We Love These 10 Fitness Trackers: Let Us Count the Ways (and the Steps)

The products featured in this article have been independently reviewed by the editorial team. When you buy something through the retail links on this page, we may earn commission at no cost to you, the reader.

Whether you have some big fitness goals, like running a race or building some muscle, or you just want to develop some healthier habits, the best fitness trackers can help you monitor your activity levels, sleep patterns and other metrics to help you set and stick to a routine that’s better for you. Whether you increase your daily step count, make an effort to get a bit of extra sleep or increase the intensity of your workouts, a fitness tracker can help you understand how your health could be improved in small, actionable ways. Determining which fitness tracker is the best option for you depends on your lifestyle and goals: Do you enjoy running and want one with GPS capabilities? Do you want the device to be sleek and design-forward? Do you want it to measure your sleep? We’ve laid out the best fitness trackers of 2023, covering budget-friendly options, activity-focused models and smartwatches, helping everyone find the best fit for them. 

• Best Overall Fitness Tracker – Fitbit Charge 5
• Best Smartwatch – Apple Watch Series 7
• Best for Android Users – Samsung Galaxy Watch 4
• Best Premium Fitness Tracker – Garmin Venu
• Best Fitness Tracker for Running – Coros Pace 2
• Best Analog Fitness Tracker – Withings ScanWatch Horizon
• Best Budget Fitness Tracker – Amazon Halo Band
• Best Fitness Ring – Oura Ring
• Best Apple Watch Alternative – Fitbit Versa
• Best Looking Fitness Tracker – Garmin Lily

Exercises It Can Track: Bike, interval workout, run, swim, treadmill, weights, bootcamp, circuit training, elliptical, golf, hike, kickboxing, martial arts, outdoor workout, pilates, spinning, stairclimbing, tennis, walk, workout, yoga  

Keeping track of your workouts and monitoring your fitness is an easy way to get more invested in your health. The Fitbit Charge 5 is a slim device that’s chock-full of features and tracking modes for a comprehensive look at your overall well-being. In addition to an extensive library of exercise modes, the Fitbit Charge 5 also has heart rate tracking, sleep tracking, heart rate variability, oxygen saturation, breathing rate and workout intensity through the Fitbit app. If subscribe to Fitbit Premium, the Charge 5 will analyze previous activity and sleep to provide users with a daily readiness score, and use in-depth sleep tracking to determine a sleep score each morning. These features are designed to give users a glimpse into their health and help them prioritize not only their activity, but their recovery and stress levels as well.

All Fitbit devices include a 90-day free trial to FitBit Premium, which includes mindfulness sessions, a wellness report, health metric trends and other insights. Fitbit tracks users’ activity by breaking it into active zone minutes, which are meant to help users not only monitor their activity levels, but maintain and increase their intensity to improve the efficacy of their exercise.

While the Fitbit Charge 5 doesn’t have any music capabilities, it does offer GPS tracking, Fitbit Pay, a quiet alarm that wakes you up during the optimal stage of your sleep and much more. It’s a great all-around fitness tracker that gives users a ton of information to dive into, all in a sleek and slim design worn on their wrist. 

Exercises It Can Track: Walk, run, cycling, elliptical, rower, stair stepper, HIIT, hiking, yoga, functional strength training, dance, cool down, core training, pilates, Tai Chi, swimming, wheelchair, other

Smartwatches have come a long way, and none more so than the Apple Watch. The Apple Watch Series 7 is a high-functioning fitness watch, sleep tracker, phone accessory and exercise tracker rolled up into one wrist wearable, now with a new and improved touchscreen for easy navigation. A plethora of apps for the device gives users the power to do pretty much anything: Make phone calls, send texts, check the weather, use Apple Pay, track their activity (the watch will even automatically track workouts if users forget to start them), listen to music and more. The Apple Watch also syncs with the majority of third party fitness apps such as Future Fitness. Rather than asking what this watch can do, a more relevant question would be to ask what it can’t do, since it seems to cover just about everything.

Apple Watches come with an immense array of trackable exercises, so users can catalog their workouts and monitor the relevant stats while they exercise. The biggest downside of the Apple Watch is its battery life: The watch needs to be charged daily or overnight, which can eliminate some (or all) of the sleep tracking capabilities. In addition to an activity tracker and sleep, the Apple Watch Series 7 also offers guided meditations, specific apps for certain activities (surfing, tennis, running, etc.) and a variety of different band designs to match your preferences. 

Exercises It Can Track: Run, walk, bike, elliptical, stationary bike, sports (basketball, baseball, cricket, volleyball, football, bowling, etc), hike, backpacking, ballroom dancing, weight lifting, stretching, yoga, swimming and more

Great news for Android users: The Samsung Galaxy Watch 4 is not only a top-notch smartwatch, but it also boasts a huge array of health tracking features and is more affordable than most of its counterparts. This is the first big-name watch to offer body composition tracking, which can help users understand how their diet and exercise affects their overall body composition and aid in effective muscle gain and fat loss.

