Samsung Galaxy Watch 8 Review | Wear OS 6 is here!

I've reviewed so many Samsung products lately you'd be forgiven for thinking I've changed the name of the channel to Samsung Spurt. But not content with having their latest phones stuffed in my pants, I've also had their latest Galaxy Watch 8 strapped to my spindly northern wrist. And the Watch 8 is one of the very first wear OS 6 smartwatches to hit blighty, boasting a slick and beautiful design, some proper smarty pants new fitness features, and a bigger battery compared with the previous Galaxy Watch generation. But is it actually any good? Well I've had the Samsung Galaxy Watch 8 slapped on my arm for a couple of weeks now so here's my full review. And for more on the latest and greatest tech please do poke subscribe, ding the old notifications bell. Cheers! Now first up a wee bit of practical information for you. You can grab the Watch 8 in 40 or 44mm sizes. I've got the 40mm version. Because my wrists are so pathetically wheezy that even a Girl Scout would scoff at them. It starts from £319 here in the UK but keep an eye out for deals. And if you want the LTE model which is what I've been reviewing, it'll cost you a wee bit extra. I've got to say the design of the Galaxy Watch 8 is certainly one of my favourite bits of it. It's slightly slimmed down over the old Galaxy Watch 7 so as you can see there it sits pretty squat on your wrist. I find it perfectly comfortable to wear nearly constantly. The only time I actually ever take it off is to charge the bloody thing which is, well, more on that later. And usually if I have a shower as well. You've got this really attractive minimalist design, a perfectly circular screen as you can see there which sits on a more of a squircle kind of base I guess. Just pokes up above the rest of the chassis just a wee bit as you can see there. And thankfully that glass seems pretty tough because of course there's no bezel to help protect it. If you do bang your arm off stuff as I do all the bloody time. As you can see there it's pretty tough stuff, not a single scratch or nick that certainly I can see anyway. And likewise the stainless steel frame still in perfect nick as well. You can grab the Galaxy Watch 8 in a choice of two colours, graphite or silver. This is the graphite. My version came with this rubbery strap bundled in the box. As you can see you've got the lug system for snapping these off and on which is a lot easier to do if you don't chew your fingernails to bits. But you know all the stress of being a top YouTube tech twat really taking its toll. But the Galaxy Watch 8 is super easy to slap on and whip off again when you need to. And of course you can replace those straps if you need to, change up the colour or the material. And the Galaxy Watch 8 can take a serious splashing as well. Sadly I haven't been swimming with it this past fortnight because frankly the sight of me in speedos can put any man, woman or child into cardiac arrest. But I've done the washing up, this thing, I've been in the shower a few times and forgotten to take it off. It's been absolutely fine. Now as usual for this 8th generation Samsung has slapped a gorgeous OLED display on this smartwatch. It's got the same crispy contrast, nice sharp resolution, punchy poppy colours which really makes the most of that Wear OS UI. And because it's quite a sizeable screen and the text isn't too tiny you shouldn't have any trouble reading any of this stuff unless your eyesight is proper borked. I've found that auto brightness has worked perfectly these past couple of weeks as well. It dims right down when you're just chilling in the evenings watching a bit of TV or you're about to get all tucked up with Teddy at night and then brightens right up when it notices you've stepped outside. And the main upgrade for this generation is that brightness level has been boosted right up to 3,000 nits. So even with some serious sun reflection going on, no worries, that display brightness can boost all the way up and counter pretty much any kind of glare. Now to connect your Galaxy Watch 8 to your smartphone you will need the Samsung Health app, which thankfully came pre-installed on my Z Fold 7 which I've been testing it with. And of course the watch shares all of your health stat shenanigans with Samsung Health so you can have a good old browse, see exactly how you're coping with everyday life. You can track most of those stats right here on the smartwatch's screen as well. This is the first Wear OS 6 smartwatch that I've tested out and so far I'm really liking that UI. It hasn't changed up massively in terms of the general layout so pretty intuitive stuff. All of your main toggles are a quick swipe away like so. Your notifications can be accessed with a right swipe. If you swipe the other way you'll access all these tiled widgets which are all grouped together now based on what they're actually all about. So you've got your health stuff, all of your fitness tracking, and then a bunch of other bits like your next calendar event, how your battery life is doing, all that kind of stuff. And it's all fully customisable. Of course you can remove any tiles that you don't want and then slap in fresh new ones based on pretty much any app that you've got installed on this thing. So for instance with Spotify there's a heavy rotation and a podcast tile. You can also slap a WhatsApp one on there with for instance your primary contacts. And then finally if you swipe up that screen you can access all of your apps that you've got installed on the Watch 8 and of course you can swap between grid view and list view. You'll see you can access recent apps by tapping this wee icon here. It's all the stuff that you've got open and your most used apps will cluster up at the top of that apps list as well which is a feature I really like. You've also got the equivalent of the Samsung Now bar right there on the main