Samsung Galaxy Watch 7 review

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Samsung’s all-new Galaxy Watch Ultra grabbed most of the attention following the company’s latest Unpacked event, but that’s not the smartwatch most people will be considering. The Galaxy Watch 7 comes in at around half the price whilst boasting a similar core selection of smart and fitness-tracking features.

Featuring the same improved performance, the latest Wear OS 5, and Samsung’s sophisticated new BioActive health sensor in a deeply familiar design, it’s a watch that hides most of its advances over the Galaxy Watch 6 out of sight.

It shouldn’t surprise anyone to learn that it’s a fairly minor upgrade overall (again), but is it the best all-round smartwatch for most Android users? That’s what we’re going to try and find out in the following review.

Design & Build

• Slightly larger body than before
• Still comfortable to wear and well-built
• Two physical buttons

Samsung’s mainline smartwatch range really hasn’t changed its external appearance all that much over the past several years. This year, it’s been left to the Galaxy Watch Ultra to offer something new – though Apple would doubtless contest the use of the word ‘new’ here.

As for the Galaxy Watch, it looks much the same as the Galaxy Watches 6, 5, and 4 before it. It presents the exact same combination of a round watch face and flat, industrial metal frame, with a gently bulbous back containing all the sensors.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

The main difference with this year’s model is the colour options. I really like the Green finish and complementary army green Sport Band that came with my review model, the latter with its undulating texture and contrasting blue and orange thread details. It looked equally at home whether I was dressing sporty for a workout or smart-casual for a nice meal out.

You can also get the 40mm variant in a Cream colour, and the 44mm watch in Silver. There are four other alternative Sport Band colours, alongside three other strap types.

The Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 was already a little on the chunky side, but the Galaxy Watch 7 is actually 0.7mm thicker and 0.1g heavier. That’s not a particularly meaningful increase, but I would have liked to have seen things travelling in the opposite direction.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

As before, the Watch 7 packs an exemplary level of robustness, with 5ATM (meaning it can withstand pressure up to 50m underwater), IP68, and MIL-STD-810H (military grade) ratings, while the display is covered in tough Sapphire Glass.

In my experience, the sharp black metal ridge that surrounds said glass is the most likely to pick up nicks and scrapes, and I noticed one such nick appearing within the first day or so of wearing the watch. That might be preferable to wearing a scratch on the display, as is the case with Google’s rounded Pixel Watch 3 design.

I was sent the smaller 40mm variant of the Watch 7, which looked and felt comfortable on my skinny wrist. There’s also a 44mm option for those with bigger wrists. I don’t usually wear watches to bed, but in testing the Watch 7’s sleep-tracking features it didn’t cause me any major irritation or discomfort.

As with previous models, you get two remappable physical buttons on the right hand edge, covering the ‘Home’ and ‘Back’ functions by default. With no Galaxy Watch 7 Classic on the cards, there’s no physical bezel control, and Samsung’s digital bezel command (with accompanying haptic feedback) doesn’t feel quite so precise or tactile.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Screen & Audio

• Choice of 1.3- or 1.5-inch OLED display
• Vibrant colours and excellent detail
• Decent speaker

Samsung hasn’t messed with its core smartwatch display set-up, which means that you get a choice of 1.3-inch and 1.5-inch OLEDs, with a resolution of 432×432 or 480×480 respectively.

Whichever one you go for, you’re going to be hitting a peak brightness of 2,000 nits, which is a match for the Google Pixel Watch 3.

This remains one of the best smartwatch displays around, even here in its second successive generation. Samsung’s OLED mastery is on full show, with rich and vibrant colours and inky blacks. The latter really makes a virtue of One UI’s preponderance of black backgrounds.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Text legibility is on point too, making it easy to parse even smaller text at a glance. As already noted, the edge of the screen incorporates Samsung’s digital bezel, enabling an alternative way to navigate through One UI’s menus.

It still doesn’t feel quite precise or intuitive enough to become your primary means of navigation, but it’s easily ignored.

Just as with last year’s Watch 6, the Galaxy Watch 7 packs impressive speakers give the size of the watch. It made Samsung’s vocal workout instructions easy to process even while lifting weights. All you really need such a small component to be is crisp and loud, and Samsung ticks both of those boxes.

Software & Features

• One UI Watch 6 over WearOS 5
• Smooth, responsive UI
• Some health features require a Samsung phone

The Galaxy Watch 7 runs on Google’s WearOS 5, with Samsung’s bespoke One UI Watch 6 layered on top. Just like the last few models, Samsung is promising four years of software updates, which will take you through to 2028.

