How to Find the Best Fitness Apps for Your Smartwatch

The 15 Best Smartwatch Apps for Android

Wear, formerly Android Wear, is Google's smartwatch platform that powers watches from dozens of manufacturers. Some smartwatch manufacturers include great functionality right out of the box with their default apps, but you can turn a budget-priced, bare-bones smartwatch into a powerhouse with the right smartwatch apps.

Finding the Best Smartwatch Apps for Android

Google's pared-down version of Google Play is available right on your wrist, which makes it easy to discover new smartwatch apps for your Wear device. In the Wear version of Google Play, you'll find a list of popular apps, a few handy categories, and even a list of apps on your phone that have smartwatch versions available.

Since it can be tough to sift through the thousands of smartwatch app options on such a tiny screen, we assembled the 15 best Wear apps to help increase your productivity, access important information, and stay entertained when you're away from your phone.

The apps in this list are available for free from Google Play. Some of them have a premium version that you can buy, and others have optional in-app purchases. Still, you can use the basic version of each app without paying anything.

ParKing is a handy app that takes the hassle out of remembering where you parked your car. When you launch the app on your smartwatch, all you do is tap the little car icon to log where you parked. When it comes time to find your car, you'll be able to zoom in on a Google Maps view of its exact location.

What We Like

• Create and access notes and reminders.

• Syncs with your other devices.

• Connect with Android and iOS devices.

Google Keep, which shows up on your Wear smartwatch as Keep Notes, is a lightweight note-taking app that's available on a variety of devices and via a web interface.

The version of Google Keep for your smartwatch lets you access your notes on the go and jot down notes wherever you are. Notes created on your watch are synced to the cloud, so you can access them from your other devices later.

The AccuWeather app brings the same forecasts you can access on the web or your phone to your Wear smartwatch. You don't get the MinuteCast information, radar, or other bells and whistles because the information is pared down for the limited screen size on smartwatches. What you do get is a weather app that's easy to read at a glance.

Wear Casts is a standalone Wear app, meaning it works independently from your phone (except for getting podcasts to the watch). You can use Wear Casts to download podcasts to your watch, pair Bluetooth earbuds, and listen to podcasts whenever you want, even if your phone isn't within Bluetooth range.

Since Wear Casts doesn't require a constant Bluetooth connection to your phone, it's easier on your batteries than other apps.

Amazon has an official Alexa app for Android phones, but it isn't compatible with Wear. That's where the third-party app Listens for Alexa comes in. This app brings Alexa to your wrist, and it includes most of the functionality of an actual Alexa device.

You can even use this app to control any smart home devices that you usually control with your Amazon Echo.

What We Like

• Generate shopping lists on your watch.

• Store loyalty card details.

• Share your shopping lists with family members.

Bring! is a shopping list app that lets you create, edit, and share lists right from your smartwatch. It includes a library of items with easy-to-understand icons, and you can add items to the list using your smartwatch's voice transcription functionality.

What We Like

• Offers trip timing for public transit, walking, and bicycling.

• Supports mixed transportation routes.

• Provides Uber time and cost.

Citymapper is a must-have if you use public transit in one of the cities it covers or you're planning to visit a supported city. It brings a ton of information about bus, train, subway, ferry, and taxi data right to your wrist.

The downside is that it's only available in a limited number of cities, and it's useless if you don't live in any of them and don't plan on visiting.

One major function that Wear smartwatches lack when compared to dedicated fitness devices like Fitbit is sleep tracking. There's also a lack of sleep tracking apps on Google Play that work with Wear but Sleep as Android fits the bill nicely.

Sleep as Android includes a ton of features, some of which aren't available from dedicated fitness devices. For example, the lucid dreaming mode can determine when you enter rapid eye movement (REM) sleep, and it provides an auditory cue to help you realize you're asleep without fully waking up.

The only downside to Sleep as Android is that the smartwatch app doesn't work independently from your phone. So you have to make sure your phone is charged up, paired to your watch, and nearby when you go to sleep.

Use the Apps on Your Phone section in the Google Play store on your watch to download this.

If you use the Google Authenticator app on your phone, this app is a great accessory to add to your arsenal. It provides easy access to your authenticators via a swiping motion, and the numbers are large enough that they're easy to read even on small smartwatch screens.

The only downside is that it relies on your phone to work, so it can't act as a backup for the authenticator on your phone.

If you're a whiz at mental math, having a calculator on your wrist might not have that much appeal. For the rest of us, Google's basic calculator app is an awesome answer to the clunky calculator watches of the 1980s, and it takes the headache out of calculating tips.

What We Like

• Tons of free watch face designs.

• New designs are added regularly.

• Create your own watch faces.

Many free and paid apps provide access to new watch faces, but Mr. Time is at the top of the heap. It includes free watch faces, premium watch faces you can buy, and you can design your own.

What We Like

• Access range information when you're golfing.

• Decent coverage including small local courses.

• You don't have to pull your phone out before every shot.

Hole19 is a golf range finding and score tracking app that runs on your phone. Plus, it has an accessory smartwatch app that lets you access essential information from the convenience of your wrist.

