Amazfit GTR watch review

Introduction

The Amazfit GTR is technically not a smartwatch. It lacks a proper OS and can't really run additional apps. You are limited to the features you get out of the box, meaning that it perhaps falls in the category of fitness trackers. But it's a lot more than that so we can probably agree to call it a smart wearable.

As for the Amazfit brand, you can rest assured that you are getting a quality product from a very reputable source.

In fact, Amazfit or rather Huami - the California-based company behind the Amazfit brand is arguably the most reputable and trusted name in smart wearables today. Not counting the Apple Watch, Huami is the largest wearable device company in the world, with over 50 million units sold and over 16% global market share. Besides its own Amazfit fashion-conscious brand, Huami is also responsible for Xiaomi wearables as an exclusive provider. As such, it is the company behind the popular Mi Band line of products.

Amazfit GTR specs

• Body: 47mm: 47.2 x 47.2 x 10.75 mm, aluminum - 36g, titanium- 40g, stainless steel- 48g, 22mm strap; 42mm: 42.6 x 42.6 x 9.2 mm, 45.5g, 20mm strap; 5 ATM water resistance; Gorilla Glass 3 front; Metal, microcrystalline zirconium ceramics, polymer used in body
• Display: 47mm: 1.39" AMOLED, Resolution 454x454, 326 ppi; 42mm: 1.2" AMOLED, Resolution 390x390, 326 ppi
• OS: Proprietary; Support for Android 5.0 and above, iOS 10.0 and above
• Memory: 16MB + 40MB - not user accessible
• Battery: 47mm: 410mAh (24 days typical use); 42mm: 195mAh (12 days typical use); Magnetic charging base (2h for a full charge)
• Connectivity: Bluetooth 5.0 + BLE; GPS+GLONASS; NFC
• Misc: BioTracker PPG biological tracking optical sensor, 6-axis acceleration sensor, 3-axis geomagnetic sensor, Air-pressure sensor, Capacity sensor, Ambient light sensor

Speaking of the Mi Band, it is a perfect jumping-off device to introduce the Amazfit GTR. As far as features go, the two are pretty similar, especially since the Mi Band has been gaining hardware in recent generations. To oversimplify things a bit, a GTR gets you GPS, a bigger display, more battery, and a fancier PPG Bio-Tracking sensor. So why would anyone spend five times what the Mi Band costs for the GTR? It's rather simple, really - it looks like a proper watch. One that goes nicely with a suit, as well as casual wear. For better or worse, this does matter on certain occasions.

As for why you would prefer the Amazfit GTR over some other name brand, full-featured smartwatch from the likes of Samsung or Huawei, to name a few significant players, the answer is pretty simple - battery life.

We already have too many devices that need charging in our lives. Out of all the wearables this reviewer has tested throughout the years, only three ever managed to stay on his wrist for more than a few weeks - a few Mi Band iterations, the Amazfit Bip and now the Amazfit GTR. Not having to worry about a frequent charging routine is the most essential thing to look for in a modern wearable.

If you share that sentiment, chances are you will like the Amazfit GTR. The rest of the feature set includes forwarding notifications and the occasional activity tracking. Personally, that's all a wearable is about and if you feel the same, definitely read on.

Design and materials

If it looks like a duck and walks like a duck, then it must be a watch. Horrible jokes aside, the Amazfit GTR simply nails the traditional round watch aesthetic. The Amazfit GTR really leaves little to be desired in the looks department, while still promising to deliver tons of practicality.

It is definitely worth noting that you are quite spoiled for choice when it comes to the GTR. It is available in both a 42mm and a 47mm variant. The former, of course, giving up half of its battery life for the compact form factor.

Then there is the 47mm size, which we have for review. To be even more precise, though, we have the Aluminum variant, weighing in at just 36 grams. You can also pick the GTR up with a titanium enclosure at 40 grams and a stainless steel one at 48 grams. The latter two are significantly less common and a bit harder to come by. Besides the material, finish, and weight differences, all three variants are identical in features and specs. You do, potentially get a different strap out of the box, but since it is a standard 22mm watch band (20mm on the 42mm model) you can pick a third-party replacement anyway.