Samsung’s UI keeps the core elements the same as Google’s as seen on the Pixel Watch series, but switches the layout around a little. So, for example, swiping up from the bottom on the home screen on the Galaxy Watch 7 accesses an app menu, while I have to press the crown button to access something similar on my Pixel Watch 2.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Swiping up on a Pixel Watch accesses your notifications, which is accessible with a rightward swipe on the Watch 7. It’s the same basic things in a slightly different configuration, and it’s largely a matter of personal taste as to which is better. Google and Samsung worked closely in the development of WearOS, and it shows.

Samsung’s UI runs extremely fluidly on the Watch 7, and works well as a regular smartwatch with any phone running Android 11 and higher, though you’ll need to install a few extra apps and plug-ins. You’ll only get the best out of all its health and fitness features with a Samsung phone, however.

It’s only when you go all in on Samsung that you’ll be able to use the Samsung Health Monitor app. This app is crucial to gaining access to features such as the electrocardiogram (ECG) and blood pressure, as well as the new sleep apnea detection feature.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

The first two of these aren’t huge losses. Taking your blood pressure remains a fiddly process that requires an independent cuff-based monitor unlike the Huawei Watch D2. The ECG function doesn’t require any additional equipment, but still requires quite a specific calibration process.

However, these features combine to make the idea of buying a Galaxy Watch 7 somewhat unpalatable unless you also have a Galaxy phone. It would feel like you weren’t getting the complete experience that you were paying for, which is rather a shame when the Watch 7 is otherwise a hugely competitive offering.

Whatever the phone, you’ll be using Samsung’s Wearable app to quickly swap out watch faces and tiles (essentially little widgets), as well as offering easier access to settings and app downloads.

That solid Google basis means the Watch 7 has access to the Google Play Store for apps alongside Samsung’s lesser Galaxy Store, granting you access to all the major examples like Spotify, WhatsApp, Todoist and SoundCloud. This also means you can download Google Wallet for mobile payments, which is highly recommended if you want to do tappy payments with your watch.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

There are a lot of Samsung apps preinstalled here, as well as the likes of Microsoft Outlook. But you also get the likes of Google Maps and the aforementioned WhatsApp, both of which are likely to be almost universally welcome.

Health and fitness management is handled through the Samsung Health app, which offers deeper insights into your various health metrics and workout performance. We’ll talk more about that in the following section.

Fitness & Tracking

• Wealth of health and fitness data
• New advanced sensor
• Advanced sleep tracking

Samsung’s smartwatch range has long excelled when it comes to fitness tracking, and the Galaxy Watch 7 kicks things up another level.

The key advance here is Samsung’s new BioActive health sensor, which packs in more heart rate sensor LEDs (13 compared to 6 in the Watch 6), which means that it can record health metrics like heart rate, sleep quality, blood pressure, blood oxygen levels, and stress levels more accurately.

Samsung reckons it could be as much as 30% more accurate when tracking high-intensity workouts.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

On a basic level, I found the step and distance count to be broadly consistent with my Google Pixel Watch 2. Samsung has fitted the Galaxy Watch 7 out with dual-band GPS, which means that location tracking should prove even more accurate and reliable.

On the software front, Samsung has implemented a new Energy Score, which utilises Galaxy AI to produce a personal score out of 100 based on factors such as your recent workouts, your heart rate, and your sleep quality.

This seems somewhat arbitrary for the first few days and even weeks, but as you spend more time wearing the watch and making full use of its tracking abilities you’ll come to rely on it for an indication of how much you’re likely to be able to take on in any given day Samsung shows you how much your Energy Score has risen or dipped, and breaks down each contributing factor.

Sleep tracking is even better than before, with a new feature that can scan for sleep apnea. This is the first general-use smartwatch to gain FDA approval for such a feature, which is quite an achievement.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Other than that, the Galaxy Watch 7 can handle all the same heart rate, ECG, SpO2 monitoring, and AFib detection tasks as before, albeit with a greater degree of accuracy. As already highlighted, you’ll need to have a Samsung phone to make use of the Samsung Health Monitor app and its ECG, blood pressure and sleep apnea-tracking functions.

When it comes to general workouts, Samsung seemingly has just about everything covered. I counted 102 dedicated workouts covering general workouts and multiple sports. In the unlikely event that your chosen workout isn’t covered, you can create your own exercise, or even your own extended routine incorporating multiple exercise types.