watch face. So for instance if you're playing some media you can fast access the media controls to pause, play, skip a track etc. And also if you've got any timers running they will also pop up in there. In fact if you just have the timer running then as you can see the actual the full thing is on display there on the main watch face you don't even have to tap it to see how long is remaining. Unfortunately however this doesn't seem to work when you're actually tracking a workout. So for instance if I'll jump into a boxing workout. Now I swear to God every time I've tracked a workout this past fortnight the watch has hibernated or gone back to the main watch face and this little bugger here has just not shown up at all as you can see it's now working as it should do for the first bloody time ever. Bloody technology man I just can't stand it. Yes I do really love just how colourful that UI is. The little animations that pop up from time to time especially here in the exercise tracking app. And you've got a respectable selection of watch faces on here as well. If you go to add watch face and scroll on down you'll see there's a good variety bunged on here by default all kinds of analogue and digital efforts including yes all those classics from previous watch generations. And aye the majority of these are fully customisable as well everything from the clock font and the complications to the colours. And the Galaxy Watch 8 comes with a pair of buttons squirreled away on that right edge. The top button is your home button so push that at any point no matter what app you're in etc you go back to that watch face. And meanwhile if you're in an app you can also press that bottom button to go back. You can also customise it so poking that bottom button brings up your recent apps. You can also long press that top button to bring up the Gemini assistant. You read Gemini? Gemini is a family of multi-modal AI models developed by... You know just shut up now thanks. And a double tap is fully customisable. I've got it loading up. You get a bit of fitness tracking but you can have it set to any other app instead. Unfortunately there doesn't really seem to be a way of customising that bottom button besides switching between recent apps and back. If you long press it that always loads up Samsung Pay which I don't ever use I prefer Google Pay but there doesn't appear to be a way of swapping that out. And likewise there doesn't appear to be a way of assigning any shortcuts to a double tap of that bottom button which seems like a bit of a waste. And of course there's bugger all rotate and bezel on the regular Samsung Galaxy Watch 8 unlike the Galaxy Watch 8 Classic. And yes you can simply run your thumb around the circumference of that screen to scroll up and down through menus etc but it's not quite as satisfying as a proper twisty rotatey knob thing. Now the Samsung Galaxy Watch 8 can access the internet either via your smartphone or via Wi-Fi as well you can just connect directly to your Wi-Fi network with the watch and I've had bugger all issues with that. Or if you're Billy Megabucks you can pay 50 extra quid for the LTE model and then of course you'll have to pay an extra subscription on top of that to stay connected wherever you roam. Now of course you've got all of the usual apps stuffed onto the Samsung Galaxy Watch 8 from the health tracking type shenanigans to timers and clocks and remote camera access and all that googly goodness as well although I did install some of these myself including Google Home. You can download tracks through Spotify to listen to online just to hug up a pair of buds to your watch you don't even need your phone to be anywhere in sight. And naturally you've got full Play Store support as well so you can download fresh watch faces fresh apps go Curator Bits essential apps fun apps for all just just so much fun. And yes as I mentioned before you've got full Gemini support as well just long press that top button. Hey has Sunderland finally bought Granit Xhaka yet? Sunderland has not yet bought Granit Xhaka. Well hopefully that wee drama will all be sorted by the time this video goes live. Incidentally that was the Galaxy Watch 8 internal speaker on the maximum possible volume so not the loudest around that's for sure I mean as you'd kind of imagine from something so tiny as this. But certainly if you're out and about you're trying to take a phone call on this thing or you're trying to hear what the assistant is saying you'll probably struggle. Doesn't matter so much with Gemini of course because the text just pops up there on the screen as well. I've got to say the mic is pretty impressive combined with Google's usual AI shenanigans it quite clearly picks up what you're saying and understands you again even in quite a noisy environment. Those haptics are pretty decent too you get a good old buzz on the wrist whenever a notification pops through. Speaking of which the notification support is excellent as always. If you get an email through for instance you'll see the sender and the subject matter. You can have a good old read through of the message and then respond using the quick responses of which there are many and of course that's completely customisable. You can also simply archive delete or show the message on the phone or yes you do also have the option of responding via a tiny little on screen keyboard or otherwise using your voice instead which is much more preferable. And of course yes you've got all of the usual health features crammed on here using Samsung's bioactive sensor. So for instance every day you're given an energy score just in case you're not entirely sure just how knackered you are which sums up exactly how you've slept how much activity you've been doing all kinds of random shenanigans. Got heart rate tracking body mass index you can go absolutely nuts with all of this stuff and the Galaxy Watch can also monitor