We were never really tempted to, though, since the included strap feels and looks amazing. Despite being described as leather on the official site, it is comprised of very soft plastic and feels sturdy yet very comfortable. It even has a pattern on the bottom side, which helps with band sweating quite a bit.

The leather part of the strap is actually just the its top surface and a bit extending to the bottom side. The two materials are combined really seamlessly and make for a great combination of comfort and style.

The only real complaint we have about the strap concerns the two safety rings meant to hold the loop in place. These don't really feel as premium as the rest of the strap. Even so, Amazfit etched a small logo in one of them, which is really indicative of the attention to detail that went into the product as a whole.

Our 36-gram aluminum Amazfit GTR feels really light on the wrist. That's just four, or so, grams more than the Amazfit Bip, which is entirely made of plastic. Pretty impressive, if you prefer your wearables light. The benefits being mostly to comfort during prolonged wear and especially while sleeping with the device on. At just 10.75 mm thick, the Amazfit GTR was low-profile enough to wear to bed. Something we found to be a struggle with the Samsung Gear S3 and its massive 13mm thick, 63-gram body and rigid rubber strap.

Of course, this is yet another subjective point, and it is worth noting that if you are a long-time watch wearer and are used to a bit more heft on the wrist, the Amazfit GTR might feel a bit too light for your taste. Even the stainless steel 48-gram variant is a bit too light in average watch terms.

The styling on the body of the watch is yet another subjective matter. We definitely fancy the all-black aesthetic. However we aren't exactly confident in the scratch-resistance of the paint job. Our unit actually came with a few imperfections out of the box, and introducing new ones was pretty easy.

The finish on the dial, especially, tends to pick up grease and moisture in such a way that it stains in a pretty visible way, making for a worn-out look. Unfortunately, we can't really comment on the either the stainless steel or titanium variants, but our research does lead us to believe that any of those would be a better bet than the aluminum if you want to keep your watch looking fresh long-term.

Hardware and controls

The amount of hardware crammed into a modern smart wearable is pretty impressive. That, of course, is especially true for proper smart watches. Still, even something like the Amazfit GTR is an amazingly tech-dense gadget.

Working our way from the outside in, what is probably the centerpiece of the experience as a whole is the vibrant and very sharp OLED panel. In what is a relatively cheaper option, compared to the closest available competitors, one would naturally assume that the display would be the first to take a hit. On the contrary, with a resolution of 454 x 454 pixels, the 47mm Amazfit GTR is up there with the new Huawei Watch GT 2 as one of the most pixel-dense panels you can have on your wrist.

Left: Huawei Watch GT 2, Right: Amazfit GTR

As is typical of OLED technology, colors are vibrant. Blacks are inky deep. Brightness is also plenty. Glare off of the Corning Gorilla 3 coating is a bit more than we would have preferred, though, which is especially noticeable in direct sunlight. Even so, the Amazfit GTR remains perfectly usable outside and just about on par with competitors. Thanks to a built-in luminance sensor, the GTR also reacts quite effectively to changes in outside brightness conditions.

Left: Amazfit Bip, Right: Amazfit GTR

In terms of controls, the Amazfit GTR has two physical buttons beside the multi-touch display. These look quite nice and complement the overall design of the wearable. The red accent on the top one is a nifty little accent we appreciate. However, the buttons feel a bit mushy and are rather hard to properly press. Plus, since the top one is strictly a home/screen on and off button and does nothing else within the actual UI, it seems suboptimally utilized.

The backside of the Amazfit GTR is made entirely of plastic, which feels sturdy enough and keeps the weight down. It has four clearly visible and easily accessible screws in each corner. Technically, taking the wearable apart should be quite easy. You might not want to do that unless really necessary, though, since you could easily damage some sealing elements that help deliver the impressive 5 ATM water resistance rating.

