On the left, my cheap and cheerful Amazfit Bip; on the right, Amazfit's newer, more premium
GTR. You can probably guess by the step count which one I prefer, but you would also be correct to say that this isn't even a fair comparison—the GTR is closer in looks, features, price and name to
Huawei's GT.
For my GTR I paid $199.94 CAD, a promotional launch offer from
Gearbest. Here's how I got on with it...
Specs
1.39 inch 454 x 454 pixel AMOLED display
47.2 mm aluminum alloy case
22 inch quick-release leather and silicone strap
(unknown processor, OS)
16 MB RAM / 40 MB storage
410 mAh battery, 1.5 to 2 hours charging time
Bluetooth 5.0
5 ATM IP rating
Battery Life
Amazfit's bold claim of 24 days between charges doesn't seem all that far-fetched; in the 10 days that I've used it the battery has lost only 20% of its initial charge.
Buttons
There are two physical buttons on the GTR's right side but only one of them is remappable. The one positioned at two o'clock (with the red colouring under the pusher) can only turn the display on or off. The four o'clock button can be mapped to the app or function of your choice, but you'll have to press it twice to get there. This is because the first press will light up the display, just like the other button. So the point of the first button is...?
Display
The screen and default watch face are undeniably fetching, but can only stay lit for up to eight seconds at a time before adversely affecting battery life. And unlike Wear OS there's no option for an always-on display. This ended up bothering me a lot more than I thought it would.
I also found the glossy notches on the bezel to be a bit distracting, but they do give you something to look at when the screen is blank. Which is often. There's a lift-to-wake function, at least.
Fitness Tracking
With onboard GPS and a heart-rate sensor fitness tracking is generally very good. Workouts are logged in the Amazfit app (for either
Android or
iOS), which seems to be an exact copy of the Xiaomi Mi Fit app. For some reason I can
only use Mi Fit with my Bip, and
only the Amazfit app with the GTR. Kooky.
Music Controls
You can use the GTR to control music or podcasts from your phone, with one big caveat: the OS on this watch doesn't seem to multitask, so if you're tracking a workout while listening to audio you won't be able to access music controls until your workout is done. I guess because battery life...?
Notifications
Notifications are similarly half-baked. With Wear OS or even my Bip they're always accessible from the main screen via a single swipe; on the GTR if you miss an incoming notification you'll have to navigate to where they live in the app menu, or assign a shortcut via the second hardware button. I feel pretty strongly that notifications are a critical function for smartwatches, and on this particular watch it doesn't seem like Amazfit gave enough thought to them.
Also, like other Amazfit watches, there's no emoji support.
Tiles
Or widgets, or whatever you want to call them, the GTR's also got them. But they are limited in number to two: heart rate and step count. They live on either side of your watch face, an unnecessary redundancy. Wouldn't it be great if you could put a shortcut to, say, the weather on one side of your watch face instead? You can do this with the Bip, but not with the GTR.
Verdict
If you think the Bip looks like a cheap plastic toy but you don't want all the bells, whistles or the high cost of entry to Wear OS then you might be a good candidate for the GTR. I personally found too many missed opportunities in the UI to overcome the very basic OS. And maybe my expectations for smartwatches are too high but I 100%
hate looking at dead screens, most of all on my own wrist.
If you were still interested, the GTR is currently an online exclusive at
Gearbest.com
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Andrew Currie has been blogging about mobile phones since 2001, smartphones (depending on how you define them) since 2002 and smartwatches since 2014.
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