As far as activity tracking goes, the Samsung Galaxy Watch 4 has a massive array of activities to choose from, including more nuanced options like different exercises for weight lifting, practically any sport and a variety of more recreational activities, such as canoeing and backpacking. In addition to such extensive activity tracking, the Samsung Galaxy Watch 4 offers in-depth sleep tracking, blood oxygen levels monitoring, stress level monitoring, run coaching, access to Google Maps, the ability to receive and send and receive messages and phone calls and more. This is a great in-depth health and fitness monitor that also functions as an extension of your phone. 

Exercises It Can Track: Treadmill, strength, run, indoor track, bike, bike indoor, walk, walk indoor, pool swim, golf, ski, snowboard, cross country ski, SUP, cardio, yoga, pilates, breathwork, elliptical, stair climber, row, indoor row, navigate

Fitness trackers are a great way to increase your fitness level and the intensity of your workouts, but they can also offer a lot of insight and information about your overall health, too. The Garmin Venu is a premium fitness tracker that boasts a lot of added features most fitness trackers and smartwatches don’t offer. Online workouts (with animations for guidance) offer users a way to mix up their training in the gym or at home, and a running coach feature offers guided workouts to help users prepare for a race. The coach allows users to choose their training schedule and intensity, plus helps them stay on track and improve their running speed over the course of a few months. With the ability to download music, users can leave their phone at home and connect their Bluetooth headphones directly to their watch for distraction-free workouts.

The Garmin Venu offers in-depth sleep tracking and analyzes users’ activity and sleep to give them a body battery score, indicating how rested they are for the day. Stress is measured based on heart rate, and the watch will recommend short breathing exercises during periods of high stress. The watch also has the ability to track blood oxygen saturation, women’s health, hydration and respiration for a comprehensive overview in your overall well-being. The sleek design and wide variety of tracking capabilities make this our pick for the best premium fitness tracker.

Exercises It Can Track: Run, indoor run, track run, bike, indoor bike, pool swim, open water, triathlon, gym cardio, GPS cardio, multisport, strength training, flat water, rowing, indoor rowing, walk 

If you’re an avid runner or triathlete, the running features on other fitness trackers can fall a little flat. Whether it comes down to inaccurate distance measuring (particularly for track workouts), the inability to provide good GPS location or a dismal battery life that’s useless when participating in long distance activities, not all watches are designed for the long runs and bike rides that some users are participating in. The Coros Pace 2 was created with endurance athletes in mind, with an incredible battery life, super accurate GPS monitoring, tons of activity tracking options and a lightweight design that you’ll barely notice during your workout.

The LCD screen is a simpler interface than other fitness trackers, like the Garmin or Fitbit options, but some reviews report that the simplicity is nice: It displays relevant information, is easy to navigate and keeps the battery life nice and long-lasting. Auto-detection for workouts is useful if you forget to start tracking an exercise, and pre-designed programs for strength, biking, running and swimming provide allow users to do guided workouts if they choose. The huge variety of running activity options, combined with the UltraMax mode designed for races, makes this a top pick for fitness trackers for running. 

Exercises It Can Track: Walk, run, swim, hike, indoor cycling, fitness, tennis, squash, weights, kitesurfing, cycling, surfing, windsurfing, ping pong, badminton, elliptical, pilates, yoga, snowboarding, zumba, climbing, skiing, golf, ice skating, and most sports 

The Withings ScanWatch Horizon boasts a lot of fitness capabilities in a small, incongruous package, and is the perfect compromise for those who want to track their fitness without always wearing a bulky device that can ruin a dinner outfit. It’s a great option for beginners who are new to fitness trackers, since there aren’t a ton of controls and interfaces to fiddle with, and all your health information can be found in the app. To all appearances, the Withings ScanWatch Horizon resembles your traditional analog watch: Classy, subtle and utilitarian. But don’t be fooled, this watch is actually able to monitor heart rate, blood oxygen saturation, steps, calorie expenditure, sleep, elevation, VO2 max and more.

A small LCD screen within the actual watch face displays your step count and other information, and a more in-depth look at your health metrics can be found in Withings’ free companion app. Users can use workout mode to track their specific exercises, or the ScanWatch can automatically detect and track walks, runs, biking, swimming and sleep. A smart alarm will wake users during the lightest phase of their rest in the morning (if they opt to use it) for a gentle wake up. The Withings ScanWatch Horizon is compatible with Android and iOS, and is an excellent option for anyone who wants all the information and capabilities of a fitness tracker in a sleek, analog watch design.  

Exercises It Can Track: General activity 

Not everyone needs the highest-end fitness tracker to meet their needs, and for many individuals, the budget-friendly Amazon Halo band is a great option. This display-less band closely resembles the Whoop band in terms of looks, but has its own array of smart features and functions. In addition to tracking your steps and heart rate, the Halo can also monitor and analyze your activity, body composition, tone of voice, sleep and movement. Plus, Alexa voice assistant compatibility means you can ask your Halo to tell you your health summary, sleep quality, activity score and more.