Charging is done through two pogo pins on the back of the wearable, which, to be frank, is far from an ideal setup. The idea is to plop the GTR on what is an irritatingly small charging base and have magnets provide an extra bit of guidance. When you get it just right, it does, indeed, charge perfectly fine, but it is really easy to misalign the two pieces and interrupt the charging process. Huami could have done a better job designing this bit.

Besides the rather simple pogo pins for charging, the back only houses the PPG biological tracking optical sensor. Amazfit uses the BioTracker marketing name for this. And while it is a bit more sophisticated than your run of the mill PPG sensor, it is still the familiar light-based affair that can't really compare to a proper ECG reading.

The clever software allows the Amazfit GTR to offer advanced full-scale hear rate monitoring, with max and min bounds and overlay that with suggested fat-burning estimates. And if your exercise gets too intense and your heart rate spikes, the GTR will warn you. Not quite comparable to what Apple is doing with the Watch and ECG, but still a cut above your generic activity tracker.

Moving on the Amazfit GTR internals, information gets kind of scarce. We know, for certain, that there is a 410mAh LiPo battery in the bigger 47mm model and an 195mAh one in its smaller sibling. We also know that whatever chipset is driving the GTR, it has BT5.0 BLE and GPS + Glonass. Things get a bit speculative beyond this point, but form what we can gather, the OS has about 16MB of RAM to work with and 64MB of storage. It stores the OS and various other resources. Most notably - watch faces.

Taking all of this into account, plus the fact that the OS itself kind of chugs on certain animations and is far from speedy, it is fairly safe to assume that the internals on the GTR are pretty underpowered.

Huami has likely re-purposed a lot of the tech it already has for driving things like the Bip and the Mi Band with all the resource limitations that come with it. Some of the upsides of this include lower production costs and potentially lower power consumption. Plus, the fluidity situation really isn't all that bad on the custom OS.

We are pretty willing to forgive the lack of raw performance and slightly lower animation frame counts if that resulted in better battery endurance and lower retail price. Which, we hope it did. We just wish Huami had thrown in a bit more memory on the GTR, since just like the Bip, it can't keep its entire watch face selection on-device. These need to be swapped-out as needed via the app. On the plus side, this is one of the reasons why such a vibrant third-party wealth of unofficial watch faces exist for these sort of Amazfit devices. Once somebody figured out the Bluetooth communication and file structures, modifying certain aspects of the otherwise closed-up experience became pretty trivial. More on that in the software section.

Software

Flipping through the UI on the Amazfit GTR and the options it offers comes with a touch of nostalgia. Remember getting a new phone back in the day when phones didn't have a unified UI but relied on custom implementations with hidden features throughout the menus? Yes, these were good times.

The menu structure on the Amazfit GTR is pretty simple and rarely goes more than a level deep. The two hardware buttons are quite underutilized. The top one turns the display on or off, and if you happen to be anywhere within the menus of the GTR, it always brings you to the watch face.

If the screen doesn't wake up when you bring your wrist up, you have no other option to wake the watch but to press the button. Of course, this is a non-issue if you decide to leave the display always-on.

As for the bottom button - in Huami's current setup, it is only a quick action shortcut. This is referred to as "quick start-up" and offers a few options: Status, Heart rate, Workout, Weather, Notifications, Event reminder, Alarm, Compass, Count down and Timer.

This shortcut only works if you are on the watch face. The only other feature the second button has is stopping active exercise tracking by long-pressing and exiting out of battery saver mode. In any other part of the UI, the bottom button does absolutely nothing. Just like the top button, the second one does also wake the screen, which is convenient. Still, we feel like Huami could have made it a back button at the least.

Speaking of Back, unless you always want to end up on the home screen, you need to get into the habit of mostly ignoring the buttons altogether and stick to swiping. Left to right is the system-wide back gesture. Tapping and scrolling are pretty straight-forward inside the UI itself. Swiping left and right on the watch face gives you access to a live heart rate measuring UI and your step count, respectively.

