More and more people are wearing fitness trackers, not only at the gym, but throughout the entire day. Fitness trackers, also called smart watches, sport watches or activity trackers, are watches that you wear when exercising, but they don’t look out of place at other times. What is the point of these accessories? Is a watch really going to help you achieve your exercise goals? It might well do!
What do fitness trackers do?
Fitness trackers are very useful while exercising. You can use them to monitor your health or as an extension of your smartphone. A smart watch can measure your heart rate and sleep pattern, it can count your steps, track the number of kilometres you have walked, or tell you how many calories you have burned. Some trackers can even help you control your breathing, offer personalised workouts and even track you in the pool. Other trackers, alongside the basic functions, are fully integrated with your smartphone, allowing you to take calls or read messages on your watch while you're exercising.
Get competitive!
Keeping track of all this information while you're working out is not only very useful for monitoring your progress, it can also be a great motivator. Many trackers will allow you to share your results immediately with others who have the same tracker and/or via social media. It’s great fun to compare your results with your friends and family and create some competition. We’re willing to bet that it will give a huge boost to your performance.
What to look out for when you are choosing a fitness tracker.
Are you thinking of buying a sports watch? Then consider the following:
- Operating system: is the watch compatible with your smartphone?
- Functions: what do you want to use the watch for? Which functions are important to you?
- Appearance: you don't only wear fitness trackers when exercising. They can be stylish accessories that you can wear all the time to track your daily activities. That means, of course, you have to like the watch. So the look of the watch is very important!
- Battery life: smart watches need to be charged regularly, just like your smartphone. Some batteries last a lot longer than others.
- Fitness trackers are available in various price ranges. As a rule, the more expensive the watch, the more functions it will have. Think carefully about how much money you are willing to spend, and what functions you are really going to use.
