Withings Activité Pop Activity Tracker Review

​​With wearables becoming the norm (you’re beginning to see them almost as much as you see smartphones), one of the goals with them is making them seem “normal” or casual. By normal, I mean making the wearable fit in with your clothing / outfit. Having the structure of a bracelet or watch, and not look like some ginormous screen with wrist straps.Some wearables want to look like wearables. The Withings Activité Pop  activity tracker seems to want to want to bring in a nice combination of classic watch simplicity and activity tracker. But does it get the job done?

The design of the Activité Pop  is important, because you notice they tried to make the activity tracker look like a casual watch as much as possible. The unit I received is the lower end $150 version (there is a $450 version as well) in a bluish-green color. It has a metal body, with a pretty sturdy screen. It has rubber​ 18mm​ straps. Looks like a watch you’d throw on with a tee and jeans.​ Won’t get in your way. ​

 

The Activite Pop has two dials though. The main dial that tells the time, and on the bottom right you have a smaller dial. The smaller dial ​tells you how many steps you’ve taken. It has a “0” at the starting point, and “100” at the end point. There are indicator lines (9 lines) for every 1000 steps you take.

The Activité Pop looks simple, but it does a lot. It tracks steps, sleep, calories burned, and now swimming (with a new update). Of course this is all taken care of with an accompanying app, Withings Healthmate (available on iOS and Android). The app is a bit colorful, which may come off as cluttered at a quick glance. You get notifications, badges and reminders

 

  

 

With the most recent info on top, and then working in reverse (like a twitter timeline), the Healthmate app shows your daily steps in all bar graph, percentage and of course the exact number. If you swipe to the left you can share your progress. So on top you’ll have “Today”, followed by “2 days ago”, etc. It even gives you the chance to share your stats. If you swipe to the left, you see the share icon, and it encourages you to add a picture of yourself with the stats before sharing. That’s pretty cute; giving you the visual encouragement. In the app you get breakdowns of your steps and sleep patterns. The Healthmate app does a pretty good job of breaking down your activity, but there is no way to input activities (such as running, weightlifting) on your own.

 

 

 

The watch does a great job of blending in with my everyday lifestyle, that I forget to sync it with the app at times. Unfortunately if you don’t open the app, the Activite Pop won’t sync and you pretty much lose your tracking data. Opening the app before the day is over shouldn’t be so hard, but in case you do forget to open it, the Healthmate shouldn’t forget your data. That can really throw off overall progress.

If you happen to forget your Activite Pop, you can switch to mobile tracking on the Healthmate app. You can also set a silent alarm to vibrate on your wrist. I use it to go to the gym in the morning. It’s not super intrusive. You can also set reminders to do certain things to keep you on track. Certain reminders are tasks to keep better record, such as a reminder to weight yourself, or take your blood pressure. It works a lot better if you had the Withings scale  to sync your weigh-ins to the Healthmate app.

 

This is where the Activité Pop shines. There is no daily charging of the tracker. I can’t tell you how often I forget my smartwatch at home because I leave it charging as much as possible. And if I forget to charge it, that’s another fail for me. Not having to charge on the daily makes more of a difference than you realize. So, no fuss on the battery. The battery it comes with is supposed to last 8 months (according to Withings). There’s no way of knowing your current battery life though. I will just be extra careful when it come to month 7-8.

Trying out the @withings Activité Pop activity tracker #PositivelyHealthy #Withings #ActivitePop #PopPerspective #ActivityTracker #TechWeLike #MotivationMonday #NikeFree #GadgetGirl #igtech #Gadgets #igdaily

A photo posted by Analie Cruz ?? (@yummyana) on Jul 6, 2015 at 2:08pm PDT

Withings has done a great job of combining a fitness tracker with the look of a simple daily watch. Its great for the person who wants to get basic tracking down without having to set modes or switch. The Activite Pop is also great for those who enjoy power walking, jogging, and swimming on a fun level and want tracking to get an idea of how much work is done (not on the super athletic level where you would get a running or swimming watch).

For $150 price tag, there should be a way to track an exercise session, or put a session in later. Depending on how important the swimming tracking is to you, it may or may not be worth the $150. In this case you’re paying for the design of the watch over the features that it offers. I recommend this to the person who casually enjoys working out. It’s a great starter watch for semi-active people. Wear it to the gym, pool, or next lunch date.

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