Amazfit GTR general UI

Speaking of the UI in general, it is pretty well-designed overall. It's simple and straight-forward with nicely laid out options. It also looks quite well. It is rocking colorful round iconography and pretty much universally dark backgrounds for better battery life.

The only real complaint we have with the UI is probably not the UI's fault, to begin with, and it has to do with performance. The GTR is clearly powered by custom hardware which is modest at best. This leads to a noticeable "chug" throughout the UI. Even so, if buttery-smooth frame rates are not particularly high on your list of wearable must-have features, we can promise you that the GTR is still fast enough to live with and perfectly usable.

Features

Now that the general software bits are out of the way, we can circle back to the original plan of taking a tour around the features the Amazfit GTR offers. We'll start on the wearable itself and then move on the companion smartphone app. We'll also do out best to share our experiences with said features and how well they work.

Starting from the watch faces, since that is kind of the spotlight feature on a modern wearable. Further proving that the GTR has rather limited resources to work with, the watch only comes with three faces loaded on the device itself. In fact, that's the maximum number it can take, at least out of the box. The already vibrant modding scene could figure a way around that in the future, but even so, the GTR is clearly meant to be lighter on the software side of things, with many bits and pieces of customization and functionality hosted on the smartphone side of things and provided as needed.

That is especially true for the watch faces. The Amazfit app has a surprisingly healthy and growing number of faces up on offer (72 at the time of writing). Choosing one of these is followed by a rather slow process of transferring said style on the watch via Bluetooth in place of one of the default three. It's the same system that other Amazfit devices like the Bip utilize, and it is definitely good enough for the average consumer. Less than ideal if you are the kind of person who likes to frequently change-up styles. As for that pool of 72 available faces, it only includes the ones officially provided by Huami. Like we already mentioned, the GTR, just like other Amazfit devices, has a vibrant and buzzing modding community. So, with a few easy extra steps, you can have access to hundreds of additional styles. But, more on that in a bit.

As for functionality on the watch faces themselves, you can expect a varying amount of visualized data, but no interactivity. There are no customizable complications, like the ones on Samsung wearables or anything of the sort. Still, certain watch faces do include things like a live heart-rate readout, steps, distance, and calorie counters, as well as things like Bluetooth connectivity status and do not disturb mode indicators. Most users should be covered.

Speaking of interactivity, the GTR foes offer a bit of it, easily accessible from the home screen. Beyond the two extra interfaces to the left and right and the customizable quick start-up button we already mentioned, there is also a sort of quick toggles interface available when you swipe down from the top of the watch face.

In the order they appear, the features here include: Flashlight - which simply blasts a white image at max brightness on the wearable's display. Then there is brightness control, complete with a manual slider as well as an auto mode. The latter relies on a luminance sensor underneath the OLD panel and actually works pretty well. Especially nifty outdoors. Do not disturb mode affects the notification on the GTR itself, rather than reaching over and controlling the same setting on your phone. You can have it manually on or off, as well as on a schedule. The latter lacks weekly functionality, though. There is also a smart option, which toggles DnD when the GTR detects you are sleeping. Also nifty and surprisingly well implemented.

On the bottom role, there is battery saver, which turns the GTR into a simple watch, no Bluetooth, no Notifications, or specific activity tracking. It does still keep a step counter and sleep data, which you can make use of once you sync the GTR with the app. Huami claims that in this basic watch mode, the 42mm GTR can last 34 days on a single charge and a whopping 74 days for its bigger sibling. Last, but not least, the final option in this toggle area lets you lock the GTR and its touch screen, which is particularly handy while you are in the water. Water and capacitive touch typically do not play well together.

Swiping up from the watchface opens up the main menu, of sorts. Most options in the scrolling list are pretty self-explanatory. Status is a readout of your daily steps, calories, distance traveled and the number of times you stood up for the current day so far. The same interface is also accessible by tapping on the corresponding screen a swipe to the right of the watch face.