your blood pressure. Although the first time you use this you will need an actual dedicated blood pressure monitor in order to calibrate it. You've also got some bonus health tracking shenanigans in this generation including an antioxidant index monitor. To use this just tap measure and then basically stick your thumb over that bioactive sensor on the back and it will take a reading. I seem to get a reading of 69 every single time I do this which is childishly hilarious. What this apparently does is measures the levels of carotenoids carotenoids in your skin and then basically tells you what to do to stop looking quite so old and bloody haggard. Most of the advice just seems to be along the lines of the bloody obvious basically stop drinking so much and eating so much s***. I don't really mind looking like an elephant's scrotum. Fitness tracking is pretty decent as well your favourite exercises pop up there in the main menu. Otherwise you can quickly and easily add a new one just go to select exercise and then scroll through. There's a pretty extensive list if not quite as extensive as some rivals likes of Huawei but to be fair all of the main stuff is definitely found in here. And Samsung has also slapped a running coach into the Galaxy Watch 8 if you're into all of that pavement pounding shenanigans. I am not so I haven't bothered to test that out. Sorry you'll have to watch another review if you want to know more on that. But the auto workout tracking certainly seemed to work well whenever I did have to go out walking anywhere I picked up a walk from basically where I started and if I did have to stop off in a shop for instance odd bins to pick up some tinnies or perhaps just a Gregg's for a steak bake or two bit of extra fuel. Well the workout would automatically pause and then resume again when I got my arse in gear. And of course you can check out all of your past workouts right there in the Samsung Health app so you can dive on in and get more of a detailed breakdown roughly how many calories you've burned your maximum heart rate the various heart rate zones etc. And oh yes naturally you've got full sleep tracking shenanigans slapped here on the Galaxy Watch 8 as well as you can see exactly how well you slept the previous night how much deep sleep you managed to achieve etc. Can also tell you if you were snoring and you have to have your phone next to you to actually record all of that as well your average heart rate etc. And the watch can then deliver guidance on how to improve your sleep which usually involves hey don't drink so much booze before you pass out you massive booze hound and hey maybe don't have a brain that stresses about things at 4 a.m. for absolutely bugger all reason. But a couple of fresh new sleep related features slapped here on the Galaxy Watch 8 as well including the ability to help detect sleep apnea which I'd never even heard of before but apparently this is where your breathing is a bit too shallow during the night leaving your body oxygen deprived which can f*** up your heart and your brain as if there wasn't already enough sh** to be absolutely bloody terrified about. And the watch can also monitor your vascular load during the night just to give you a possible indication of early onset heart disease. A touch word I appear to be so far in the clear despite my deep fondness for those Gregg's Steak Bakes. As for the chipset that's in charge well that is the fresh new Exynos 1000 a 3 nanometer platform and this watch has certainly been well behaved this past fortnight. Nice and nippy. I've seen one or two wee judders but nothing major seriously. It can handle running several apps all at the same time. But one of the usual major pain points for these Wear OS small watches is the battery life and Samsung has apparently increased the capacity for the Galaxy Watch 8 by 8 percent very apt over the previous generation. Unfortunately this hasn't really helped matters because I still find I get roughly 36 hours of playtime from a full charge of the Galaxy Watch 8. And yes that is with the always on display switched on and all of the various health tracking features active as well. But I just wish that I could make it through a 48 hour period so I could charge the watch every other day rather than every single sodden day. Yes there is a power saving mode that you can switch to if you want to have it just displaying the time and doing the most basic functionality but honestly what's the point. I would definitely say if you are looking for a smartwatch that can last you a full weekend if you bugger off away somewhere etc maybe get the OnePlus Watch instead which can generally survive around 3 to 4 days on a full charge. You've still got all those Wear OS smarts as well and when it is time to recharge this bugger. I mean it's just it's tooth grindingly slow so yeah you'll have to bung it on the Wii magnetic charging dock for a good couple of hours if it is fully drained before it's completely charged again. Hopefully the situation will be improved with the Samsung Galaxy Watch 8 Classic which I am going to review next. In the meantime I did enjoy my time kind of with the Galaxy Watch 8. It's got some great features packed in there the screen is gorgeous the performance is excellent and Wear OS definitely gets the old spurt of approval. The software has been a wee bit shonky in places hopefully that will be sorted in an update very very soon indeed and of course the battery life just isn't good enough for my needs. Anyway that's what this bald northern twonk reckons but it would be great to hear your thoughts on the Samsung Galaxy Watch 8 down in the comments below especially if you've been rocking it on your own wrist these past few days. Please do poke subscribe and ding that notifications bell for more on the latest and greatest tech and have yourselves a ruddy wonderful rest of the week. Cheers everybody, love you!