Heart rate monitor watches are gaining popularity. These smartwatches come in a wide variety of colourful straps and can monitor your heart rate whether you’re being active on your fitness pedestal or just chilling on your couch.
Though heart rate monitors aren’t always extremely accurate, they are a good enough estimate of where your heart rate lies between exercise and rest. These heart rate monitor smart watches get more and more innovative in the market with varying features dedicated to sports activities, GPS, sleep tracking, fitness tracking, music storage capabilities, and many more.
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From Garmin to Apple, how do we decide on the one that’s right for us? Not to worry as we have listed 8 of the best ones to help narrow down your search.
Top 8 Heart Rate Monitor Watches in Malaysia
Why It’s Our Top Pick:
“We feel that Fitbit Luxe is an all-rounder heart rate monitor watch. With a sustainable battery life for up to 5 days, its heart rate monitoring is remarkable making it one of the best to have on your wrist whilst you’re active with sports. Sleek and attractive, this smartwatch is a great daily booster for helping you keep up with your health habits.
To top that, with excellent health monitoring tools, and the competency to support the Fitbit app and ecosystem, the Fitbit Luxe is another one of the best Fitbit ranges you don’t want to miss out on.”
Features:
With regards to its specifications, Fitbit Luxe comes with a 0.76-inch AMOLED power display that is protected by a Corning Gorilla glass. It comprises a heart rate sensor, accelerometer, and red and infrared sensors for oxygen saturation (Sp02) monitoring.
Performance:
The smartwatch’s SpO2 blood oxygen monitoring enables you to check your oxygen level in your blood so that you can be aware of any vital changes in your fitness and wellness. Its in-app Cardio Fitness Score educates you on how you can improve your fitness level over time. Besides, the Active Zone Minutes alerts you when you’ve entered your personalized target heart rate zone during workouts.
2 more points
This Suunto 9 Baro Smartwatch is noted to be a high-end sports watch that fits ideally for the needs of cyclists and other high endurance athletes.
Features:
Featuring robust GPS capabilities, weather forecasts, and navigation features, this smartwatch can also track heart rate, sleep data, and numerous other activity metrics. The Scandinavian-designed smartwatch is made with durable materials such as Suunto 9 Baro Titanium and sapphire crystal glass which is resistant to scratches. It comes with a 1.4-inch Matrix LCD that is bright enough to make it easily readable under sunlight.
Performance:
This comprehensive fitness tracker of a smartwatch comes with more than 80 sports modes and can even track your statistics such as training effects, training load, recovery, and general fitness level. Besides, it supports several sports services such as Strava, Endomondo, MapMyRun, and many more. Just from a single charge, this smartwatch’s consistent GPS tracking can sustain up to 120 hours, which makes it great for tracking long hours of activities. Despite using it for various purposes, this smartwatch can sustain up to 14 days of battery life.
2 more points
Understand your body better with better monitoring of your heart health, stress management, skin temperature conditions and more thanks to Fitbit Sense.
Features:
This smartwatch comprises an ECG, stress tracking, and body temperature monitoring. It also comes with a loudspeaker and microphone that enables Bluetooth calling. With a 1.58-inch AMOLED display, be sure to expect better and more vivid information at your best viewing.
Performance:
This comprehensive fitness tracker boasts an ECG tracking that can detect irregular heart rhythm. Its innovative stress monitoring app alerts you when you’re feeling stressed, while its temperature-monitoring feature detects abnormal body temperature while you snooze. Thanks to its in-built GPS, you can conveniently track your pace and distance on your runs, walks, etc.
Apart from tracking activities and calories, Fitbit Sense even tracks the menstrual cycle for women, blood oxygen, inactive modes. Expect up to 6 days and beyond of battery life, from just a single charge.
3 more points
Thanks to a large and high-resolution touchscreen and user-friendly features, Fossil Gen 5 is a great watch to be worn by senior folks.
Features:
Apart from heart rate monitoring, this smartwatch features a sleep and activity tracker, built-in GPS, and an energy-saving mode. The 46mm touchscreen smartwatch comes with an integrated Google Fit health-tracking app. It is powered with Wear OS by Google to offer you accessible health insights. The smartwatch also features a Google Pay, speaker, and 8GB storage to download and store more apps and music.
Performance:
This swim-proof smartwatch is capable of working on its own without having your phone nearby thanks to its untethered GPS. Together with its Accelerometer, Altimeter and Gyroscope sensors, and its heart rate feature, it can monitor and display your real-time heart rate. Powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon processor, you're able to activate your Google voice assistant for seamless hands-free assistance. However, this smartwatch can only sustain up to 24 hours or more after a 2-hour charge.
