- This video is sponsored by Skillshare.
The Fossil Sport Smartwatch has been getting
a ton of attention since it's December unveiling
and there's a good reason for that.
If you use an android phone,
it's one of the best smartwatches you can buy today.
I'm Michael Fisher, and this is the Mr Mobile review.
(upbeat music)
A careful listener will accuse me
of damning this watch with faint praise,
so right up front I'll say it, yes,
WearOS still has potholes to patch
before anyone can call this the best smartwatch overall.
I'll share them as we go,
but the biggest is battery life.
Despite the new Snapdragon 3100 processor,
the Fossil Sport is still a one day smartwatch,
two days if you're careful.
You may recall I had the same complaint
about the only other watch running on the 3100
in last years Montblanc Summit 2
but that watches thousand dollar price tag
brought with it a spec advantage
that does give it an edge over Fossil Sport,
an extra half gig of RAM
which makes it incredibly responsive.
The Fossil Sport is more like
the Android wear of years past,
fast sometimes, very not fast at others,
in particular when you get a phone call
it sometimes takes up to six or seven seconds
for the caller ID info to pop up on the screen,
not ideal.
But WearOS has a lot going for it too,
as a frequent traveler I love the fact
that the assistant feed keeps my upcoming flights
and hotel info on deck without me having to do anything,
it's just there.
I love that I can program each of these pushers
to do what I want even if it's just boring old shortcuts
to stopwatch and timer,
and the Sport includes what I consider
a must-have for WearOS, the rotating side button.
It's a little stiff,
and in what I take to be a software bug
it sometimes stops working
forcing you to use the touchscreen,
that's frustrating but I can live with it,
in the hopes that it's a quick software fix.
From a hardware standpoint I'm just glad it's here,
it's rare to have a functional crown at this price point
which I'll share in a second.
First I wanna talk about the other hardware wins though,
FS doesn't just stand for Fossil Sport,
it stands for f'ing small,
my 41 millimeter review unit
is the more petite of two available sizes
with a two layer casing that some say makes it look thick,
I say at 12 millimeters this is thinner
than the last five smart watches I've reviewed.
A combination of aluminum and nylon means
it's the lightest one I can remember wearing, period.
Fossil sent over some dummies along with my review sample
and it's legit hard to tell it from the fix,
it's ridiculously light.
And it doesn't leave features at the door to hit that weight
the holy trifecta of NFC, GPS
and a heart rate sensor are accounted for
along with a microphone for talking to Google Assistant
and the whole thing gets a
five atmosphere water resistance rating too.
About the only thing missing is a speaker
which I don't care about almost as much
as I don't care about fitness features,
but Mr Mobile you rightly object,
the watch is called the Sport,
surely you're gonna at least touch on the sporty side?
So okay, I will, I've read from people I trust,
namely the folks at wearble.com
that the heart rate sensor registers
a few more BPM's than a chest monitor does,
but I continue to believe that people
who are serious about their fitness
shouldn't buy a smartwatch,
they should buy a fitness tracker from Fitbit
or Polar or Garmin.
So if you decide to buy the Fossil Sport,
buy it for what it is:
a WearOS watch running on the best silicon available
for the platform with very few missing features,
in a casing so light you can barely feel it on your wrist.
As for the price, when I drafted this script,
the Fossil Sport was selling for 199,
that sale has since ended and the price has reverted
to the full 255 but the next time that price drops,
because they've done it once,
they're gonna do it again,
I say buy it, because for now this is
the best WearOS experience you're gonna get
if you don't wanna pay Montblanc prices,
and if you don't want WearOS at all
stay with me through the sponsor spot
and I'll tease what I'm hoping to review next.
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Happy learning, and thanks to Skillshare
for sponsoring this video.
Folks by the time you see this video,
I'll be on a plane to Samsung Unpacked in San Francisco
where I'm hoping the company will drop
it's rumored Galaxy Watch Active.
The biggest and saddest rumor on this one,
according to Sam Mobile is that
it might drop the rotating bezel control
which will well and truly make me cry
right on the show floor.
To see if that comes true be sure to
subscribe to theMrMobile on YouTube
and follow me at the same handle on Instagram
where I'll be posting all the new stuff
from Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.
Until next time.
Thanks for watching, and stay mobile my friends.