The Watch 7 reliably noticed whenever I was on an extended walk and kicked off an automatic walking workout, which helped an impromptu weekend tap room crawl feel far more virtuous than it actually was.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

For committed runners, the range of data Samsung assembles is quite extensive for a non-specialist running watch such as this, with a breakdown of elements such as cadence, pace, elevation change, VO2 max and more. This alone could be enough to warrant consideration of the Watch 7 above other all-round WearOS watches, even if you don’t have a Samsung phone and can’t access every last health feature.

The Sleep Coaching feature proves very insightful. So long as you’re comfortable wearing the watch over night, Samsung will use the Watch 7’s new advanced sensor to track your sleep. It’ll take a week to form an initial prognosis, but eventually it will have a pool of data to work with, and will supply you with an appraisal of your sleep quality.

This includes attributing you with a signature sleep animal. I’m a penguin, apparently, because while I get plenty of sleep on a fairly regular schedule, I tend to wake up often. Beyond this, Samsung’s Sleep Coaching feature supplies ratings for your sleep time and efficiency, and provides tips on how to improve less than satisfactory areas. It strikes just the right balance between accessibility and supplying enough useful data to act upon.

If you keep your phone beside you, you can also record any snoring – though as a non-snorer, it was impossible for me to test this conclusively.

Much of the fitness and wellness tracking is available on the Samsung Galaxy Ring if the idea of a smart ring might suit your preference. It’s more expensive at £399/$399 but does last longer in terms of battery life.

If you’re flush enough to use both the Galaxy Ring and Galaxy Watch 7 at the same time, the shared responsibility of tracking extends the smart ring’s battery life by up to 30%. It’s just a shame Samsung doesn’t offer a bundle discount for anyone willing to buy both.

Specs & Performance

• Exynos W1000 and 2GB RAM
• Slick performance
• 32GB of storage

Samsung has equipped both sizes of the Galaxy Watch 7 with a new Exynos W1000 chipset, which looks to be a considerable upgrade on the Galaxy Watch 6 and its Exynos W930. This is backed by 2GB of RAM, just like the Watch 6.

That new Exynos W1000 chip is made up of one ARM Cortex-A78 1.6GHz core and four Cortex-A55 1.5GHz cores, compared to the Exynos W930’s dual Cortex-A55 1.4GHz cores. Not only does the W1000 have a core and clock advantage, it’s all built to a smaller 3nm standard (vs 5nm in the Exynos W930).

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

To cut a long story short, while the Samsung Galaxy Watch 7 might look and handle the same as the Galaxy Watch 6, it’s a lot faster and more energy efficient.

Performance isn’t a night and day improvement in general operation – the Watch 6 was and is already pretty zippy. But that extra power is evidently needed to operate the more sophisticated BioActive health sensor. It should also ensure that the Galaxy Watch 7 stays faster for longer, and that it’s better equipped for future advanced health-tracking updates that Samsung has hinted at.

Storage has also taken a big step forward, with the Galaxy Watch 6’s 16GB being doubled to 32GB in the Galaxy Watch 7.

All in all, when you factor in the aforementioned upgrade to the health sensor and its new dual-band GPS provision, the Galaxy Watch 7 represents a more substantial upgrade than initially meets the eye.

Battery Life & Charging

• 300mAh battery on 40mm, 425mAh on 44mm
• 1 to 1.5 days of battery life
• Supports 10W Qi wireless charging, but no more Wireless Powershare

Samsung has stuck with the same battery capacities as the Galaxy Watch 6, which means that the 40mm model of the Watch 7 is powered by a 300mAh cell, while the 44mm variant get s a 425mAh cell.

That’s a bit of a shame, considering that we were somewhat underwhelmed by the Watch 6’s stamina. Still, I held out hopes of an improvement, if only thanks to that more efficient Exynos W1000 processor.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

All of this is anecdotal, of course, with each person’s usage pattern being different, but I found the Galaxy Watch 7 to be comfortably and consistently capable of going a full 24-hour day or even slightly longer – even with the always-on display active. On lighter usage days it would get up to half way through a second day before it gave out.

That’s a small but potentially significant improvement on the Galaxy Watch 6, which struggled to get through a full day. Again, I need to supply the caveat that we’re comparing data from two completely different users here.

Of course, a day to a-day-and-a-half of usage is hardly outstanding, but it does instantly make the Watch 7’s sleep tracking features more viable. I was able to wear it through a full day and night, then place it on charge in the morning while I was having a shower and making a coffee. You can extend that battery life if you opt against using the always-on display, too.

