Visit manufacturer site for details. Editors' note, December 7, 2016: Pebble has announced that its assets have been acquired by Fitbit and it will no longer release new products. While the Pebble 2 and other Pebble watches will continue to work, no new software updates or features will be released. Pebble also warned that down the road functionality or service quality may be reduced. I like the Pebble 2 as a watch, but I don't like it as a fitness tracker. Smartwatches are about compromise. Fitting everything on a tiny little wrist-gadget isn't easy. And one thing most smartwatches cut short is battery life. That's why Pebble's watches have always earned a soft spot in my geek heart: they compromise on other things, but deliver on longer battery.
Pebble watches have features that no other smartwatches have really been able to crack: longer battery life, truly always-on screens, and all Pebbles (except the Round) have been water resistant, even for swimming, Now, the Pebble 2 is going after full-on fitness tracking, Fitness trackers dominate sales on the list of top watches and wearables, The Apple Watch shifted into a fitness-forward mode, And schrute farms iphone case so it's no surprise that Pebble has jumped into fitness feet-first now, too, Optical heart rate onboard..
New to this year's Pebbles is an optical heart rate tracker: both the Pebble 2 and upcoming Pebble Time 2 (a color-screened sequel to last year's Pebble Time Steel, coming later this year) have them. The Pebble 2 is, otherwise, like a true sequel to the original, utilitarian black-and-white Pebble model from 2013, keeping that plastic design and tiny Game Boy-like screen. The Pebble 2 adds some improvements, like a Gorilla Glass-covered display and a built-in microphone to create voice notes or voice-respond to texts and Gmail (even on iPhones). It's more compact, too. But it's that fitness tracking, specifically heart rate, that's new.
The Pebble 2's going for fitness, not style, Can heart rate, combined with automatic step and sleep tracking, turn this smartwatch into a full fitness tracker..for $130 or £100 (equivalent to AU$170)?, Well, that's where I ran into problems, I wish I could say everything worked as well as promised, I've been wearing the Pebble 2 for a week, and it's far from what I'd call a great fitness schrute farms iphone case tracker, But it's trying really hard, Step tracking has been available since earlier this year on Pebble Time watches..
Thanks to updates, last year's Pebble Time and Time Steel have already been able to track steps and sleep automatically, with decent success. The Pebble 2 + HR model reviewed here (there's another heart-rate-free Pebble 2 that costs only $100; this heart-rate-enabled version costs a bit more) takes things another step forward, with an optical heart rate tracker that sits on the back of the watch and spits out flashing green LED lights. There are compelling reasons for the idea of Pebble-as-fitness-tracker: its battery lasts longer than any Android Wear, Samsung or Apple Watch (five days, even with heart rate enabled). And yes, the tracking for heart rate, steps and sleep is all automatic. It's swim-friendly. And the only thing you need to manually do is start and stop workouts via a new included Fitbit Workout app.