In the same way Heart rate is another way you can access the interface for taking a bps measurement on demand. If you prefer for the GTR to do that through its own volition, there are various options for that as well, including at timed intervals during the day and while you sleep and as part of active activity tracking sessions.

We won't really go through all the self-evident options, some of which are hidden away, rather inexplicably in a "More" section, but there are a few other interesting notes to make of some of the features. Weather relies on your connected phone to pull data. The same is true, in a way, for the Music app as well. It is just a remote for a player on your smartphone. The Amazfit GTR doesn't have enough memory of its own to store local music on the wearable itself. It also lacks streaming services and capabilities, so all you get is a multimedia remote. On the plus side, it does work pretty well, and most every app we tried that recognizes the standard Android play, pause, and next commands works great. You even get volume controls.

The Event reminder is kind of a bummer. While it does work well enough, it does not offer any integration with a third-party calendar app. Instead, you can only use it by setting events through the Amazfit app on the phone.

Battery life

If there's one main feature that sets the GTR apart from pretty much all of its competitors, it is battery life. That does require some extra clarification, though. Let's put it this way; if you want a wearable with a full size display and a classic wristwatch form factor, while enjoying the best battery life possible, then the Amazfit GTR is probably the current champion.

And believe us when we say, we've been keeping an eye on the industry for a device that meets these exact criteria for some time now. If you are happy with how the Amazfit Bip looks, it can still offer better battery life, a comparable feature set and a much lower price tag. It is also kind of undisputed in this regard within its respective wearable niche.

Huami is specific when it comes to its battery life estimates. We shouldn't forget that we are talking about an very small 410mAh battery being stretched-out to last over a whopping 74 days. That means that variance in your own personal use case as little as getting 200 notifications a day instead of 150, can put a dent in the battery measured in days.

We confirm we got the advertised 24 days on a single charge out of the 47mm Amazfit GTR (yes, it's been with us for a while now). That being said, we also looked around for other people's experiences since we have been genuinely impressed with how well Amazfit devices handle their tiny batteries. Most reviews and impressions agree that you can pretty much expect the battery to last you close to a month.

That being said, if you are after an Amazfit GTR of your own, we should note that there have been multiple reports of a defective battery batch, of sorts. Most users with such dud devices claim their units came with absolutely no charge out of the box, which is odd in itself, and then tend to discharge at a rate of up to 1% an hour. If you end up in this situation, definitely reach out out to the seller or Huami.

Pretty much in line with Huami's own measurements, our review unit charges in just shy of two hours. Like we already mentioned in the design section, the design of choice for the magnetic charging base is not ideal. We suggest leaving the GTR alone and far away from any vibration or accidental bumps while charging since the connection is disturbed relatively easily.

Notifications

For many smart wearable users, this reviewer included, the bread and butter of the wearable experience are notifications. The Amazfit GTR has its strengths and weaknesses in this area. Notification forwarding is done in a rather robust manner. The Amazfit App requests OS-level notification access, then walks you through a slightly confusing, but mostly helpful tutorial on how to give the background service the best chance to not get killed by your particular flavor of Android.

Then, you have to manually select every app you want to get notifications from on the GTR. Nothing is pre-selected, and nothing not on the list can ever get through. It does make for a rather lengthy initial setup process but does end up being quite versatile.

The only thing better would be to differentiate between various notification channels form any given app and offer on and off toggles for these separately.

Notifications on the Amazfit GTR

On the GTR itself, every notification triggers a configurable vibration pattern and wakes up the display. No sound, though, since the GTR lacks any hardware speaker. Text within the notification UI is pretty legible. You also get an app icon on top.

The whole thing is far from perfect, though, mostly since Amazfit's notification pickup and forwarding service often times fails to properly parse a notification and get the right data from it to send to the watch. Hence, for many apps you end up with a generic app icon. Worse still, however, often you don't even get the title or the body of the notification. What you end up with is a rather generic note - you have received some notification for something, check your phone. While is just about the same information my phone already conveyed to me by simply vibrating.

