Huawei Watch Fit 4 review: Budget smartwatch with outdoor appeal

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The Huawei Watch Fit 4 sees the tech brand update its cheapest smartwatch, which also might be its most likeable.

While it lacks the luxury watch materials of the Watch Fit 4 Pro, Watch Ultimate 2 or the richer health smarts found on the Huawei Watch 5, the Fit 4 takes plenty of features from those more expensive Huawei smartwatches. That does still make it an attractive and more affordable package.

Those new features include the addition of free full colour maps, improved GPS support, new health and wellbeing monitoring smarts and new watch faces.

I was a big fan of the Watch Fit 3 and had a good time with the pricier Watch Fit 4 Pro, so my hopes were high for the Watch Fit 4 going into this review.

Design & Build

• Available in four colours
• Slimmer case design than Watch Fit 3
• Still waterproof up to 50 metres

Huawei made big changes with the design of the Watch Fit 3, so for the Watch Fit 4, it’s really about refining the good work it achieved last year.

You’ve still got a pretty compact square case, which comes in a single 43mm size. So it doesn’t follow in the footsteps of the Watch Fit 4 Pro’s clearly Apple Watch Ultra-inspired design.

That case now features softer curves and it’s the type of change that gives the Fit 4 an instantly more elegant appearance. It’s also a touch slimmer compared to the Fit 3, which helps to create a sleeker profile.

The case is made from aluminium alloy like the Fit 3’s case to give it some heft, but just enough. The single button and digital crown now seem to sit more flush with the case as well, which again helps to offer an overall more pleasing look.

If you had expectations you’d be missing out on the high-grade look of the Fit 4 Pro, I think Fit 4 is a nice smartwatch to wear.

Flip the watch over and along with the optical sensor that you’ll drop the circular charging cradle onto, you’ll spy that the strap is a removable kind.

There’s a fluoroelastomer one featured on three out of the four available colour options. That’s grey, white, purple and black. You’ll need to grab the grey model to get a nylon strap instead of the rubber one.

Removing the straps is easy and you’ll need to pay to get more straps if you want to change up that look. It’s also good to see Huawei opt for a traditional watch clasp. That makes it a breeze to whip off and also stays well put as well.

If you’re wondering what you’re missing out from the Fit 4 Pro, ‘Ultra’ look aside, you don’t get sapphire glass for stronger protection against scratches. The Pro also has a brighter AMOLED screen and is suitable for recreational diving.

Screen & Audio

• Same resolution screen as Fit 3
• Brighter display
• Speaker and microphone for Bluetooth calls

Huawei doesn’t budge from the screen type, size or resolution it offered on the Fit 3 for the Fit 4.

That’s a 1.82-inch, 480 x 408 resolution AMOLED panel, that can be kept on 24/7. The big change is with brightness. It’s moved from a screen with a maximum brightness of 1500 nits to one with 2000 nits.

On the whole, the display is great. Yes, there is some noticeable black bezel surrounding the screen, which I wish was slimmer, but it thankfully doesn’t eat too much into an AMOLED screen.

The screen is colourful, vibrant, offers deep black levels to improve viewing angles. You don’t necessarily need to set the brightness to maximum to get a display that’s comfortable to view in most conditions.

One thing I’d mention that I didn’t absolutely love is that the screen doesn’t appear to sit flush with the case. It’s been most noticeable when swiping up and down on the touchscreen.

On the side of the watch case, you’ll spy that there is a microphone and speaker, which supports letting you take Bluetooth-enabled calls or listen to music out loud.

On both fronts, the speaker is loud. While not offering the crispest and clearest clarity performance you’ll enjoy on a smartwatch, it does offer a good enough experience to handle calls.

Software & Features

• Works with Android and iOS
• Quick message replies and record voice memos
• Watch faces with custom stickers

As I found after testing the Watch Fit 4 Pro, what you get in features and general feel of the software isn’t far removed from the Watch Fit 3.

It’s still running Huawei’s HarmonyOS, which won’t give you everything the Watch GT or Huawei Watch smartwatches offer. Elements like the user interface and interactions with the Huawei Health app are similar.

I’ve been using it with both an Android phone and an iPhone. The most notable features that aren’t available across both platforms are the missing music player support and Petal Maps mapping on iOS and the remote camera shutter mode you miss out when paired to an Android phone.

This is a smartwatch that neatly displays phone notifications with scope to fire off quick replies. It gives you the ability to make Bluetooth calls as mentioned.

If you opt for the grey version Fit 4, this will get you NFC for contactless payments. Support isn’t available in all countries where you can pick up the Fit 4, however.

You have access to what I’d call a lighter version of Huawei’s AppGallery app store. A rummage around shows there’s not a huge amount of apps to download. I found ones like a Spotify controller and air quality monitor app most useful, but it’s definitely a more scaled-back experience compared to pricier Huawei smartwatches.

Watch faces are a big play for Huawei on the Fit 4. In general, Huawei does a good job of offering strong quality preloaded faces.

There are plenty of good ones on offer on the watch and in the Huawei Health app. There’s more to be found in the Watch Face Store, just be prepared to pay for them.

Fitness & Tracking

• New dual-frequency GPS
• Offline maps and import routes
• Track emotional well-being

When it comes to fitness and health features, there are some pretty significant updates to the Fit 4.

Firstly, Huawei has moved from a single to dual-band GPS to offer the latest in positioning technology and improve outdoor activity tracking. There’s now also a barometer to better measure elevation for hilly adventures.

