Fitbit Charge 5 : Smart Feature Ability is Reasonable
Smart features in a smart watch or fitness tracker has evolved over the years. Smart features these days becomes an extension of your day to day activities. Depending on how you live your lifestyle smart features can provide some form of automation to your daily activities.
Does the Fitbit Charge 5 have smart features? yes in fact all smart watches or fitness trackers have smart features and in this article I am going to provide details that may be of interest to you. Here is my final result of my findings
| Level | Score |
| Beginner | 4/5 |
| Intermediate | 1/5 |
| Advanced | zero |
| Final Score | 5/15 |
In the end I have given the Fitbit Charge 5 a final score of 5 out of 15 for it’s smart feature ability. It covers most of the beginner level features and some intermediate level as well.
Basic Level Smart Features : 4 out of 5
The Fitbit Charge 5 can provide almost all the smart features you need at a very low level. When it comes to these features, I think they should be available as the bare minimum only because it’s the most common features that people tend to use on a regular basis. Let me show show you what the Fitbit Charge 5 can offer you.
| Available | Not Available |
| Ability to find your phone | Ability to find your watch |
| Ability to set alarm or timer | |
| Ability to reply to messages with preset messages | |
| Do not disturb ability |
To gain a point, each feature must perform with some reliability. Each of the available features performed really well except for the find your phone feature. In order for it to work you must be in Bluetooth range of your phone before it can detect your location. For a better result you must walk fairly slowly in order for the Charge 5 to pick your location of your phone.
In the end, the Fitbit Charge 5 deserves it’s rating of 4 out of 5 for basic level smart features because each feature performed well without any issues. Please note that it’s based on my own experience.
Intermediate Level Smart Features : 1 out of 5
When it comes to intermediate smart features the Charge 5 does offer something. I know the end result does not reflect that but in terms of what’s on offer it’s not so bad. Please note that I am only sharing my own experience, so lets have a look at what intermediate features that the charge 5 has and has not.
| Available | Not Available |
| Contactless payment | Ability to control music |
| Ability to lock out water | Ability to contact emergency contact |
| Ability to answer phone calls | |
| Ability to make phone calls | |
| Ability to talk back to watch user | |
| Ability to save battery life | |
| Ability to improve time management |
When it comes to intermediate level smart features there is a lot. In reality this is some what a reflection of what’s out there in the market. However the Fitbit Charge 5 does deserves it’s final rating of 1 out of 5 so let me share with you my findings based on what features are available
Contactless payment is very reliable. Ever since Fitbit pay was superseded by google wallet in late 2022 the contactless payment is very good. I use this feature a lot and google wallet is a very reliable, similar to the level of Apple pay. I can only speak for my country in New Zealand but I never had any issues to date
Ability to lock out water is pretty good. All it does is, it puts your watch into standby so that the water does not interact with the watch, but found it to be very reliable. You do have to be a little patient when turning the water lock mode off. I found it easier to double tap using two fingers really hard quickly to unlock water lock mode.
I just want to point out that with answering phone calls with the Charge 5, it can answer the call but you dont have the ability to speak into the watch. When a incoming call comes through, you can select the answer phone icon and then your phone will take the call.
No Advanced Smart Features On Offer : 0 out of 5
When it comes to Advanced smart features unfortunately the Fitbit Charge 5 does not offer any. I think the Team at Fitbit were really focused providing fitness tracker that provides the basic features, which the Charge 5 does offer. Let me show you what I expect with a smart watch or fitness tracker when testing it’s smart feature ability.
- Live stream to devices
- Ability to connect to smart devices
- Ability to provide a magnetic compass
- Ability to measure air pressure
- Ability to use gestures to quick access features
- Smart touch ability(interact with watch for disabled persons)
- Ability to provide assistance (google, Alexa or Bixby)
- Ability to provide direction (similar to google maps, Petal maps)
This is an impressive list of smart features and what it also shows is what other smart watch brands are offering.
How Does The Fitbit Charge 5 Compare To Other Devices
I think this part of the article would be of great interest to you. Since this is a new measure I have re tested a lot of my watch’s and so far this is the final result. I will over time add to the ranking table but at least you can get a fair idea of the type of watch that you are looking to buy.
To be fair the processing chip capacity with a smart watch is far greater than what a fitness tracker has to offer, so for a fitness tracker you can expect it to be around the seven point mark at it’s best.
From a fitness tracker perspective, Garmin’s Vivosmart 5 is around the same level as the Versa 4 but at the moment I am still concluding my results.
Does it really matter if the Fitbit Charge 5 sit’s quite low on the ranking table? In my opinion, I would say no and to me it’s a blessing in disguise. Any watch that is reliable and smart feature heavy tend to burn a lot of battery life
Final Conclusion
Thank you so much for reading and I hope you learnt a lot about the Fitbit Charge 5’s smart feature ability. I think the score that I have given is a true reflection how I feel about the Fitbit Charge 5 in the market in terms of smart feature ability.
A 5 out of 15 is the final result in terms of the Fitbit Charge 5 smart watch ability. However smart features isn’t the Charge 5’s strongest category. It’s strongest category is health and well being and simplicity. I have owned so many Fitbit devices and this is what they do really well.
If you decide not to subscribe to Fitbit Premium, you wont gain the benefits from it’s health and well being features, you still gain a awesome Fitness tracker that is simple to use