This does kind of make the whole thing superfluous. However, thanks to that vibrant modding scene we keep mentioning so often and its interest in Amazfit products, there are already third-party app solutions that do a better job at forwarding notifications on the GTR. And judging by the Amazfit Bip, the number of these third-party software endeavors will likely only grow in the future. If you are interested in some we tested out and how much better and more usable they make the GTR skip on over to the next software section.

Notifications on the Amazfit GTR

Rounding-off the notification features on the GTR there is a notification item in the main menu. Here you can get a list of all current notifications. In the sense that they are still present on you phone as well. If you swipe any notification on this list from right to left and then press on the delete button it will disappear from the wearable as well as the phone. Doing the same on the phone technically works the other way around as well, but certain notifications still fail to disappear on the GTR in this case.

Text message and call notifications get their own enable and disable options in the Amazfit app. Generally, these work pretty well. The latter offers up a number, as well as caller name if you have one in your contact list. Plus, there are options to hang up and suppress the ringing.

We should note that prior to a couple of software updates on the GTR and a few factory restarts, we did experience a rather nasty issue where the wearable would get confused and start vibrating for outgoing calls as well. Worse still, it never actually stopped vibrating while in this state until manually cancelled. Not ideal, but it does seem to be fixed now.

All things considered, Huami managed to put down a solid foundation for notifications on the Amazfit GTR, but there are still bugs to fix and features to polish. We can only assume that many of these base features get transplanted and ported from other Huami devices, so getting it just right might take some work.

Activity tracking

This is the other spotlight feature of a modern smart wearable. Despite not really looking the part, the GTR is perfectly well-equipped for the task. In fact, thanks to its relatively fancy PPG biological tracking sensor, along with a 6-axis accelerometer, 3-axic geomagnetic sensor, barometer, and GPS, it is surprisingly aware of both its wearer and surrounding. The amount of activity data the GTR tracks is pretty impressive. Even overwhelming at times. Plus, Huami has done a great job organizing and plotting/charting all of it for viewing both on the wearable as well as in the Amazfit app.

Cycling activity report

It is worth noting though that certain data the GTR claims to track is merely extrapolated using fancy algorithms - things like VO2max and other breathing data. You need specialized equipment for those kinds of metrics. Still, it's nice to see Huami going the extra mile in the activity tracking department.

That approach and attention to detail are pretty evident from the sheer amount of activities the GTR supports as well as the surprising depth of some of the options on offer. As you are starting a new exercise on the GTR, it offers a nifty estimate of the total tracking time you can expect based on your current battery level. It's not exactly precise since it takes into account GPS usage as well and not all activities actively utilize the positioning. So, it's sort of the worst case scenario.

Speaking of which, all the different activity types get their own tracking setup and specific options. The ones you do outdoors typically leverage GPS positioning, but can also be forced to work without a location lock. It is worth noting that the latter can take some time on the GTR since it lacks an active network connection and only has the most recent A-GPS package last synced from the smartphone to work with.

Waiting for a GPS lock does have its benefits, though, like the Auto pause feature. The GTR does a pretty good job at estimating when you have stopped an activity and are resting. Then resume on its own with minimal tracking data loss. Having GPS active also allows for some nifty reminders during some activity sessions, like running. You can, for instance, have the GTR notify you after every kilometer or if your pace drops below a certain level. There are a couple of other reminders related to heart rate.

You can have the watch fire off a warning if you exceed a certain bps threshold or even nudge you if it detects you are outside a custom range you choose. You can also set goals on a per-workout basis in distance, duration or calories. Like we said - surprisingly in-depth activity tracking features. Huami really put some extra care and attention in here. It's the little things that really make a difference, like the fact that you can set a lap distance for indoor swimming.

And yes, in case you were wondering since there is a certain vagueness when it comes to ATM ratings, Huami feels confident that the 5ATM rating on the GTR allows you to go for a swim with the watch. Both indoor and outdoor, in fact. Although, that being said, we still wouldn't subject the poor thing to saltwater willingly. Electronics and salt just don't mix in our book.

