I purchased a sense 2...but after reading all these reviews, what other watch should I consider?

[EmRG]

I just purchased a Fitbit Sense 2 and was looking forward to it. I had a horrible experience with my last Garmin (Venu 3), soooo many broken features and inaccurate sensors, and thought I'd switch back to the brand I had purchased my very first tracker from - Fitbit (back in 2015) I loved them for years until Google acquired them and users had to begin paying monthly to access their full data profile...so I switched to Garmin. But now I'm back! And boy oh boy. These reviews are making me nervous. Do you guys have any recommendations for a watch that's got an accurate HR sensor, good sleep tracking, and good battery life? 

[mamaberuang]

Charge 6 is promoted as having more accurate heart rate sensor compared to other Fitbits. I loved my original Sense, switched to Sense 2 and regret it a bit. I think no smart watch can have perfect heart rate sensor but they suit my need. The sleep tracking is good enough. The app is buggy sometimes.

[Guy_]

Hi @EmRG - it sounds like your Venu 3 may have had a fault, did you try to get a replacement? It does so much more correctly than any Fitbit and has a 14 day battery life and great phone app with dark mode.

[EmRG]

I had 2 replacements sent in exchanges and both had the same issues. I slept for 9 hours one night and the watch tracked 2 hours. It was horrible because then that would impact the body battery feature which would then impact the stress feature and it was a whole mess. Garmin customer service was great for the most part. But other than that, my experience was terrible. The app sucks. Totally not user friendly, anything I wanted to see was buried in menus within menus with no rhyme or reason...the GPS was EXTREMELY slow to connect, sometimes taking an upwards of 3-5 minutes. I had an awful experience with that particular watch (Venu 3) and honestly could never bring myself to recommend Garmin to anyone. They're a GPS company that does little more than that...I'd opt for a coros or polar before ever buying Garmin after what I went through.

[Guy_]

Thanks @EmRG - strange, haven't had a problem with my Venu 2 Plus (in nearly 2 years) and like the app for reporting information, it has performed well for what I use it for and has good battery life. Admittedly configuration is a bit quirky.

[EmRG]

The huge problem was the fact that the watch couldn't seem to detect when I was at rest. So it just kept insisting that my stress levels were through the roof even while I was sleeping. My sister has a vivo and really likes it. That's why I wanted to give them a try...but not one single thing reported to me was accurate. Other than steps. It also had trouble with auto activity tracking. I'm so used to my old fitbits starting up my walks/elliptical sessions for me. Fabulous activity tracking. But the garmin (with the setting turned on) only ever auto detected 2 of my walks and it missed more than half of said walks...I just wanted to crush that watch under my heel one too many times to justify keeping the thing haha! Just looking at it began to annoy me! Hopefully fitbit hasn't changed too much in the couple years I've been gone. If I wasn't an android user, I'd probably just pull the trigger on an apple watch ultra. But I can't justify handing that amount of money over to companies who brag about a 36 hour battery life! They can do better.

[LSQ]

Straight out of the box I was getting only 24 hour battery life on the Sense 2. I had SPO2 app installed, and it was KILLING the battery. I uninstalled it, and I'm getting about 5 days of battery life now. I'm also unimpressed that Alexa cannot control the device. I had a Pixel Watch 2 that did everything seemlessly with Google Assistant. Unfortunately, it didn't detect heart rate properly when working out.

I can't help but feel like the Sense 2 is a demo. It feels like they missed what they were shooting for... I mean, you pick the wrong clock face and you kill the battery, yet again. This should be optimized so that doesn't happen.