While Samsung’s flagship wearable range is headed by the Galaxy Watch Ultra and Galaxy Watch 7, the company also maintains a more affordable line of smartwatches with its new Galaxy Watch FE line, which was introduced to the market some months ago. With that in mind, Samsung promised that the Watch FE would get an upgrade in the form of an LTE variant, which has been recently announced. As such, you might be thinking of what the Galaxy Watch FE offers, especially if you’re after an affordable device from a reputable brand which doesn’t break the bank. Let’s take a look!
As far as design goes, Samsung has decided to give the Galaxy Watch FE a look that’s not too different from the rest of its wearable lineup. At first glance, you might even confuse it with the Galaxy Watch 4 from years ago, especially with how the Watch FE is designed. It’s a lot small as well, coming with a 1.2-inch Super AMOLED touchscreen, and it lacks the rotating bezel on the Galaxy Watch 6 Classic. For controls, there are two action buttons on the side in addition to the touch interface onboard.
Now the big differentiating factor here is the addition of LTE support, meaning that you’ll be able to access data services and make phone calls directly from your watch without the need for a smartphone. It’s a nice feature to have although we’d imagine that battery life might take a hit. Like Samsung’s other smartwatches, the Watch FE is also made with an aluminium design that’s available in a handful of different colour options including black, pink gold and silver. It’s pretty durable as well, and adds a bit of water resistance thanks to 5ATM + IP68 certification.
On the inside, the Galaxy Watch FE is powered by the Exynos W920 chip, which is one of Samsung’s own first-party processors (no Snapdragon Wear on here, unfortunately). This works in tandem with a decent 1.5GB of RAM, as well as 16GB of storage for app installations. Of course, the watch runs Google’s Wear OS, although this is layered with One UI 5 Watch, meaning that users get access to Samsung-exclusive apps, Google apps, and a wide selection of third-party software as well. Powering the entire setup is a 247 mAh battery.
For health and fitness tracking, the Galaxy Watch FE comes with several sensors which consist of a Samsung BioActive Sensor, which itself tracks Optical Heart Rate + Electrical Heart + Bioelectrical Impedance Analysis. There’s also an Accelerometer, Barometer, Gyro Sensor, Geomagnetic Sensor, and a Light Sensor built into the Galaxy Watch FE. There are several workout modes built into the watch’s software.
While it won’t be out on the market until October 3rd, buyers can of course pre-order the new watch in select regions, and it retails for around $250.
