Galaxy Watch 8 review: Hey, I like the Squircle design
Smartwatches have a singular advantage over other devices: around-the-clock connectivity. Connectivity to you, that is. Your phone is in your pocket; your earbuds are only worn when you're listening to something. But a smartwatch rides on your wrist, with brief breaks for charging. Which makes it an ideal health tracking device.
Now, with the debut of the Galaxy Watch 8, Samsung has gone all in on health metrics from your watch. From activity to sleep to stress levels to body composition, the Samsung Galaxy Watch 8 can track just about everything you do. (Who needs a fitness tracker?) It takes a holistic approach to determine how you're feeling and how it can help you feel better.
Data isn't great unless you present it in a way that makes sense and feels actionable. Samsung's approach is getting to be very good. I've been using a 40mm Samsung Galaxy Watch 8 (the smallest one) for 10 days; here are my thoughts so far.
Galaxy Watch 8 design: Thinner hardware and the return of the 'squircle'
The first notable upgrade on the Watch 8: it's thinner and lies flatter on the wrist than previous generations of the Galaxy Watch. More precisely, this watch is 11 percent thinner, and the sensor pack on the back is also flatter, meaning the watch is theoretically more comfortable to wear. Personally, as a bigger guy with plenty of padding already, it's hard for me to notice.
What is easy to notice: the redesign of the strap mechanism. It's similar to the strap on the 2024 Galaxy Watch Ultra, although the straps for one won't fit on the other. The main change is how the lugs attach to the case. While the Watch Ultra lugs angled down to more naturally conform to the shape of your wrist, these come straight out of the sides of the watch.
The result, regardless of wrist size, is that the watch will lay more flat. I find it more comfortable, and I think the smaller your wrists are, the more you'll agree. I'm definitely not a fan of proprietary lug systems for third-party bands, however.
The other major redesign involves the Samsung "cushion," as the company calls it. Last year's Watch Ultra had a sort of "squircle" design to it with a round watch face on a rounded square base, and this year the Korean tech brand is doubling down on the squircle.
To my eyes, the black face on the silver background is a classy look. I originally wore the watch with the included white silicone band but switched to a metal link bracelet after about five days. I was surprised by how good the Watch 8 looks with this dressier metal band.
Normally, I'm not a metal band kind of guy. I generally skew toward fabric and velcro, but when I saw just how good the watch looked with the metal strap, I had to try it. I'm not a complete convert, but definitely don't mind it on this watch.
The primary difference between the Watch 8 and the Watch 8 Classic is the absence of the rotating bezel. The Watch 8 still has a touch-sensitive rim around the face that you can run a finger around as a "pretend" rotating bezel, but it's just not the same. It can also be problematic if you try to swipe up with your finger. If you're too close to the edge, you accidentally trigger the bezel instead.
There are two buttons on the side of the watch that I barely used, preferring the swipe-based navigation system. The main thing I used the buttons for was to activate Google Gemini AI, which is fun to use on a watch. And since the Apple Watch has very limited AI functionality (at least for now), this will be a much better smartwatch for AI nerds looking for a wearable.
Galaxy Watch 8 software changes
This is the first smartwatch to run Gemini on the watch face. That's a big win for Samsung, especially with new Google hardware likely coming soon. In my experience, Gemini and Google Assistant are basically six of one, half dozen of the other. Still, if the death of Google Assistant is all that will sate Google's appetite for product murder, then this is another step in that direction.
Other than Gemini, OneUI 8 brings a few new enhancements, including the "pill". This is basically Samsung's version of Apple's Dynamic Island. It shows you information at a glance in a pill-shaped graphic at the bottom of the watch face. This feels like it belongs on the watch face, even more so than on a phone screen. I dig it.
There's also a comprehensive set of widgets that you can set up in the widget panels to the right of the watch face. You can choose which widgets you want to see and reorganize them as needed. This is very similar to the Galaxy Z Flip 7's cover — but again, what was annoying on a phone screen works better on a smartwatch.
With the Galaxy Watch 8, Samsung wants to keep you healthy
The main focus of the software comes from Samsung Health, which runs on the watch and on your Android phone. This is home for all the biometric data the watch collects, including a new metric: antioxidant levels in your skin. To measure your antioxidants, you need to take off the watch and press your thumb against the sensor on the back of the watch while you initiate the scan from your phone.
