For most consumers, the Fitbit Versa 3 is the company’s best smartwatch. When compared to more expensive options like the Apple Watch SE and the Fitbit Sense, the Versa 3 holds its own thanks to features like its always-on display, built-in GPS, blood oxygen and temperature tracking during sleep, and a battery that lasts for six days.
All You Need To Know About The Fitbit Versa 3
The Versa 3 is a comparable smartwatch and fitness tracker to the Sense, minus the stress tracker and FDA-cleared electrocardiogram (ECG or EKG). The Versa 3 also saves you money by being $100 cheaper than the Sense.
Overall, A More Effective Design
The Versa 3 boasts a larger 1.58-inch AMOLED screen with smaller bezels than its predecessor, the Versa 2, but maintaining the same square-ish watch body and metal frame. It is clear and readable even in broad daylight.
You can check the time without having to move your wrist because it can remain on all the time (in a simplified form with fewer metrics displayed). There are countless watch faces available for the Fitbit because third-party developers can create them.
While the touchscreen and Fitbit interface have seen some improvements, they still fall short of the responsiveness of the AMOLED displays found on the Apple Watch and the Samsung Watch. The Versa 3 has a slight delay when swiping and is slow to load apps and show data.
The Versa 3 sports an indented haptic side button instead of a physical side button like its predecessors. This button functions identically to a physical one in principle, but the haptic feedback isn’t nearly as pleasurable as pressing a physical button until you get used to it.
There isn’t necessarily a steep learning curve associated with all of the new designs. The Versa 3’s strap system has also been redesigned by Fitbit, making it as simple as pressing a button to switch between bands. Compared to older models, which featured a tiny, awkward clasp, this one is a breeze to use.
Improved Fitness Monitoring And Training Tools
Most Fitbit devices should now be enough for tracking your most fundamental fitness metrics, including your steps, distance, calories burnt, and heart rate. The Versa 3 offers all the same fitness functions as the more costly Sense, and it does a good job of covering the basics as well.
Automatic workout identification for specific activity kinds like jogging means you never miss a session, even if you forget to start. It tracks 20 different activities, including indoor and outdoor swimming.
Not the first Fitbit, as the Charge 4 and Sense also include GPS, but the first Versa smartwatch to do so. Having to get out my phone and draw a map of my route without GPS on older iterations of the Versa was a major annoyance for me as a runner (or bike ride).
Thanks to the Versa 3, I can complete my outdoor exercises without worrying about remembering to bring my phone back home with me. The one drawback is that it may take the watch several minutes to acquire a GPS signal.
It took around four minutes to acquire the confirmation after hitting start, but I always forgot to wait and took off as soon as I could. During your workouts, the Versa 3 can alert you when you’ve entered a new heart rate zone. As your heart rate changes, the watch beeps to let you know that you’ve entered a new zone, such as fat burn, cardio, or peak.
This might give you a better idea of when to push yourself while training, and when to take it easy. The Active Zone Minutes statistic on the Versa 3 uses heart rate data to calculate how long you’ve engaged in some form of physical activity, even if it doesn’t need walking around much, making it a more comprehensive indicator of your day’s success than just counting steps.
As an alternative to 10,000 steps, you may set a target of 20 or more minutes in the Activity Zone. Active Zone Minutes, rather not just steps, are a better indicator of fitness, according to Fitbit.
The Versa 3, and other Fitbit gadgets, are great since they don’t judge you everyday but instead give you weekly activity targets to work towards. Working from home and attempting to fit in exercises while taking care of two young children during a pandemic is challenging.
I know I’ll have bad days, so setting weekly objectives has been more effective for me. Instead of viewing my daily metrics on the watch as proof that I was failing, I would view them as evidence that I was making improvement.
When you meet your weekly target before the weekend is through, the Versa 3 alerts you (and displays an animated victory message). You can view a complete analysis of your activity on the Fitbit mobile app and continue to rack up points until the week is over.
