That community is now coming over,
and there are so many cool watch design faces
you can now download for this device and the Ionic
that make it worth it for me.
In fact, I'm still shocked on the Apple watch
there are so few faces that are out there
compared to what's available here,
and you'll spend a lot of time toying around
and figuring out what you wanna use,
and that's a cool feature to have.
So another thing I wanna talk about is
the special edition of the Versa,
which costs an extra $30 and has NFC
tap to pay and a special nylon band.
Is it worth it?
Well, that's going to depend
on you have tap to pay systems around you.
Believe it or not, I don't.
I live in Massachusetts, outside of Boston.
I have never seen one of these systems around.
In fact, in six months of using the Ionic,
I never used tap to pay once,
not to mention there's only some banks
that work with Fitbit Pay, which is their system.
Bank of America does, that's what I use,
and I suppose it works.
Now, I will say this nylon band, though,
is super cool.
I love the color of it, I love the design of it.
It worked well even at the gym.
It's very breathable, it's very comfortable to use
and very light.
And more importantly, you can't buy this band separately.
In that regard, yeah, I would get this version
because I kinda really like the design of it.
And you also get the regular band with it too,
so for an extra $30, probably worth it.
Okay, let's run down the list here.
I'm very excited about the Fitbit Versa.
I think it's an excellent purchase.
For $200, you're getting a lot of device here.
First of all, you're going to get
very good battery life.
You'll very get good heart rate data,
you'll get sleep analysis,
and you will get exercise things,
and you also get a little bit of smart watch features,
which I wouldn't buy this for a smart watch,
but it's cool to have.
It's also just a fun device to use
and won't be cumbersome at all in your lifestyle.
There's also the fact it works with Windows 10 mobile,
Windows 10, iOS, and Android, so no matter which device
you switch to in the future, this will work with it.
So the bottom line is this.
If you're into technology and you want a cool wearable,
and you wanna get into fitness, I think the Fitbit Versa
is the best choice on the market today.
So there's a quick look at the Fitbit Versa.
Now, I have a ton to say on this device,
so if you want more information on it,
or if you want more videos on it,
let me know in comments below.
You can also go to Windows Central
to read my full review.
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Thanks for watching; take care, everybody.