For most people, the Galaxy Watch Ultra 2 is overkill, and that’s why Samsung has a ‘lighter’ alternative in the form of the Galaxy Watch 9. Carrying forward an almost identical design from the Watch 8 while refining the rough edges to enhance comfort, the Watch 9 is presently one of the classiest smartwatches in the premium segment with its retro-inspired watch-like looks.
Hence, as someone coming from the chunky Galaxy Watch Ultra 2, the Watch 9 seemed exactly what the doctor ordered – a clever fitness-centric smartwatch minus the bulk but with a relatively large battery inside. It’s down on a couple of fronts, such as missing the 5,000 nits bright display, a titanium body and a dedicated button to activate its workout tracking.
On the plus side, however, the Galaxy Watch 9 focuses on a more premium experience – it wants to be a watch that you can accompany to the gym as well as your boardroom meeting. Last year’s Galaxy Watch 8 accomplished this task well but fell short in certain areas, like performance and battery life. So, what about the Galaxy Watch 9? Does it address the concerns we discussed last year?
I stowed the Watch Ultra 2 and donned the Watch 9 for a few days to find out.
Wear comfort: My wrist thanked Samsung
At roughly 34 grams, the aluminium Watch 9 feels almost weightless in comparison to the Watch Ultra 2. It’s thin at 8.6mm, is feather-light, and features a smooth cushion-style underbody that sits flush against the skin.
The Watch 9’s silicone Sport Band sits flat, breathes surprisingly well during night sweeps, and doesn’t snag on dress shirt cuffs, jacket sleeves or riding gloves. It was after weeks that I stopped waking up halfway through the night wanting to throw my watch onto the nightstand.
The Snapdragon processor upgrade was much needed
Under the hood, Samsung made a major upgrade this year by ditching its internal Exynos chip in favour of Qualcomm’s 3nm Snapdragon Wear Elite platform. Paired with 2GB of RAM and 32GB of internal storage, navigating One UI 9 Watch (built on Wear OS 7) is silk-smooth. I spotted none of the annoying lags and UI stutters that were a common occurrence with the Galaxy Watch 8 and its predecessors. The new chip makes the Watch 9 feel as smooth as the Apple Watch.
Swiping through widget tiles or opening apps like Spotify and WhatsApp happens with zero stutter. Even the workout tracking happens instantly with zero stutter.
Samsung’s One UI 9 for Watch is well optimised for the hardware too. The integration of Google Gemini, which was half-baked last year, works wonderfully this year, as Gemini can now set timers, take reminders, and even answer the odd questions that keep popping up. Samsung’s new watch faces for this generation also enhance the aesthetics, especially the stock minimalist faces. What’s surprising is that the watch face collection in the Samsung Wear app has gotten better this year, especially with more variations – there’s something for everyone here.
Note that the Watch 9 unlocks its entire feature set for Samsung smartphone users only – pairing with non-Samsung Android phones limits Blood Pressure and ECG tracking.
Health monitoring and fitness tracking simplified by AI
Samsung’s health monitoring ecosystem is currently one of the most comprehensive on the market. Between Sleep Scores, Energy Scores, Blood Pressure trends, ECG, Body Composition, and Vascular Load, there is a staggering amount of data being collected every second. Similar to the Watch Ultra 2, it was the AI-based data processing that made sense of all the data collected.
During my 10 days, three key metrics stood out:
Sleep and vitals: Because the Watch 9 is so comfortable, I actually kept it on every night. Every morning, the Samsung Health app served up a breakdown of my sleep latency, sleep efficiency, and skin temperature trends. The new “Vitals” screen aggregates overnight heart rate, respiratory rate, and oxygen levels into a single, easy-to-read baseline score.
Fitness tracking and GPS: The new dual-frequency (L1+L5) GPS locked on noticeably faster during late-night walks than older Galaxy Watch models. Auto-workout detection kicked in accurately within 10 minutes of walking or jogging.
Cardio and vascular load: These two metrics gave me a quick glance at cardiovascular fatigue. If I pushed too hard on a walk the next day after a night of terrible sleep, the Energy Score and Cardio Load warned me to dial it back. Throughout the weekend, the Watch 9 instructed me to spend the Saturday resting and resume the walking on Sunday.
Battery life and charging could be much better
This is the only aspect where the Watch 9 falls flat on its face.
Coming from the Ultra 2’s mammoth 3-day battery, adjusting back to a one-day smartwatch was a rough transition. Even though Samsung increased the battery capacity on the Watch 9 (445mAh on the 44mm and 390mAh on the 40mm model), the power-hungry 3,000-nit display and Snapdragon Wear Elite processor keep endurance firmly in “charge every single day” territory. Loading up the WhatsApp app along with Jio’s eSIM reduced the battery life to just half a day.
Because I wanted to track my sleep, I couldn’t simply dock the watch overnight. Instead, I had to find a 60-to-70-minute window every morning while getting ready for the day, provided I had around 40 per cent juice remaining. The charging is utterly slow.
Our verdict
The Galaxy Watch 9 is one of the most comfortable smartwatches you can find in the market today. With its arsenal of health and fitness tracking, the Watch 9 is a great investment for someone who wants to keep an eye on their vital stats, and even focus on basics like sleep, stress, overall activity and smart insights, telling you what to do with the data. The top features like ECG and Blood Pressure could come in handy if calibrated well, but they work only with a Samsung phone. The one-day battery life is also another concern, and if you want to load up third-party apps like WhatsApp and Spotify, you might need to have the charging puck and a power bank on you.
However, when you look at the overall picture, the Galaxy Watch 9 (4.4 cm), with its starting price of Rs 41,999, is a well-polished fitness monitoring device that’s exceptionally smart, especially with the Google Gemini integration. For those getting serious about fitness and health, the Galaxy Watch 9 earns our recommendation.