Samsung Gear Fit2 Pro review: A swimproof fitness tracker with GPS

Last year’s Gear Fit2 was and still is an excellent fitness tracker. It provided all the right features to accurately track runs and workouts but it missed out on one key aspect: it wasn’t waterproof and you couldn’t use it to track swimming.

The Gear Fit2 Pro changes that, adding proper waterproofing of up to 5ATM of pressure  – (or around 40m). You can take the Fit2 Pro on a swim, soak it in the shower and run through torrential rain and it’ll be perfectly fine

At £200, though, it’s around £50 more than its predecessor. Is it worth the extra cash, or are there better alternatives?

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Samsung Gear Fit2 Pro review: What you need to know

The Gear Fit2 Pro certainly ticks all the boxes for a fitness band in 2017. It has a bright, 1.5in AMOLED touchscreen display, built-in GPS, 4GB of internal storage for music, plus Bluetooth and Wi-Fi, a heart rate sensor and, of course, that 5ATM waterproofing. It even does notifications and you can expand its capabilities by installing apps, just like a smartwatch.

In its price bracket, in fact, there isn’t another fitness tracker that offers the same set of features. Fitbit doesn’t do anything that’s as fully featured and nor does Garmin. The Samsung Gear Fit2 Pro stands alone in this respect.

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Samsung Gear Fit2 Pro review: Price and competition

This why, at £200, the Fit2 Pro looks a little pricey for a fitness band. It’s around £50 more than the Gear Fit2, £80 pricier than the Fitbit Charge HR 2 and it’s £30 more expensive than the Garmin Vivosport.

In fact, it’s only when you step up in price and to devices that you’d more typically associate with the smartwatch market, that you find devices with a comparable feature set. The £329 Apple Watch Series 3, the £290 Garmin Forerunner 735XT, the £280 Garmin Vivoactive 3 and the £280 Fitbit Ionic, for example, which all have GPS, heart rate monitoring and swim-proof designs.

Samsung Gear Fit2 Pro review: Design and specification

The Gear Fit2 Pro looks and feels very much like its predecessor, it has the same vibrant 1.5in (128 x 432) AMOLED touchscreen display, which is bright and clear enough to read in most conditions.

It has two buttons on the right-hand side, a heart rate sensor and a removable strap. The Gear Fit2 Pro’s strap is still rubberised but this time it’s decorated with a subtle, faceted pattern. Another difference is its clasp. The Pro now has a traditional buckle, which is a lot less likely to come undone than its predecessor.

This doesn’t affect comfort unduly, though. The Pro is extremely comfortable to wear and with its lightweight design (at 34g for the large and 33g for the small variant) you’ll barely feel it on your wrist.

As for connectivity, the watch has Bluetooth 4.2 and 802.11n Wi-Fi and there’s 4GB of internal storage inside, used storing your workout tunes to play over your wireless headphones.

The Fit2 Pro doesn’t require your phone to operate and can be paired with your favourite Bluetooth headphones. (If you’re looking to buy a new set of wireless headphones, incidentally, check out our pick of the best.

On a slightly negative note, the Fit2 Pro isn’t available in Blue or Pink, but instead in black with red accents and plain black-only.

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Samsung Gear Fit2 Pro review: Performance

The Gear Fit2 Pro is water resistant with up to 5ATM of pressure, which means it can be submerged and taken swimming. Even if you’re not an active swimmer, the ability to take it in shower or do the washing up without having to take it off each time makes a more convenient life companion than the original Fit2.

And, when it comes to general fitness tracking, it’s just as good as the original. It tracks runs automatically and thanks to its built-in GPS, tracks pace and location accurately without the need to take your smartphone out on your run with you. Its pedometer, altimeter and gyroscopes, meanwhile deliver the full gamut of daily activity tracking data: steps taken, calories burned, even floors climbed. And the heart rate monitor lets you get a handle on whether your overall fitness is improving or not.

You’d think all of these features would weigh down the Pro, but thanks to its 1GHz dual-core processor and 512MB of RAM, the Samsung smoothly and responsively.

It’s easy to use, too. Installing apps, synchronizing music and setting up the watch is breeze. You don’t have to own a Samsung phone like you once did with the Korean company’s wearables – any Android handset will do – but you will need to install a flurry of apps (Samsung Gear and Health) and a bunch of plugins to get it up and running.

Once the Fit2 Pro is set up, you’ll be able to read and reply to your notification straight from the fitness tracker, you can also ‘Show on phone’ and it’ll automatically open the relevant app and conversation on your paired phone. 

The Fit2 Pro even supports offline Spotify music playback, although for Premium accounts only. This works well, but it isn’t exclusive to the Fit2 Pro, with Samsung rolling the feature out to the original as well.

As for stamina, the Fit2 Pro is just as good as the original. That’s not a surprise because the Fit2 Pro houses the same 200mAh battery as in the Fit2 and this lasts around two days of medium use. It charges the same way, too, using a small magnetic dock that you drop the Fit2 Pro onto when you need to top it up.

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Samsung Gear Fit2 Pro vs Gear Fit2: Verdict

In all, the Samsung Gear Fit2 Pro is a great fitness wearable that ticks all the right boxes. It’s more expensive than most of its close rivals, but it does more, too.

The naysayers will say it’s a waste of money over the original Fit2, but if you swim as well as run and go to the gym, or you simply want a water-resistant wearable, the Fit2 Pro is well worth the extra outlay. Highly recommended.