Mi Smart Band 5 is the latest offering from Xiaomi in the fitness band category. This wearable succeeds the Mi Smart Band 4. It has a slightly larger display and new features such as a dedicated women’s health tracker, stress monitoring, breathing exercises, remote shutter, and Personal Activity Intelligence (PAI) Index to help users assess their overall fitness. For the first time, Xiaomi has introduced a magnetic charger on its fitness band, eliminating the need to remove the capsule from the strap for charging. So in this article, we will see redmi watch 5 hands review.
Mi Smart Band 5 design
The new Mi Smart Band 5’s overall aesthetic has not evolved much compared to its predecessors. It still has a capsule with a colour display and a thermoplastic elastomer wristband with a loop buckle. It has approximately 20 per cent more display area than the Mi Smart Band 4, but that’s hardly noticeable. There’s a touch-sensitive button below the 1.1-inch (126×294 pixels) AMOLED touchscreen with a 16-bit colour range. This is a downgrade from the 24-bit colour range of the Mi Smart Band 4’s display. However, the peak brightness has increased from 400nits to 450nits.
The weight of the Mi Smart Band 5 is only 11.9g, and it’s comfortable on the wrist. There also seems to be a coating for preventing fingerprint smudges. There are two contact pins at the back for the magnetic charger. The Mi Smart Band 5 feels premium in terms of build quality, and there was no loosening of strap or buckle in my time with this device during the review.
Mi Smart Band 5 interface and software
Xiaomi offers over 100 watch face options on the Mi Smart Band 5, sorted into categories such as workout, art, science and technology, business, fashion, and more. There are some great options to choose from, including animated ones, which helps the otherwise bland display look quirky. These watch faces can be accessed in the Mi Fit app by going to Profile > Mi Smart Band 5 > Store.
Users can swipe up or down on the touchscreen to see their steps are taken and calories burnt, their PAI index, heart rate stats, notifications, stress level, breathing level, and menstrual cycle monitor. Swiping left shows notifications, while swiping right offers shortcut widgets that can be customised using the Mi Fit app. The weather and music widgets are shown by default, but you can add others such as an alarm, stopwatch, and even workouts.
Apart from letting you read email and text notifications, the Mi Smart Band 5 also allows you to reject and answer calls. Its interface is simple and easy to understand. Text is readable, and the brightness is adjustable.
The Mi Smart Band 5 has a host of software features, including the ability to use it as a remote shutter for your paired smartphone’s camera. A world clock feature has also been introduced so you can see the time in different cities, and a new dedicated breathing guide can train you to calm yourself and focus better. There’s a stress monitor that can calculate your stress level based on heart rate variability data. It informs you whether you are relaxed or strained. Xiaomi has also introduced a menstrual cycle tracker that offers reminders on period dates, ovulation days, and even your fertile period.
There is a new PAI index (Personal Activity Intelligence) that shows you how active you need to stay healthy. This is calculated by using gender, age, heart rate, and other data points. This new system is built to help users stay motivated, and you have to keep your score at 100 or close to that to be considered “fit” by the device. It gives you daily scores based on your workouts and also offers suggestions based on the data collected.
Mi Smart Band 5 specifications and features
The Mi Smart Band 5 offers 11 professional sports modes compared to the six on its predecessor. These are outdoor running, treadmill, cycling, indoor cycling, walking, elliptical machine, rowing machine, yoga, jump rope, pool swimming, and freestyle. The fitness band monitors your heart rate during activities and figures out when the workout has stopped, to pause tracking automatically.
A 5ATM waterproofing rating means that the band can be used in a swimming pool. I wore it while swimming and even in the shower, and the Mi Smart Band 5 survived both \tests with no hiccups after that. It is worth noting that Xiaomi warns against using this device in a sauna or while scuba diving. It also packs 512KB of RAM and 16MB of storage and supports Bluetooth 5. Sensors onboard include a three-axis acceleration sensor, a three-axis gyroscope, and a PPG heart rate monitor. The Mi Smart Band 5 is compatible with phones running Android 5.0 or iOS 10.0 and above.
Mi Smart Band 5 performance and battery life
The touch interface is satisfactory, and the workout modes offer detailed data based on the exercise you choose. For instance, swimming mode offers stroke rate and records types of stroke as well. The jump rope mode counts skips, and the rowing machine mode depends on stokes. The varied watch faces with the option to customise the default ones make for a great addition. The heart rate tracker and the newly introduced stress tracker managed to produce verifiable results.
Verdict
The Mi Smart Band 5 aces all the basics expected from a fitness band. It is accurate enough in tracking and can easily last for more than a week per charge. It offers useful new features such as stress and menstrual cycle tracking. The PAI score didn’t motivate me, but that’s going to be subjective for every user, based on their priorities and priced at Rs. 2,499, the Mi Smart Band 5 is more affordable than the newly launched Samsung Galaxy Fit 2, priced at Rs. 3,999. The Samsung wearable offers 70 watch faces to choose from, whereas the Mi Smart Band 5 offers 100. The former also doesn’t track stress and menstrual cycles and only offers five workout modes.
The Mi Smart Band 5 is a standout at its price point and should prove to be a reliable purchase for most people. If you’re looking for a fitness band that offers accurate tracking, reliable workout data, and decent battery life, you can opt for the Mi Smart Band 5.
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The Review
Redmi Watch 5 Hands Review
The Mi Smart Band 5 is a standout at its price point and should prove to be a reliable purchase for most people. If you're looking for a fitness band that offers accurate tracking, reliable workout data, and decent battery life, you can opt for the Mi Smart Band 5.
Review Breakdown
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Redmi Watch 5 Hands Review