If you delve into the options far enough, you can even find out your fitness level. The Versa 3 plots an estimate of your Vo2 max (maximum oxygen consumption during exercise) against your age and gender to show you how you stack up against people of similar fitness levels.
Cardio Fitness levels, accessible by tapping the heart rate tile in the Today summary and swiping left on the accompanying graph, may be found on the Fitbit mobile app. Guided exercise videos and programmes are also available to users with a Fitbit Premium subscription.
The Versa 3 comes with a free three-month trial of the premium service, which normally costs $10 per month. You can download a whole workout on your watch using the Fitbit Coach app, or you can follow along with courses on your phone from companies like Popsugar and Daily Burn.
Since I could generally fit in a quick 10-minute ab workout directly after a run without needing to check my phone for instructions, downloading a workout was more convenient for me.
Lots of Medical Details Available Upon Request.
Yet, the Versa 3 does a lot more than just track your workouts. It also tracks your SpO2 (blood oxygen levels), breathing rate, and temperature changes in your skin while you sleep, all of which can be used to provide a more complete picture of your health.
This is not a diagnostic tool or medical instrument and should not be used as such. If you have questions about a medical condition or health goals, you should always speak with a doctor or other trained health provider. The FDA has only approved the Fitbit Sense’s ECG feature.
When it comes to monitoring your sleep, the Fitbit Versa 3 gives you one of the most in-depth looks of any wristwatch. Whether or not that aids you is another question. As is customary for such tracking, it considers not just how long you slept but also how deeply, lightly, and rapidly you cycled through sleep.
In addition, the Fitbit app records and displays information on your breathing rate, heart rate, blood oxygen levels, and skin temperature fluctuations during the night. For a more in-depth look at your sleep patterns and how they compare to the norm, I highly recommend upgrading to Fitbit Premium, which includes access to Fitbit’s sophisticated sleep analytics.
In addition, it provides advice on how to enhance your slumber. I know I need to start going to bed at a more reasonable hour. Not yet, at least, can it make me go to bed at 10 o’clock.
The fact that this wasn’t displayed prominently on my watch face each morning was a major annoyance. If you use a certain watch face, you can see a brief overview of your sleep and your SpO2 range, but for further in-depth analysis, you’ll need to open the Fitbit app on your phone.
That seems counterproductive to me as a smartwatch owner. Sometimes I would go weeks without opening the app. Yet, when I finally did walk in and look, I was pleasantly pleased by what I discovered.
I could see how, over time, you could begin to draw links between, say, skin temperature variations and the peaks and valleys in your menstrual cycle (note that the Fitbit Sense also detects skin temperature). Not everyone needs to keep tabs on their body temperature all the time, but it’s helpful to have that information on hand just in case.
Unrivaled Battery Life
The Versa 3 may not be the most intelligent watch, but it has unrivalled longevity compared to its rivals. Despite heavy use (always-on display, two GPS workouts, and sleep tracking), the watch lasted for over three days on a charge.
Using it less intensively and turning off the always-on display can increase that to as much as six days. Fitbit claims that 12 minutes on the charger will give you 24 hours of battery life on the Versa 3, and that 30 minutes on the charger will get you to 100%.
But, if you’re upgrading from a prior model, you should know that the Versa 3 requires a different proprietary charger. It takes some practise to get used to the fact that it is magnetic and must be held at a specific angle in order to charge.
Optimal Balance Between Health Tools And Fitness Monitoring
When compared to the more expensive Fitbit Sense, the Versa 3 provides sufficient health indicators for those interested in learning more about their bodies. Its built-in GPS makes it a feasible option for outside jogging and cycling, and it provides useful fitness tools for training.
In addition, I have not seen a better smartwatch for monitoring sleep. If you own an iPhone and are interested in a Fitbit device, the Charge 4 may be a better choice than the Versa 3 for you.
You can get a lot of the same high-quality health and exercise features for roughly $100 less. Some of the extra smart capabilities, such as voice to text answers, are unavailable, but many of these apps aren’t compatible with iPhones anyhow.