Official and third-party apps

The official Amazfit app already has quite a few iterations under its belt and hence plenty of time to improve and polish the experience. That was definitely time well spent, since in its current state the Android app we tested both works and looks great.

Amazfit app main interface

It is worth bringing up, though, that the Amazfit app is a health hub of sorts with functionality way beyond any wearable and the GTR in particular. That's why you get various statistics and historical data as well as quick shortcuts to initiate walking, running or cycling tracking front and center on the main app interface.

Detailed workout tracking data

The Amazfit app can pull data from various other devices and sources and does a pretty impressive job of visualising it. No complaints there. The actual settings pertaining to the Amazfit GTR are placed within a separate interface in the Profile section of the app.

Amazfit GTR settings

Most of these are pretty self-explanatory, so we won't go into too much detail. Beyond what you can see for yourself in the screenshots, it is worth noting that the initial pairing process for the GTR is a bit wonky. It takes a surprisingly long time and we had to resort to unpairing and pairing again between some major GTR software updates to fix the odd issue.

To Huami's credit, though, once the GTR is set up, the connection is very stable - it's definitely an improvement over the original Amazfit Bip.

It should be noted, though, that the stability of the connection is very dependent on the Amazfit service remaining alive and functional in the background of your phone. On most modern Android smartphones you need to take at least a few steps to ensure the service has the best possible chance. The Amazfit app even offers some mostly correct per-brand instructions of its own. You might have to live with a persistent notification in your status bar. On the plus side, we had no issue with battery drain from the Amazfit app itself working in the background on our phones.

Amazfit GTR features and options

Most of the GTR features don't really require any additional explanation. We already pointed out the per-app notification forwarding scheme Huami has adopted and its versatility. The discoverable and sharing options are worth a mention. These are not really well explained within the app itself, but the general idea is to make the GTR and its data visible and accessible to other supported surrounding devices. You can read up further on the feature if you are interested since it does take some researching to find out exactly which devices can work together. That being said, most of what we found support for online was part of Xiaomi's smart ecosystem, which definitely makes sense.

Amazfit GTR features and options

Custom vibration settings was definitely a nice and pleasant little extra to find inside the Amazfit app. Since the GTR is mainly meant to convey information to the user by vibrating it makes sense that one might want to differentiate between different events with different vibration patterns. Another nifty quality of life option is the ability to re-arrange all the items in the main menu of the watch itself. You can simply drag and drop these in a more convenient order. Anything you don't need can be hidden away from the GTR's interface until further notice as well.

That's for the official side of things. Like we mentioned on several occasions, Amazfit devices tend to attract a rather dedicated modding and tinkering community. It is in part due to their relatively more affordable price, or rather better value than competitors. And also, in no small part, thanks to the relative consistency in most communication and software aspects of said products and their relative straight-forward nature. That is to say, Huami does not extend too much effort into securing its resources or communication channels, smart users figure these out and we quickly end up with third party apps and watch face repositories for extra value out of the Amazfit wearables.

AmazFaces app

The GTR is still a relatively new device, so the modding scene isn't quite as vibrant as for something like the original Amazfit Bip. Still, things are picking up. We are not really in the habit of endorsing any non-official software, but we feel fairly safe in pointing you to a few resources. Like the AmazFaces app on the Google Play Store. It already has over 1000 user-created GTR watch faces in its repository and a very comprehensive tutorial on how to use them. Some custom watchfaces could lead to increased battery drain, though, which should be noted.

Notify and Fitness for Amazfit is another third-party app we have used for ourselves and are pretty pleased with. It is pretty much a drop-in replacement for the official Amazfit app. It does tend to handle notification forwarding a bit better than the default. That alone makes it worth checking out. The same goes for the descriptively named Alert Bridge for Amazfit and Mi Band. It is much simpler in terms of functionality and is meant to only be a notification bridge. Still, you might have better luck with it, depending on your particular messengers and other apps of choice.

