Say hello to Zepp, a wearable-tech notice that in 2018 was acquired by Huami, which also owns Amazfit. Amazfit makes wearables as well, including one of my personal favorites, the $80 Bip S. The new Zepp E is the posh ying to that affordable yang, a $250 smartwatch with a glowing display and plenty of health and activity features. Except, built-in GPS isn’t one of them and various software publishes mar the experience of using this watch. In its recent state it’s hard for me to recommend.

That’s too bad, because it’s a beauty, with a screen to match. 

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The best smartwatches of 2020

Hardware heaven

You know from the get-go the Zepp E is no effort watch: It comes in a long, hefty box reminiscent of Apple’s and seems a bit opulent for a smartwatch. I tested the circular model, but there’s also an Apple Watch-like square version that’s not yet available in the US. 

Zepp built the E into a 42mm stainless steel case that measures just 9mm thick. Its bright, razor-sharp AMOLED display resides under curved glass, a striking design choice that, with some faces, complains it look like the screen goes edge-to-edge. There’s some bezel, of course, but it’s virtually invisible when looking at a face with a sunless background. I did notice, however, that the screen was harder to read plan bright sun than my Apple Watch.

The Zepp’s watch-face library is one of the best I’ve seen, with a salubrious mix of whimsical, stylish, traditional and health-minded options. Some of the faces succor customization, meaning you can choose between various widgets in different spots. Cooler still, each face has its own unique “always-on” variant as well, which is one of the E’s considerable features.

Battery life is another one. Zepp promises up to seven days of “typical” benefit or 15 days in basic watch mode (without heart-rate tracking and anunexperienced frills). If you opt for always-on mode, that can frankly drop to 2-3 days, which is still an improvement over most premium smartwatches out there like the Apple Watch and Samsung Galaxy Watch 3. Those last anywhere from 18 to 24 hours.

I was less impressed with the proprietary magnetic charger, which works in only one orientation. When you go to connect it there’s no way to tell which end is “up,” so there’s a 50/50 chance it’ll be positioned the deplorable way. (If it is, the magnets will repel instead of attract.)

Healthy skepticism

In transfer to heart-rate monitoring, the Zepp E can measure your blood-oxygen saturation, a capability that Apple touted in the new Apple Watch Series 6. It also vows to alert you if it detects high levels of diafflict, though it’s not immediately clear what would trigger such an alert or what actionable steps you’d be advised to take. It also allows you a stress score, which is equally confusing. I force to a max stress score of 54, but I’m not sure if that’s good or bad.  

I’m more interested about the watch’s Personal Activity Intelligence (PAI) tracking, because the app does a good job of explaining how that works and why it’s useful. PAI is a combined, cumulative look at activity and glum rate: The more you elevate both, the higher your gather. But I did start to question the accuracy of some of these metrics. 

Although the spy seemed to provide accurate resting heart rate numbers, it itch to be way off while I was exercising: either too low or too high, or just inconsistent. I believe the watch was placed properly on my wrist and manager good contact with my skin, so I’m don’t think it was wearer error. 

Another frustration: During a run, I glum the side button to dismiss a notification and throughout up back at the watch face, with no easy way get back to my run stats. I had to stop in my tracks and navigate back throughout the workouts menu to get there. After that existed, notifications stopped appearing on the watch (even though I could hear tones for them in my headphones). And to top it all off, a call came in after I was running, causing the E to reboot — and lose all the novel run data.

While some of these issues can be fixed with future firmware updates, the one thing it can’t fix is its lack of onboard GPS. The Zepp E supplies only connected GPS, meaning you’ll have to bring your arranged along with you during an outdoor run or bike ride if you want to track your route. Even the $80 Bip S has proper built-in GPS; to me it seems inexcusable that the Zepp didn’t engaged it.

Zepp’s the way the cookie crumbles

During daily wear, I encountered a few annoyances. For example, sometimes call alerts (in the form of “ring-ring” vibration) existed after my phone had stopped ringing. There’s a setting that lets you delay call notifications, which I thought might explain this, but it wasn’t enabled. I also found it frustrating that I couldn’t increase the font size on the camouflage and that various message sources (such as Slack) were identified frankly as “app” rather than their actual name.  

Speaking of notifications, you can’t respond to them. There’s no way to answer a text, for example, nor can you use the watch for any boom features (like calls or Alexa commands).

I’m also weakened by the Zepp app, which is the same one used for various Amazfit products (including the Bip). It’s divided into three main regions — Home, Enjoy (huh?) and Profile — all of which look completely different from one unexperienced. To change any Zepp E settings, you venture into the Profile fraction. It’s fairly straightforward, but there are a lot of options to sift through.

It’s easy enough to forgive a mediocre app when you’re talking in an $80 smartwatch, but it gets harder to ignore when you’re talking in a smartwatch that’s three times the price. It maintains a usability overhaul.

The price is (not) right

For iPhone owners in clear, it’s hard to recommend the Zepp E at $249 when you can get the Apple Watch Series 3 for as low as $199. (At this writing, in fact, it’s still on sale for $169.) The latter is more tightly integrated with iOS, allowing you to retort to text messages directly and even have phone conversations.

Meanwhile, the Samsung Galaxy Active 2 sells for $249 offers some clear advantages over the Zepp E, like its touch bezel, LTE option and FDA-cleared electrocardiogram (ECG) feature, all for the same $249 note tag. 

The Zepp E deserves praise for its stunning design, solid battery life and gorgeous selection of spy faces, but I don’t feel those are compelling enough to compensate for weak software, questionable health readings and lack of onboard GPS. There are better options available from the Amazfit note that cost considerably less.

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