How useful is this? It's debatable for two reasons. Firstly, when you measure your antioxidants, the high end of the scale is labelled "adequate" — as if to say, even if you eat all the veggies in the world, you'll only ever be adequate. Second, after checking with other gadget reviewers, no one I knew rated it above "poor."
I'm not sure if that's an indictment of the meat-eating culture here in the U-S-of-A or Samsung's measurements. Suffice it to say, I don't eat enough veggies — and chances are, neither do you.
A lot of the rest of Samsung's health software has been present for at least a year, including energy scores, sleep tracking, AGEs index, BMI, and more. Overall, I like how Samsung organizes the information into an easy-to-understand set of data that you can use to improve your health. For example, for sleep coaching, you're first assigned a sleep animal, which represents how you sleep. Apparently, my animal is a penguin because I wake up several times at night. Sleep coaching will give you suggestions for how to sleep better, like hitting your sleep target time consistently.
What I'm not fond of is how easy it is to dismiss that information. A coach is only as effective as the attention it demands, and most of Samsung's coaching instructions are easy to just swipe away. I'm not sure what more Samsung could demand of someone aside from a tapped "Okay" button, but honestly, this feels like low-hanging fruit for AI, which is what Samsung is supposedly all about these days.
Samsung has a sleep coach that makes suggestions, but I would like to see it go further. For example, if a sleep coach pops up on your watch and says "Hey, you're kind of stressed out and it's almost time for bed. How about some meditation?" and you dismiss it, AI could tell you the next night, "Hey, so you ignored our meditation suggestion and you slept pretty badly last night. How about tonight?" Or it could say, "Hey, you relaxed for a good 20 minutes before bedtime, but then you continued to use your phone for two more hours. Maybe let's not do that tonight?"
Battery life is... fine
I tested this watch over a two-week period, which included two road trips. Often, I found myself away from Wi-Fi and using my phone and watch frequently. I also wasn't always able to let my watch die completely from day to day, which skewed my battery longevity data. I had another fun-filled day of activities planned for the following morning, so I would end up having to plug the watch in when it had 30-40 percent left, as opposed to 15 percent, which is what I normally use to determine battery life. Having said all that, I did get some good results from battery testing.
There's no question this watch can last you a full day on a charge. It definitely won't last you two days. I averaged about 33 to 35 hours per charge when I let the watch get down to around 5 percent. It took over an hour to charge back to full, which usually took between 65 and 75 minutes. Bearing in mind that this is the smallest watch with the smallest battery, that's not too bad. I'm not fond of how long it takes to charge, but I can't argue with the battery life.
More than once, I wore the watch for a day and a night, then charged it the next morning when I went to eat breakfast or grab a shower. That was usually enough to top it up for the rest of that day. Which is fine since I never wear the watch in the shower anyway. (I tested it in a pool and on a few water rides, however.)
Not long ago, I would have put this battery life on a par with other smartwatches. But in the past 18 months or so, OnePlus and Google have shown us what's possible with a dual-chip architecture that offloads most of the basic health tracking to a lower-powered processor. Those watches have battery life measured in days rather than hours.
I'm not sure why Samsung has not followed this trend. Still, 35 hours is adequate battery life, and definitely delivers more energy than my vegetable intake.
Is the Samsung Galaxy Watch 8 worth it?
I say yes. I really like the Samsung Galaxy Watch 8, despite the battery life. I love the classy look, the software is really tight, and the Google Gemini integration is a big perk. However, unless you really want that Gemini app or the new antioxidant feature, there's also not much incentive to upgrade if you already have last year's Galaxy Watch 7.
Samsung is a popular enough brand that it's not hard to find third-party bands, but if you're like me and you have a shelf full of other straps that you have bought and like, you'll be out of luck, unless you buy a third-party converter to use your third-party straps.
If you have a smartwatch older than the Galaxy Watch 7, then the new Watch 8 is worth the upgrade. The look is polarizing, but I'm a fan, and I would love to see Samsung carry this design forward, personally. The rest of the watch is a treasure trove of data and health metrics. In theory, if you follow the advice of the watch without outright dismissing it, it can help you live a better life. And you'll look good doing it.