The Apple Watch SE 3 is one of the best smartwatches on the market today and the the most affordable Apple Watch. Starting at $249, the SE 3 doesn’t have all the same emergency or health features found on its pricier siblings, but it’s still a mighty capable, handsome, and easy-wearing smartwatch for the money. During CNET’s lab testing to find the smartwatch with the most accurate heart rate monitor, Vanessa Hand Orellana, CNET’s wearables writer, ran over 30 miles of tests. With the Polar H10 chest strap heart-rate monitor as the control, she compared the Apple Watch Series 11, Garmin Venu 4, Google Pixel Watch 4, Samsung Galaxy Watch 8 and Amazfit Bip 6. The fitness trackers on this list are the ones that have stood out to us during our testing, specifically for fitness, and are the ones we would personally continue to use for our workouts.

In our 1-mile distance test, the Charge 6 was -0.02 miles off and had an error rate of 1.3% in our step-count test, performing just below our pick. On a full charge we were able to get five days of use while working out regularly and using GPS. The Fitbit Inspire 3 was the most accurate fitness tracker for step count and near the top of the rankings for every other test we performed. The touchscreen display is only 1.5 inches tall but is simple to navigate, thanks to its sharp colors and easily readable text and icons. The thin, half-inch band doesn’t feel clunky during workouts or everyday use, and the Inspire 3 weighs just 0.32 ounce — lighter than a typical USB flash drive. The Inspire 3’s battery is advertised as lasting 10 days before charging, although we found it to come in a fair bit short of that mark.

Garmin Venu Sq 2 GPS Smartwatch (Shadow Gray)

This also looks way more stylish than beefier multisport watches with similar battery life. What I like most about this watch, however, is that it’s one that you can grow with. On top of recovery metrics and sleep tracking, it also has Garmin Coach — a built-in, free training program for beginner and intermediate-level runners hoping to tackle a 5K, 10K, or half marathon.

Charger A Compatible Devices: GT 2 series, GTS 4 mini, GTR Mini, Active, Active Edge, Bip 5,  Bip 5 Unity,…

It also has a strong battery life; it’s advertised as lasting 10 days, and during our most recent test, in 2025, it lasted 8.5 days, including near-daily recorded workouts and auto-detected activity. We test fitness trackers against a validated pedometer and on a known 1-mile loop. Max Paquette, a professor at the University of Memphis who also consults athletes on optimizing performance, warned that trackers ​​often make people less in tune with their bodies.

• The app is ideal for lifters who already know what they’re doing and want an efficient way to stay organized.
• In addition to activity tracking, the app offers sleep, food, water, menstrual cycle, glucose, and weight tracking—which are great features if you’re trying to be healthier overall.
• The app lets you monitor your progress through charts and graphs, making it easy to see gains in strength and endurance.
• The app has badges, achievements, and social features for a gamified running experience.
• Maximum battery life is approximate and is based on testing conducted in 2025 on pre-production hardware and software, using default settings with a median Fitbit Air user battery usage profile across a mix of features.
• You’ll need a Google account, though, even if you already have the Fitbit app.

For women in perimenopause or over 40, Menovation offers a 60-day trial — the most generous trial period of any specialized app in our comparison. Even if you don’t have a Peloton tread, you can still take advantage of the playlists (Broadway, hip hop, new releases, artist spotlights, and more) and personalities of the many Peloton coaches with the Peloton app. There are indoor run training plans to get you started or to train for races, as well as bootcamp classes that mix in strength training. You can even take your runs outdoors with their outdoor training plans and runs. We’re raising the game with our new Smart Trackers for cats and big dogs. Get AI-powered health features and the trusted GPS tech that makes us #1.

Activity Benefit tracks all your active choices during the day and shows how they help you to stay healthy on a daily, weekly and monthly level. Measures all your movement throughout the day—not just workouts—so you can see how every step adds up to real progress. Analyzes your recent sleep to predict how alert and focused you’ll be during the day — helping you plan work, workouts, and rest at the right times. Healthline tester Candice Abellon said that following other people on the app — including people she knows in real life and high profile athletes — motivates her. However, she mentioned that data privacy concerns are something to keep in mind when deciding which activities to keep private and whether to start and end your activities at your home.

General health & fitness apps

Some also track your overnight respiration (the number of breaths you take per minute), a feature that is available on the Apple Watch. While I’m still a big fan of Fitbit products, I thought it might be helpful to offer up some capable alternatives to the most popular Fitbit models, including both fitness trackers and smartwatches. Almost no fitness trackers support voice assistants because a mic takes up room and reduces battery life. So if that matters to you, the Amazfit Band 7 has that unique Alexa access to tempt you, though it doesn’t have a speaker to vocalize responses. You’ll want to upgrade to a fitness smartwatch instead if you want a complete experience or Google Assistant access.

Display

Fitness trackers have come a long way from the simple bands that tracked steps and little else. Modern trackers can monitor everything from your heart health to how well you’ve recovered from a hard bout of training. Even flagship smartwatches, which used to be lackluster trackers, have become pretty adept workout companions.

If you end up not liking the companion app, you can’t just switch to another one; you’ll have to buy a whole new band. We like calorie tracking apps Fitbit’s data collection, but the subscription may be a deal-breaker. Garmin’s data is just as in-depth, but the Connect app isn’t quite as user-friendly.

Best Fitness Apps That Work With Apple Watch

It includes detailed instructions and illustrations for reference. That’s because PUSH uses AI to generate a strength training program for you, based on the science of progressive overload. You can also manually create a program yourself, but the app isn’t intended to record one-off workouts; it’s geared towards moving you through a program of weight-bearing exercises. Overall, Fitbit could be a great choice for someone who’s just starting their fitness journey and doesn’t want to spend a pretty penny just yet. Even though the app doesn’t offer any standout features, it includes solid basics at a decent price point. Plus, it captures more than just workouts—making it an affordable all-around tracker.

Gentler Streak Workout Tracker

These days, most trackers have a heart rate monitor and blood oxygen monitoring. But the Charge 6 has more specific sensors for stress and irregular heart rate spot checks, and others can measure these metrics through continuous tracking. You may or may not need this based on whether you care more about health or fitness tracking. Wear it all day, let it quietly track in the background, and check your progress when it suits you. No monthly fees.Lightweight and comfortable, Loop wraps seamlessly around your wrist, blending into your routine and keeping you connected to your health—without ever getting in the way.

Beyond the Wrist

Finding the best fitness tracker with a heart rate monitor shouldn’t be too complicated today, as most come equipped with this capability. Being able to access analysis on your sleep patterns can help your overall wellness. It is also important to keep in mind that certain features will wear down the battery on a tracker more quickly. Luckily, some trackers have rapid-charge options that require little downtime for your wearable.

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Women — particularly those navigating hormonal changes, cycle-based energy fluctuations, or perimenopause — often find that generic apps miss the mark entirely. This section covers the apps that actually account for those realities. For women specifically, Nike Training Club offers the most inclusive free library, with programs designed for strength, flexibility, and stress management.

Best Apple fitness tracker

Because they have fewer features than smartwatches, they also tend to have a lighter and/or smaller build. But the reason to choose the Fenix 8 over other premium smartwatches is its plethora of fitness features. The free, built-in Garmin Coach offers running, cycling, and strength training plans, and will make tweaks based on data it collects about your health and how you’re performing in workouts. It will also suggest daily workouts, provide an estimated recovery time, and plot out a recommended pace time for long races using GPS data.