In today’s smart watch review, we have on our hands (quite literally) the vivo Watch 3. I feel a little bad to make the comparison this early in the article, but if you like the rounded curved display on the Google Pixel Watch, you’ll like the vivo Watch 3.

They look very similar to each other, but looks are as far as similarities go. At the end of the day, they’re a mismatch. The latest Pixel Watch 3 retails at a hefty starting price of RM1,849, while the vivo Watch 3 is far less of a burden with an RM899 starting price, which is great news for us price-conscious folks.

You are quite short on choices, though. There are no 41mm or 45mm options to pick from, nor do you have an array of colours at your selection.

The vivo Watch 3 comes in a single size – though the specific measurements are not mentioned – and only in Asteroid Black and Moonlight White. The former comes with an accompanying soft silicon strap suitable for sports, and the latter with white leather straps more appropriate for elegant aesthetics. We must add that the Moonlight White model retails at a slightly higher price of RM999.

The unit we got was the sport-friendly Asteroid Black model. I had the pleasure of slinging the vivo Watch 3 over my wrist for the past month, and – spoiler alert – it’s mostly good stuff.

Sturdy built with classy curves

Have I, on occasion, mistaken the vivo Watch 3 for the Pixel Watch? Guilty as charged. Did I also, in the beginning stages, think of this as a poor man’s Pixel Watch? Regrettably so.

All that’s now in the past though, and the vivo Watch 3 has certainly grown on me since then. The smart watch is pretty sturdily built, made from what feels like hard metal on the lower section of the case. The entire top section, on the other hand, is dedicated to the rounded curved glass that forms the display.

This curved display – or what vivo calls the Borderless 3D Curved Glass – honestly looks great. You’ll have decent navigation real estate on that 1.43″ AMOLED screen, which offers the standard 466×466 resolution. It’s classy, minimal, and feels like you’re peering into a crystal ball. The only negative is the large black bezels that eat away at the borders. If it helps, I counter this by applying a dark watch face for the illusion of a larger screen. Other than that, it’s got punchy, vibrant colours and is very responsive to touches.

A cute little gimmick is the playful pet animations which you can select as your watch face. Right now, there’s only Chai Chai the puppy and Tuan Tuan the kitten; both of which have a set of different animations that pop up whenever you turn on the display. Beyond these, there’s a decent catalogue of watch faces available through the vivo Health app.

Standard health and sports tracking

Health Tracking

Health tracking on the vivo Watch 3 isn’t anything revolutionary. It’s standard, but standard can be good sometimes as it doesn’t mess with the status quo.

You’ll get the mainstream suite of health measurements: heart rate, blood oxygen, stress monitoring, and sleep monitoring. There is no Electrocardiogram (ECG) here, so do keep that in mind if heart rhythm is a concern to you. Something new which might be of interest is Noise Detection, which notifies the wearer if environmental noise reaches dangerous levels for a set amount of time (e.g., 90dB for more than 30 minutes).

Health statistics can be analyzed in a broader format on the vivo Health app. You’ll get a general view of your health measurements – as far as the watch can detect. Sleep tracking records the amount of time you spent in three different stages of sleep: Deep, Light, and REM. It also tracks your heart rate, and provides an overall sleep score once you wake.

If you find yourself constantly pressed with emotion throughout the day, it might be a good idea to enable all-day stress monitoring to get an overview of your stress distribution.

Sports Modes

Have you conceded to the pickleball craze yet? If not, this might just be your sign to pick up the paddle. If you have, then this might be your sign to cop the vivo Watch 3.

There are over 100 sports modes to choose from, and yes, it includes pickleball. Among the list of mainstream sports modes available are outdoor running, pool swimming, strength training, Pilates, hiking, and badminton, just to name a few.

Since this was my main driver for the month, I brought it along to track my gym sessions under the Strength Training mode. My impressions are that it is pretty in-depth for a smart watch at this level. It calculates aerobic and anaerobic effects of the workout, average heart rate, and intensity levels (warm up, fat burning, aerobic endurance, anaerobic endurance, and extreme). At the end of the workout, it even suggests a recovery period before you launch into your next workout.