If you want longer battery life, you’ll need to opt for something like the OnePlus Watch 2R or Huawei Watch GT5 Pro.

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

Jon Mundy / Foundry

For charging, there’s been no great advancement on the time it takes to juice the Galaxy Watch 7 up, with support for 10W Qi charging. In charging up from empty using the bundled cable, I found that it was able to hit 58% in around 30 minutes, while a full charge takes just over 70 minutes. That’s about the same as the Watch 6.

It’s not a bad result, but I’d like to see things speeding up significantly (and not just from Samsung) to make that ‘charge over breakfast’ concept more viable, particularly following those heavy use days where the battery is almost completely depleted come the morning.

As for that charger cable itself, you’re looking at a far more elegant solution than Google’s Pixel Watch charger. Its ability to magnetically affix and operate through 360 degrees is far preferable to Google’s fixed-position alternative.

One feature that’s been taken away since the Watch 6 days is Wireless PowerShare, which means you can no longer charge the Watch 7 by placing it on your Samsung phone. That’s the price you have to pay for the more advanced sensor on the back of the watch, apparently.

Price & Availability

The Galaxy Watch 7 costs exactly the Same as Galaxy Watch 6, with the 40mm model costing £289/$299 and the 44mm version £319/$329. You’ll need to add an extra £50/$50 in both cases if you want to add LTE connectivity.

The Galaxy Watch 7 is available direct from the Samsung website, or from the usual major retailers like Amazon, John Lewis, Currys, and Argos.

In the US, it’s available from Samsung, Amazon and BestBuy.

This makes the Galaxy Watch 7 extremely competitive on pricing. The 40mm model undercuts the 41mm Pixel Watch 3 by £60/$50, while the 44mm model is £80/$70 cheaper than the 45mm Pixel Watch 3.

Elsewhere, the TicWatch Pro 5 Enduro, which is closer to the larger and more expensive model of the Galaxy Watch 7 in size, costs £329.99/$349.99. Over in Apple-land, meanwhile, the Apple Watch Series 10 starts from £399/$399.

For something cheaper, consider the Galaxy Watch FE which we’ll have a review of very soon.

Check our rankings of the best smartwatches for the top options.

Should you buy the Samsung Galaxy Watch 7?

Samsung has created another broadly incremental upgrade for its latest mainline smartwatch, but while the outside is largely unchanged, there are a couple of notable internal improvements.

The provision of a new Exynos W1000 chip is good news, both for the ongoing performance of the watch and for battery life in the here and now. The ability to run consistently for a full day makes those enhanced sleep tracking functions more viable.

Talking of which, Samsung has fitted the Watch 7 out with more advanced sensors that provide even more accurate and in-depth health tracking. Throw in an some extremely competitive pricing and some snazzy new strap designs, and you have a compelling smartwatch package.

All of which makes it even more of a bummer that some of those health tracking features only work with Samsung phones. If it wasn’t for that, this might well have been the best smartwatch for most Android users, no questions asked. As it stands, it’s another strong contender.

Specs

• 1.3in 432×432 (40mm) or 1.5in 480×480 (44mm) circular AMOLED always-on display
• Sapphire crystal
• Exynos W1000 3nm processor
• 2GB RAM
• 32GB storage
• One UI Watch 6 over Wear OS 5
• Bluetooth 5.3
• NFC
• GPS (L1+L5)
• Wi-Fi
• 4G LTE (optional)
• Microphone
• Speaker
• Optical heart rate sensor (PPG)
• Electrical heart sensor (ECG)
• Bioelectrical impedance analysis sensor (BIA)
• Blood oxygen tracking
• AFib irregular heartbeat detection
• Sleep tracking
• Snore detection
• Body composition analysis
• Guided workouts
• Bixby Voice
• Gesture controls
• Aluminium casing
• 5ATM swim-proof
• IP68-certified dust/water resistance
• MIL-STD-810G tested
• Wireless charging
• 300mAh (40mm) or 425mAh battery (44mm)
• 10W Qi wireless charging
• 40.4 x 40.4 x 9.7mm (40mm) or 44.4 x 44.4 x 9.7mm (44mm)
• 28.8g (40mm) or 33.8g (44mm)
• Colours: Green, Cream (40mm only), Silver (44mm only)
• Compatible with Android 11 or higher (devices require more than 1.5GB RAM)