Huawei even somehow manages to offer enough storage to let you pack on colour maps. You can also import routes with navigation in tow to help get you to your destination.

For those not that fussed about going on hikes or enjoying better GPS performance, it’s also added new health and general wellness monitoring features. You can now track heart rate variability measurements to offer more detailed insights into your stress levels.

While it misses out on the Pro 4’s ECG sensor and Huawei’s latest TruSense sensor setup and some richer mapping features for golfers, there’s plenty here to make the Fit 4 a solid tracking companion.

I tested the new dual-frequency GPS – also known as dual band on other watches – against two other smartwatches with similar support. The Watch Fit 4 performed well overall. Distance tracking and metrics like pace were generally very similar in tests.

It was a similar story for heart rate tracking, both during exercise and for continuous monitoring as well. I’d say that enabling the more detailed heart rate tracking setting in the Huawei Health app helps to get more reliable continuous heart rate data.

It’s also nice to see you can pair external heart rate sensors if you don’t trust that data for all activities.

The mapping and navigation support is pretty good on the Fit 4 and a bit of a rarity to find on a smartwatch at this price.

Downloading and syncing regions on the Huawei Health app can take some time. Once completed and synced to the watch, supported sport modes will let you swipe to see those nicely detailed maps, use the crown to zoom in and out of maps and offers a useful route back mode.

For sleep tracking, I’ve been wearing it alongside another smartwatch and two other reliable sleep-tracking smart rings. I typically saw similar sleep scores, sleep duration as well as recognising the times I’d fallen asleep and woken up the following day. I also saw similar data for the capture of REM sleep stages and heart rate during sleep.

However, things get clunky and overcrowded when you’re looking over the fine details of your sleep data in the Health app. This could be said for other areas of the app. There’s a bit too much bloatware.

There are a lot of health features on board that aren’t medical-grade health features. You can now see health insights, which looks at data including heart rate and sleep to help detect any abnormal changes in data trends. I actually found the emotional well-being feature the most interesting and best presented of the health and wellness monitoring features.

This aims to plot your changes to your emotional state throughout the day based on information such as heart rate and stress. It’ll then display pleasant, neutral or unpleasant moments in your day, with shortcuts to breathing exercises and exercise modes to help improve your mood.

In true Huawei fashion, there’s a dizzying amount of features to get your head around. Among them are some really very good ones and features that offer a nice take on similar features on other smartwatches.

Battery Life & Charging

• Up to 10 day battery life
• Up to 7 days in heavy usage
• 4 day battery life in always-on display mode

The battery life stated for the Watch Fit 4 is exactly the same as the Watch Fit 3, but that’s not a bad thing.

That’s anywhere from 7 to 10 days. It depends on how regularly you’re using features like GPS, handling Bluetooth calls, receiving notifications and how regularly you’re activating the display.

I found that the Watch Fit 4 Pro could get through a week, as long as you don’t have the screen set to always-on mode and it’s a similar story for the Watch Fit 4.

Stick to the raise-to-wake for the screen, and it’s got more chances of getting to a week. If you opt to keep the screen on at all times, it does suffer the kind of daily battery drop that will get you under a week.

If you can forgo living with the screen on at all times and live without the most advanced sleep monitoring or most detailed continuous heart rate monitoring, you’re more likely to get up to that maximum 10-day battery life.

While I don’t love that it uses a proprietary cradle, it’s at least a durable one that’s not easy to miss among other cables. It will charge the Fit 4 in 75 minutes from flat, so at least it’s reasonably quick when you do run our of juice.

Price & Availability

The Huawei Watch Fit 4 is currently only available to buy in the UK and Europe. There are no details on availability in the US.

It costs £149, which makes it slightly more expensive than the Watch Fit 3 at launch (£139.99) and you can now pick up the older Watch Fit 3 for £99.99. 

That Watch Fit 4 Pro in comparison costs £249, so that’s a sizable jump in price. You can buy it from Huawei as well as the likes of Amazon and Argos.

With a sub-£150 price tag, that’s putting the Huawei Watch 4 up against budget smartwatches like Xiaomi Watch S4 (£129.99), the Amazfit Active 2 (£149.90) and the likes of the Garmin Venu Sq 2 (£149.99).

Check our list of the best budget smartwatches to see our top 10 recommendations.

Should you buy the Huawei Watch Fit 4?

The Huawei Watch Fit 4 is a very good value smartwatch with a strong slant on its fitness and outdoor tracking prowess.

If you look at other smartwatches that cost a similar amount of money, there isn’t really a smartwatch that’s doing a significantly better job compared to Huawei.

As an upgrade from the Fit 3, I think you’re getting a fair amount extra in exchange for a little bit more money. Given how quickly Huawei reduces its smartwatches, I’d expect the Fit 4 to become even better value in the not-too-distant future.

If you’re weighing this up against the Watch Fit 4 Pro, then I would think of the Fit 4 like Huawei’s Apple Watch SE. It’s cheaper, yet still gives you many of the same qualities, along with a design that’s very neat and tidy.

I’d say this is still arguably Huawei’s most appealing smartwatch, because it competes much better with the competition around it.

If you want a budget smartwatch that looks nice, has a colourful and bright screen and enough smartwatch features, with plenty of fitness and health ones, then this is well worth looking at.

Specs

• Available in black, grey, white and purple
• Aluminium alloy case
• Up to 10-day battery life
• Compatible with Android and iOS
• Microphone and speaker
• 1.82-inch AMOLED display
• 5 ATM water resistant rating
• NFC (grey version only)
• Bluetooth 5.2
• Dual-frequency GPS