As smartwatches become more and more mainstream, prices for them seemingly never stop falling. The feeling of lowered quality, and reduced features may creep up in our mind but with brands like Boat, it appears you can build in a plethora of features, while keeping the price of the smartwatch pocket friendly. Boat’s new Watch Xtend smartwatch seems to push the limits of what you can do, with a starting price of just Rs. 2,999*. The smartwatch market is already exploding over the past year, and with prices as low as this, why would you wait around for any other smartwatch?
The Boat Watch Xtend has a 1.69-inch touch-enabled LCD display, that’s decent-sized and lets you access everything from the stats, records, to notifications from your phone, to a music controller, the clock, and a lot more. The touchscreen allows you to interact with it directly, but you can also use the side-dial. The display is smart enough to increase the brightness depending on the time set on the app on your smartwatch, so it’s always visible at any time of the day.
You would be mistaken if you think this is a delicate device that needs the utmost care while handling. It’s in fact, even waterproof, with a rating of 5ATM. That means, you could take it under 50 metres of water for about 30 minutes, without worrying about any damage. Swimming then is no issue with the Watch Xtend on your wrist, but there are also 14 different kinds of exercise to choose from that are above water. You can even track your daily performance and improve on it safely over the days and weeks.
Not everything is about just the hardware though and the Boat Watch Xtend isn’t mimicking a modern smartwatch. There are a range of sensors, which include the heart rate sensor that keep an eye on how much your heart is exerting. This is useful when you decide to exercise and want to keep a daily track of your performance. It also helps in knowing if you’re pushing yourself too hard, or too low. There is also an SpO2 sensor that measures the oxygen level in your blood. This has been a particularly important stat during the recent pandemic. It must be noted, this watch is not a replacement to medical equipment when you visit to the doctor, it’s merely an indicator. There are more sensors, that detect the quality of your sleep. It should help make lifestyle changes that can result in better quality of sleep at night, and thereby, better quality of the time you spend awake. One of the newer sensors found on slightly more expensive smartwatches is the stress monitor. It too makes it way on this smartwatch priced this low. There are even features to guide you with breathing easy, and meditating.
We spoke earlier about how the Watch Xtend offers more at this incredibly low price. The voice assistant feature tops it all. It’s a feature seen on phones that cost 40 to 50 per cent more. The Watch Xtend has a microphone that can be used to invoke Amazon Alexa voice assistant on demand. This opens a world of possibilities. The voice assistant can be used to ask for directions, to jot down notes, to stream music from one device to another, change playlists and more.
The Boat Watch Xtend also comes in several attractive colours if you are picky. The Pitch Black is for those who prefer modesty and avoid attracting too much attention. The Sandy Cream is a bit more casual, and the Olive Green a bit bolder. The straps are designed with contrasting colours, so each variant looks unique. The customisations don’t stop with the colour of the device. There are up to 50 watch faces that you can choose from. These are accessible using the Boat Wave app, that’s available for Android and iOS devices. It lets you match the watch face to your dressing style, and the look of your watch.
A smartwatch is great if you’re looking for features and looks, but what good is it if you need to recharge it every few hours. Fortunately, the Boat Watch Xtend comes with a 300mAh battery, which sounds tiny on paper, considering phones have 10 and 15 times that capacity. It’s quite decent. Boat says you can go without having to recharge this watch for about a week on casual use, and at least four to five days under more active use. Charging of the watch is done using a helpful magnetic charger, that takes the watch from 0 per cent charge to 100 per cent in about two hours. The watch uses Bluetooth 5.0 LE and that helps you get decent range and performance with battery life in mind. Performance will of course vary from one user to another.
The Boat Watch Xtend brings along a promise of few regrets, good performance, and a ton of features. If you’ve been waiting for the right time to go in for a smartwatch, there couldn’t be a better opportunity. If the Boat Watch Xtend interests you, come drop by your nearest Reliance Digital store and if you much prefer getting your product home-delivered, just order it online at reliancedigital.in. It’s convenient but we’re also prompt!