1 more point
Overview
Using the new WatchOS 9, the Apple Watch Series 8 runs faster than its predecessor as it improves the speed and the performance of the smartwatch. Furthermore, it also comes with a body temperature sensor that reads your body temperature and alerts you when it detects an abnormal temperature. To add, this smartwatch has a car crash detection system, which will alert the authorities and your emergency contact when you have suffered a car crash.
Apple Watch Series 8 Specifications
- Display: Retina LTPO OLED
- Resolution: 484 x 396 pixels
- Sensors: Accelerometer, gyro, heart rate, barometer, always-on altimeter, compass, Sp02
- Connectivity: Bluetooth 5.3
- Weight: 51.5g
- Dimensions: 45 x 38 x 10.7 mm
Who Is This For?
If you’re in the market for a smartphone with good performance, the Apple Watch Series 8 is the one for you. It reads your body temperature alongside your heart rate and has a car crash detection system so if you care about your health and protection, this might be for you.
3 more points
Overview
The Fitbit Inspire 3 comes with a bright, colourful AMOLED display and provides a detailed read on your health, allowing you to keep track of your body and understand what it needs to keep fit and healthy.
Alongside that is the long-lasting battery life that can power through your hectic schedule. With the heart rate monitor watch lasting up to 10 days, you can wear it for long periods before having to charge the watch which is great for those who are always busying around.
Fitbit Inspire 3 Specifications
- Display: Colour AMOLED display
- Resolution: 206 x 124 pixels
- Sensors: Optical heart-rate monitor, Sp02, 3-axis accelerometer, ambient light, vibration motor
- Connectivity: Bluetooth 5.0
- Weight: 17.69g
- Dimensions: 39.32 x 18.6 x 11.75mm
Who Is This For?
For those looking for a lightweight and affordable heart rate monitor watch, the Fitbit Inspire 3 is the perfect watch for you. Not only is it lightweight, but it has a long-lasting battery life and shows you a detailed analysis of your health, both physically and mentally. They’re also great for those with smaller/thinner wrists.
4 more points
Overview
The Garmin vivosmart 5 prioritises your comfort, making sure you feel comfortable while wearing it as you can switch out your bands to another one that feels suitable for your wrist. Aside from that, the heart rate monitor watch has emergency assistance features that will automatically contact the authorities and your emergency contact when it detects that you are in a state of emergency.
Garmin vivosmart 5 Specifications
- Display: Monochrome OLED
- Resolution: 88 x 154 pixels
- Sensors: Accelerometer, Ambient Light, heart rate monitor, Sp02
- Connectivity: Bluetooth Smart, ANT+
- Weight: 26.5g
- Dimensions: 19.5 x 10.7 x 255 mm
Who Is This For?
This heart rate monitor watch is perfect for those wanting to have a comfortable watch that accurately reads their heart rate which is vital for those with high and low blood pressure. With emergency assistance features and good battery life, the Garmin vivosmart 5 will be protecting you at all times throughout the day.
4 more points
Overview
The Fitbit Versa 4 comes with a slim, lightweight design that makes it a breeze to carry around. Alongside it is the upgraded interface, which is easy to navigate around. And lastly, there is also a long battery life, allowing it to read your heart rate as well as your health for the whole day without having to worry about the smartwatch shutting down.
Fitbit Versa 4 Specifications
- Display: AMOLED
- Resolution: 300 x 300 pixels
- Sensors: Accelerometer, altimeter, ambient light, barometer, heart rate monitor, Sp02, vibration motor
- Connectivity: Bluetooth 5.0
- Weight: 37.64g
- Dimensions: 40.4 x 40.4 x 11.2 mm
Who Is This For?
This heart rate monitor watch is perfect for the simple everyday Joe making their way through the galaxy. With a simple interface and a slim design, you can look cool while having your heart rate checked out with the Fitbit Versa 4.
How accurate are heart rate monitor watches?
Studies have shown that heart rate monitor watches aren’t nearly as accurate as chest-worn heart monitors. What are the differences between these two?
Chest-worn heart rate monitors
It consists of a transmitter that is fixed to a belt worn around the chest and a receiver worn on the wrist. The transmitter then receives the electric signal and sends this signal that contains heart rate data to the wrist receiver which then ultimately displays the heart rate.
Heart rate monitor watches
These monitors, on the other hand, use optical sensors to detect the blood flowing through your veins. However, as the optical heart rate sensors read your blood flow whilst being farther from the heart, its accuracy is lower.
Though chest-worn heart monitors are suitable for heart patients who need to ensure that they’re within the safe confines of physician-recommended heart rate thresholds, heart rate monitor watches are growing incredibly popular among the average health conscious individuals. While it is advised that you take several measurements to capture the most accurate reading, the advanced and improved features on these smartwatches still serve their purpose well in being a great tracker to achieve your fitness and health goals.
