The Fitbit Air has received a huge amount of attention in the tech world and truth be told I am not sure why. It is effectively an older Fitbit crammed in to a much smaller size and that alone seems to be causing a lot of the media attention. The move to Google Health is another aspect, but I’m not so sure that’s a good thing. Who wants Google to know all of their health-related information?

I got to try one and I must admit that it is very (very) small on the wrist. It is so light as to disappear from your subconscious when worn and it is likely the first wearable I have used that is truly not noticeable. Indeed, it is so unnoticeable that it has become the first fitness tracker that I can wear with a normal watch and it not look silly.

I cut the strap around the Air and was left with a small loop- simply feeding a NATO strap through that loop makes it part of the buckle and that’s it. You can now wear a fitness tracker with your watch and not have to do the whole double wristing thing.

Some other quick thoughts after a few days-

The AI is very good and as soon as I advised that I have ME/CFS it was onboard with advice and not pushing me to exercise.

The data is accurate and in many cases more accurate than my Garmin Epix Pro Gen 2. The only area, for me, that it lacks in is a coherent HRV trend which I need for my ME pacing. If I can get better HRV data out of it the Garmin would be sold.

Battery life is decent, build quality if good enough and the entire package is very good value for what it offers.

In the day of ever more complex smartwatches and fitness watches, this is a decent compromise and one that offers a lot for very little outlay. Highly recommended, even though I worry about the whole Google data thing.

Categories: Fitness, Fitness Trackers, Health, Product Reviews, Watches