The metrics will, of course, differ between each sports mode. For outdoor running, the smart watch is able to track your average pace, stride length, cadence, pace per kilometre, and even altitude. Topping it off is the built-in GPS that logs your routes after each run. It would’ve been perfect if it had kilometre markers on the map to accurately gauge your timing between each point, similar to what you get on the Nike Run Club app. As it is, you’ll have to rely on the pace per km details.

A minute detail which took me a while to realize: you can’t access notifications when you’re on the sports interface. Notifications do appear momentarily as a pop-up, but it’s easy to miss if you’re in the middle of a set. It seems like the only way to review your notifications is by temporarily exiting the sports interface via the home button. No need to fret, though, as the watch will continue tracking in the background, and you can easily re-access the sports interface by pressing the exercise button beneath the home dial.

That being said, it would be far easier to just dedicate a page on the sports interface for notifications, so I do hope that’s taken into consideration if there are any upcoming updates to BlueOS.

Functionality and buttons

Buttons

You might be hard-pressed at first at differentiating the vivo Watch 3 from the Pixel Watch, but the trick is in the position of the rotatable crown. The vivo Watch 3 has the crown on the top right section of the case, while the Pixel’s is on the right mid-section of the case.

Now that we’ve got that out of the way, the rotatable dial on the vivo Watch 3 is responsive, and scrolls even at the slightest turn. It also functions as a power button and home button, and, when you’re on the home page, takes you to the quick features page with convenient access to settings, clock, music, and more.

Beneath the rotatable dial is what vivo coins the Exercise button that leads you to the entire catalogue of sports modes available. Once you’ve selected your sport, you can then press it once to pause your workouts, or long press it to end the session.

As aforementioned, if you’ve exited the sports interface to check on notifications, this is the same button you press to re-enter sports mode.

Functions

It’s easy to navigate around the vivo Watch 3. If you’ve owned a smart watch at any point in time, it will be a familiar experience.

Swiping right from the homepage will get you to the weather and music widgets. This is fixed and cannot be altered. Swiping to the left, on the other hand, will lead you to cards with customizable widgets. Each card (page) can hold up to 4 widgets, all neatly organized in square or rectangle tiles. I personally like my health stats and fitness ring conveniently on the first page, followed by the exercise widget to quick start my workouts.

Your notifications can be seen when you swipe down from the homepage, but unfortunately, there’s no on-screen keypad or quick reply feature so you can’t respond from the watch if you’ve received a message.

One thing that I really, really like on the vivo Watch 3 is that you can transfer music files and play those files on the watch itself. You can even connect the watch to your headphones, essentially removing any dependence from your phone if you want to listen to music. This is especially useful for runners, who now no longer need to lug their phones along for roadwork. As to how you intend to procure these music files, we’ll leave that to your own devices.

The transferring process is a bit of a hassle though. You will need to have those files readily on your phone as it can only be transferred through the vivo Health app. On the app, tap on Devices, select vivo Watch 3, and scroll down until you see Music. Tap on Music, and you should see the Add Music button, where you can then select which mp3 files you want transferred to the watch.

It’s not exactly a runner’s watch like those you find in the Garmin line-up. Those tend to have third-party app integrations like Spotify that often cost an arm and a leg. From a beginner runner’s standpoint whose runs don’t often cross the 10km mark, you can definitely get by with the less-than-perfect music feature on the vivo Watch 3.

vivo Watch 3: An easy recommendation

There wasn’t much fanfare when vivo launched the Watch 3, so it’s understandable if it slipped under the radar. Based on the spending habits of people close to me, the general direction people head in is towards the Apple Watch and Galaxy Watch…only for them to use it the same way they would with a budget smartwatch.

The vivo Watch 3 isn’t exactly budget, but it’s significantly friendlier than plucking from the apple tree or reaching for galaxies, all while packing features that are up to par.

It’s definitely not a perfect choice, and it does lack a few features that might be important to you, namely ECG and Spotify integration. But other than that, it’s a pretty sound smart watch to have without going above the RM1,000 mark.

At least for the majority of consumers who just need an everyday smart watch for basic health and sports tracking, the vivo Watch 3 is an easy recommendation in my book.

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