If your local course is included in the more than 40,000 courses that Hole19 covers, you can use both the smartphone and smartwatch app for free. There is a paid version, but it primarily provides high-resolution graphics rather than unlocking additional course information.

Despite the minimal screen space available on Wear smartwatches, some decent games are available for the platform. Infinity Loop is especially well suited to play on small screens. This puzzle game uses the basic mechanic of tapping puzzle pieces to rotate them until they form a pattern.

It's easy to pick up, and it's basic compared to the great smartphone games out there, but it is a nice little time-waster that you can play without pulling out your phone.

There are many benefits associated with staying adequately hydrated. Still, most people have trouble remembering to take a few sips here and there throughout the day.

Water Drink Reminder is designed to remind you to drink at regular intervals so that you take in an optimal amount of water, based on your height and weight. It runs on both your phone and smartwatch, so there's less of a chance of missing a reminder.

Google's map app is an easy sell on Wear. It's simplistic compared to the full smartphone app. However, it makes it easy to orient yourself and find local points of interest when you're walking around on foot. It also allows you to drop a pin at your destination and launch full navigation on your phone.

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Top 5 Apps for Monitoring Your Fitness with Smartwatches

After huge success with smartphones, Android and Apple entered the world of the smartwatch and have since been producing world-class wearable fitness trackers. As such, there are loads of apps dedicated to help you monitoring your fitness.

Other than delivering notifications for your calls, texts and social media, smartwatches have the ability to inform you of your health and fitness levels. Most manufacturers have a native fitness app, but there are plenty of third-party app developers who want to compete.

Lets check out five top apps for keeping your fitness up with help from your smartwatch.

Endomundo was a very popular social fitness network long before the birth of the smartwatch. It now supports WearOS and users can enjoy rich features on their wrist.

Endomundo has matured over time and offers an awful lot. Its health and fitness data tracking offers insights into both indoor and outdoor workouts. It pairs brilliantly with a heart rate monitor and produces accurate heart rate numbers. It analyses your information, which it presents in a daily diary with split times per workout, as well as other data.

Furthermore,it has some awesome social features, so you can interact with pals and share your fitness plans and goals. Your WearOS smartwatch will deliver voice commands through which youre able to tailor what information you want to pop up first on your smartwatch.

Theres a free and a premium subscription for this app, which is $5.99 per month ($29.99 per year).

Googles Google Fit for WearOS (originally launched for Android Wear) can be used with a paired smartwatch and Android device, or solely on a smartwatch.

The app will tell you how many steps youve done on your smartwatch display. There are dedicated cards for your heart rate. You can set yourself goals for activities like running and cycling, for instance, and access maps and graphs but youll need to sync your smartwatch with your smartphone for this.

The coolest thing is that it plays well with other fitness apps too, so you can really maximise your fitness information and see all your data easily, on screen.

Strava is one of the best-known and trusted apps and comes very highly-rated. You can download it from the Android Store and use it with pretty much any WearOS-equipped smartwatch. The app will work with the GPS function on your smartwatch to deliver your health and fitness information whilst youre out and about.

Strava will deliver important data calories burned, distance covered, speed and elevation and you can monitor your heart rate, too. You can share what you get up to on social media and compete with friends on the leaderboard.

The app is free but there are various in-app purchases for the premium features. These allow you to set goals, see instant post-work out performance data, training video content and other cool things.

Runtastic is another name known to active smartwatch wearers. It lets you listen to audiobooks and podcasts whilst working out, which is a great feature that you dont see often. This comes from a feature named story running where you can purchase stories for a dollar. The tracks last about 40 minutes each perfectly timed for a decent run or workout.

If youre an Apple Watch wearer, this app will sync nicely with your rings so you can complete your exercise goals for the day. You can begin any Runtastic activity on your Apple Watch.

Its free to download, but you can get the premium features for $10 a month (or $50 a year). This gives you access to more advanced statistics and nutritional information, all advert-free.

Gymaholic is an Apple Watch-compatible app that has a focus on complex strength training. It uses 3D modelling and augmented reality, and is pretty cool. Images on the Apple Watch display are tiny, but it works well enough. Youre told about what reps and sets you have left, using the modelling feature which is valuable regardless of the actual workout youre doing.

You can edit your set and monitor your heart rate and add or delete exercises right there on your watch. The only drawback is that you need to be pretty clued up on the names of the moves and lifts as well as the correct form and how to improve. So, this app is wonderful for a seasoned weightlifter or bodybuilder chasing some serious gains.

Summary

Its tricky finding a smartwatch that offers everything you need, and once youve got that, then youll need to find a fitness app to suit your needs. If youre new to the fitness scene, there are apps that will make workout suggestions to get you started, and coaching assistance as you go.

Any sport youre into will have an app that will increase your efficiency and offer tips on how to train. Waterproof smartwear has opened up the possibilities not only to include activities like swimming and outdoor pursuits, but it also means you never need to take your watch off and so data can be collected around the clock.

Thanks to the wonderful world of tech, were able to learn more things about ourselves so we can make the right choices for our health.

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Last Updated on October 7, 2021

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