Samsung Galaxy Watch6 Classic review

Samsung's One UI Watch 5 on top of Wear OS 4

Tizen OS is long gone, so there's no reason to mention it anymore. At first, we were missing Tizen, but after three iterations of Samsung's One UI Watch, we no longer do. The new One UI Watch 5 based on Google's Wear OS 4 is more polished and fluent than ever. Sure, the changes are rather minimal coming from the previous OS version but are worth noting.

The new Galaxy Watch6 Classic is notably faster and smoother in everyday navigation, which also probably due to the higher CPU clock speeds and that extra 0.5GB of RAM.

From a UI standpoint, not much has changed. Even the iconography is the same. Although, there's a minor but noticeable change in the font. It's now bold in most places and it's somewhat easier on the eyes. Legibility is better this way.

Anyway, you can find the quick toggles when you swipe down from the top edge of the display, you can set up and arrange widgets (or Tiles, whatever you like to call them) to your liking. You can use swipe gestures or rotate the bezel when cycling through them. A left turn of the bezel from the home screen will open up the notification pane.

Speaking of the "home screen", that's actually the watch face you choose. Like every new smartwatch release, Samsung is bringing newly designed watchfaces in different categories so you will probably find some that would fit your style.

Home screen, tiles and quick toggles

Luckily, since Wear OS is maturing, so is the modding community. You will find plenty of customized and customizable watch faces on Google Play.

Watch faces

Swiping from the bottom brings out the app drawer, which can also be re-arranged to your liking, while the general Settings menu poses no changes.

App drawer and settings

However, most of the features and functionalities can be found in the Galaxy Wearable app. Stuff like notification handling, sound and vibration, accounts and backup, battery and advanced features.

Galaxy Wearable app

The Advanced features sub-menu allows you to customize the action of the two buttons - double press, single short press or long press. There are three wrist gestures too, which aren't new. One for answering calls, one for dismissing calls and another one that launches an app of your choice. We found the latter to misfire often and the watch often registers an unintentional gesture.

Advanced features and gestures

We are happy to report that Samsung's notification handling remains unrivaled. Each and every app has its own icon (it even syncs the icons with the ones on your phone), and the person who is messaging you has the avatar centered, so you know who it is in an instant. Stickers and received images also get through from the most popular messaging apps. Quick replies are also an option. You can also sync your Do Not Disturb or Bedtime modes, so once you turn them on either device, they will be active on the other.

Notification settings

One thing we don't like about the new notification card styling. It doesn't go well with the circular design. It's a really small issue and a subjective one at that, but we liked the style of the previous messages better. It didn't have any cards or styliing complications - messages appeared on the circular screen, and the UI seemed seamless.

Notifications on the watch

All in all, we liked Samsung's latest software, and we didn't find any annoying or deal-breaking bugs this time around. While previous versions had some issues, this iteration seems to be pretty stable and solid in this regard. Fluent and trouble-less operation.

Samsung Health and fitness tracking

Samsung's Health app and its features have come a long way. The company has expanded on the vitals it tracks and has improved fitness tracking over the years. The Health app on Android phone is also more polished, informative and better in every way. However, we still can't get over the fact that the Samsung Health widget on the phone doesn't give you information about steps, sleep and heart rate for the past few days or week. You have to open the Android app to see such simple stats.

Alongside the ECG and blood pressure measurements, which are not available only when paired with a Samsung phone, the new Galaxy Watch6 Classic also brings irregular heart monitoring and skin temperature measurements during sleep. The former is once again available only to Samsung phone owners.

Samsung Health app

Speaking of sleep, Samsung has worked to improve its sleep measurements, which weren't very accurate, to begin with. But that's usually the case with home-grade devices. In our experience, you can only rely on the total sleep time data - bedtime and wake-up times are also very accurate. Data like deep sleep, REM sleep, etc., is largely unreliable.

Anyway, in addition to the already existing sleep score, which has also been improved as per Samsung, you get a sleeping coach. Once you get a full week of sleeping data, the Health app will offer you coaching that focuses on fixing issues with your sleep. Those can vary a lot - inconsistent sleeping schedule, frequent awakening, not enough deep sleep, etc. Once the software analyzes your sleep, it assigns a Sleep Animal Symbol and tips on how to improve your sleep.

Sleep tracking

In case your watch is connected to smart home appliances, you can set it to automatically kick off Sleep Mode, which would mute your phone's notifications and turn off the lights in the house.

A new personalized heart rate zone is also new on the menu. The watch will identify the heart rate zones for you (as they vary depending on your fitness level and age, among other factors) and guide you on your next run so you can stay within the desired heart rate zone. You can even build a custom workout routine.

The irregular heart rhythm function mentioned earlier is limited to certain countries as it requires additional certification from local regulatory bodies. As of now, only users in Argentina, Azerbaijan, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Georgia, Guatemala, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Panama, UAE, as well as Korea and the US, can make use of the feature. In other markets, this functionality will only work in the background and send notifications to users if an irregular rhythm is detected.

Heart rate stats and history

Two things to note here. Just like ECG and blood pressure, the IHR feature works only with Samsung phones with the additional Samsung Health Monitor app that can only be downloaded from the Galaxy Store. And, of course, Samsung states that all these features can't be used to diagnose or treat certain illnesses. They are only used to guide you and encourage you to visit a licensed physician.

The watch also has a Fall Detection feature. The Watch6 Classic can alert emergency services if it detects a fall during a workout, normal daily activity or even when sleeping. It can also call someone from your emergency contact list.

When it comes to body composition measurements, it's not something new or worth diving into. There's no change in the way the watch measures your lean mass, water and body fat. It's highly inaccurate, as it's usually the case with these home-grade devices, and quite inconsistent depending on the amount of water or food you've consumed throughout the day. That's why Samsung recommends doing it in the morning when fasted and before drinking water.

We would have to acknowledge that while the body composition measurements are deeply flawed, they can still be used by users to track progress over time and have an entry point.

The Watch6 Classic, like its predecessors, supports hundreds of activities and sports, but we found the auto-detection lackluster. Rarely did it kick in to record an automatic workout. But you can always start a manual session, of course. Here's some data from a quick hike.

Hike data

You get plenty of info - from distance and pace to elevation and weather conditions. With GPS active, you can record the route as well. There is plenty of physiological data to go through, too.