Not to be outdone by this year’s Apple event, Huawei has revealed an impressive lineup of six new watches.
Huawei’s new generation of its best smartwatches includes the Huawei Watch GT5 in 41mm and 46mm sizes, the Huawei Watch GT5 Pro (again, in both sizes), the Huawei Watch D2, and a new Huawei Watch Ultimate in golfing green. We’ll be reviewing each watch in due course, but let’s dive in and look at each one in detail.
Huawei Watch GT5
The Huawei Watch GT 5 builds on the design of the Huawei Watch GT4, with an octagonal bezel shape said to be inspired by “performance” engineering, such as the locknuts on racing car wheels. The 41mm GT5, like the GT4, is designed to be more fashionable, with a Milanese strap available in addition to the sports-orientated options. Not all pricing is yet known, but we do know the watches will start at £229.99 (approximately AU$445) for the GT5 41mm.
Huawei’s new smartwatch comes with an improved TruSense rear sensor and upgraded algorithms. At a launch briefing, a Huawei representative said the new sensors pack optical light source reorganizations to even out signal distribution, moving the sensors to different positions on the back of the watch and so “addressing the challenge of uneven bloody vessel distribution in skin during data collection”. This apparently enables the watch to collect a wider range of data, and makes for consistently reliable heart rate accuracy.
The ECG app and Huawei’s menstrual cycle tracking are also getting overhauls, with the watch now offering a comprehensive menstrual report in the Huawei Health app. This shows skin temperature trends and how it affects your fertility window.
The new GT5 also has a full keyboard input for the first time, and offers larger fonts and text-to-speech compatibility with WhatsApp, Instagram, Facebook Messenger, Signal and Telegram (as long as you use a Huawei phone).
The Huawei Watch GT5 offers up to 14 days of battery life in smartwatch mode for the 46mm version, and 7 days for the 41mm version.
Huawei Watch GT5 Pro
The Pro version of both watches starts at £329.99 for the 42mm (about AU$640) and has a few upgrades over the standard version. The GT5 Pro allows you to import trails and routes to follow while trail-running using GPX files, with colour map views including a real-time route display. The new dual-band Sunflower technology is said to be 40% more accurate, and during our briefing, it was stated that the watch was more accurate than a Garmin Forerunner 965.
Running and cycling workout profiles have also received an upgrade with comprehensive on-wrist running-form analysis for runners, and cycling computer statistics beamed live to a Huawei phone.
A golf course mode offers support for maps of 15,000 courses, with 3D panoramic fairway views, a virtual scorecard and post-game analysis. Just like the Apple Watch Ultra and the Garmin Fenix 8, free-diving is supported up to 40 meters of depth, the maximum distance required for diving certifications.
A design upgrade is also here, with the GT5 Pro offering a nanocrystal ceramic case, and the smaller 42mm offering the option for a ceramic and titanium bezel with gold leaf facets. Ceramic “is not an easy material to work with” according the Huawei, so finding ceramic smartwatches is relatively rare. Both Pro models are water-resistant to 5ATM, with super-hard glass and super-hard metal coatings.
Huawei Watch D2
A sequel to the Huawei Watch D, which specializes in blood pressure monitoring, the Huawei Watch D2 has seen a radical redesign. It shares the original’s unique strap, with inflatable bladders acting as a wrist-based blood pressure cuff, but the watch itself is very different. We criticized the boxy, protruding shape of the original in our Huawei Watch D review, but the Watch D2 is thinner, looking more like an Apple Watch.
With six days of battery life, the watch is certified to do 24-hour blood pressure monitoring as well as individual readings. A data export function for generating printer-friendly reports, a rotating crown, built-in ECG and the new TruSense sensor with Huawei’s suite of fitness tracking features are all included.
80+ workout modes, dual-band GPS, messaging features and a built-in microphone/speaker make it more like a 'real' smartwatch rather than a specialist health tool. It’s priced at £349.99 (about AU$680).
Huawei Watch Ultimate
Not much has changed here other than the colorway: a fashionable Green Edition with a new ceramic bezel to complement the blue and black colors. Green is for golf, and all Huawei Watch Ultimates (not just the new green variety) will get the new advanced golf mode.
As well as all the benefits of the Pro, the Ultimate gets a new golfing watch face, exclusive Ultimate features like “plays-like distance”, which estimates what your distances to the green is versus how far it feels depending on wind, angle, and so on. You also receive a “last strike distance measurement” with every swing. The Green Edition is priced at £749.99 (about AU$1,500).
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