Competition

Wearable tech has definitely come a long way in recent years. There are plenty of options out there, covering pretty much every use case and taste. So much so, in fact, that it's getting increasingly easy to get lost in the growing sea of wearables.

Left to right: Xiaomi Mi Band 4, Amazfit Bip, Huawei Watch GT 2, Amazfit GTR

You really have to get your priorities well sorted out first to pick a device that works best for your needs. If you are the type of person who enjoys advanced and flexible features, the kind that only an actual app ecosystem can provide, then you should probably look into a proper smartwatch. Google's own WearOS has been declining in popularity lately, but there are still some great options from Fossil, like the Sport. TicWatch is also a big player in the niche with nifty offers like the E2, Pro and S2, to name a few.

Samsung Galaxy Watch • Apple Watch Series 5

Samsung deserves a mention for its persistence with the Tizen platform. Once overshadowed by WearOS, it is now arguably even more potent and application-rich than its Google competitor. And last, but not least, the king of the hill - Apple's own Watch family of devices, which hardly need any introduction or advertisement at this point.

Going for a full-featured smartwatch has its perks. You typically get all the bells and whistles, including advanced activity sensors, GPS, even some multimedia capabilities here and there. What you end up sacrificing is battery life. Having to charge one more device on a daily basis is just a deal-breaker for many users.

Top to bottom: Xiaomi Mi Band 4, Amazfit Bip, Huawei Watch GT 2, Amazfit GTR

Addressing this, on the other end of the spectrum are smart activity trackers like the exceedingly popular Xiaomi Mi Band family. These typically have battery life measured in weeks. All the while, features like notifications and even advanced tracking sensors and GPS on devices like the Huawei Band 3 Pro have been steadily shrinking the gap between them and smartwatches. If activity tracking is your main priority and you generally don't mind a sportier look, then definitely delve into this wearable niche. You'll save a few bucks in the process as well.

Huawei Watch GT 2

Then there are devices like the Amazfit GTR that don't necessarily fit in either of the above clear-cut categories. A classic watch aesthetic, combined with less versatile, but more energy-efficient software, these new devices tend to strive for a nice balance. And Huami is definitely not alone in this niche either. Huawei and the Watch GT 2, in particular, are after the same market. Pushing a device big on both looks and endurance. If you are looking for as close an alternative to the Amazfit GTR as possible, then definitely look no further than Huawei's offer.

Final thoughts

Devices like the Amazfit GTR illustrate the progress made in the smart wearable market. The odd tech niche was reinvigorated fairly recently after a long pause, waiting for technology to catch up. Since then, manufacturers have been thrashing back and forth between features and functionality, looks and utility, power and endurance.

Left: Xiaomi Mi Band 4, Right: Amazfit GTR

The GTR proves you can make a solid middle-ground choice work. Now, it's just a matter of striking the exact balance for the widest possible appeal. Honestly, the GTR came pretty close in our book. That being said, there is still plenty of room for refinement. Software, especially, sticks out as a long-standing sore point for Huami. A company that has otherwise proven time and time again it can delivery properly designed, quality hardware.

Even taking the odd bug and quirk into consideration, we still think the Amazfit GTR deserves a solid recommendation overall. Just be sure to familiarise yourself with what exactly it has to offer before you pull the trigger.

Pros

• Stylish exterior with great build quality
• Amazing, class-leading battery life
• Vibrant and very sharp OLED display
• Activity tracking works surprisingly well and is really in-depth

Cons

• Aluminum might be prone to easier scratching
• The display has a bit too much glare in bright sunlight
• The buttons look good, but feel a bit mushy
• The charging base is a bit too small and causes issues
• There is no official way of sideloading additional watchfaces. Still, the modding community is very active
• There are some minor software glitches here and there
• Buttons are very underutilized and navigation needs some work
• UI is a bit slow at times and wake-up times could definitely use some optimization as well
• No onboard speaker so no sound alerts of any kind

Let's block ads! (Why?)