The Halo offers personalized plans for improving mobility and overall movement, plus includes the option to follow along with a tailored weekly menu complete with grocery list items and recipes for simplified healthy eating. It simplifies activity into sessions, intensity and overall score, giving users a goal of earning 150 activity points weekly. Users can opt to upload images of themselves and have a body composition scan to better understand their body fat percentage and monitor their progress.

In addition to the varied tracking options, the Halo app has hundreds of workouts and programs to follow so users can participate in a structured workout plan to achieve their fitness goals. At less than $100, this fitness tracker offers a pretty comprehensive look at users’ fitness and wellness, plus includes actionable ways to improve. 

Exercises It Can Track: Walk, cycling, run, housework, yardwork, strength training, hiking, swimming, tennis, elliptical, cross-country skiing, dance, golf, HIIT, soccer, cross-training, yoga, surfing, basketball, boxing and more

Using a fitness tracker is a great way to get more involved with your health and fitness, but committing to a wrist-worn device all the time can be a dealbreaker for some. The Oura Ring is an unobtrusive and even fashionable ring that monitors your sleep, activity, temperature, heart rate, blood oxygen and more in a small and sleek design. The Oura Ring analyzes the data to give users detailed scores and actionable insights for improvement. Oura divides its scores into sleep, activity and readiness, helping you determine how to best get quality rest, how much activity is healthy and how ready you are to tackle the day.

The Oura Ring automatically tracks workouts and logs your activity, gauging your workout intensity on your heart rate and body temperature. Using seven sensors, the Oura Ring can help predict women’s periods and even oncoming illnesses by monitoring body temperature and heart rate and noting patterns and irregularities. Though it might look like a simple metal band, this tracker is brimming with sensors that send detailed information to the app, which users can check on their phone to stay updated on their health metrics and trends. 

Exercises It Can Track: Bike, interval workout, run, swim, treadmill, weights, bootcamp, circuit training, elliptical, golf, hike, kickboxing, martial arts, outdoor workout, pilates, spinning, stairclimbing, tennis, walk, workout, yoga  

If the idea of an Apple Watch appeals to you but you aren’t willing to shell out that much cash for a mere watch, the Fitbit Versa 3 is a close competitor. With the ability to receive and send calls and texts, stream audio content through Spotify, pay for items, explore workouts and monitor your health stats, this smartwatch can do it all. It even gives users the ability to download apps directly onto the watch, so they can call an Uber or pull up a workout from their favorite fitness app. This device tracks heart rate, sleep, activity minutes, steps, calories and floors climbed, so you’ll be able to keep track of your daily activities and record workouts.

The Fitbit Versa sports a super lightweight design and the type of bright and clear display you would expect from a high-end smartwatch. It’s intuitive to use for tracking workouts, but is also a great option for daily use and gives users the same functionality as an Apple Watch or other top smartwatch. 

Exercises It Can Track: Bike pool swimming, run, treadmill run, yoga, strength, cardio, elliptical, stair stepper, breathwork, pilates, walk

Not everyone likes the look of a typical fitness tracker; they can be clunky, look strange outside of a gym setting and lack some of the refinement that traditional watches have, making them less than ideal to wear to a nice dinner or night out. The Garmin Lily is challenging the traditional appearance of a fitness tracker, giving users all the functionality they could expect from a standard tracker in a sleek and elegant analog watch. When not in use to track an activity, the Garmin Lily displays an analog face with a patterned background, resembling a normal watch. Users can alternate between a leather or sport strap to match their outfits and occasions.

The Garmin Lily still offers all the features you’d expect on a smartwatch: Sleep, steps, calories, activity, heart rate and stress tracking, the ability to receive notifications from a smartphone, calendar views and updates, plus safety and tracking features. It’s the perfect combination of functionality and aesthetics, and users don’t need to compromise on either front when they purchase this fitness tracker. 

Fitness trackers come in an array of different models which offer different features to the user. Before selecting a fitness tracker, determining what capabilities are most important to you can help you make the right decision. Below, we’ve outlined some of the important things to keep an eye out for when browsing through different fitness trackers. 

Activity Tracking

If you’re going to get yourself a new fitness tracker, you first want to make sure it’s a good option for the types of activities you enjoy doing. For example, the Oura Ring might get in the way of weight lifting, but would be an excellent option for someone who stays active through hiking and doing yard work. If you enjoy running, a watch with GPS, long battery life and music connectivity might be the most useful for you. Whatever type of activity you enjoy, make sure you get a fitness tracker that can track it while encouraging you to stay active. 

Other Health Tracking

These days, most fitness trackers come with a host of other features and the ability to track tons of things, including sleep, women’s menstrual cycles, stress and more. If you’re interested in getting a more high-level view and increased insight into your overall health and well-being (or maybe you want to see how sleep affects your day-to-day), getting a fitness tracker with good sleep tracking or the ability to track other health metrics is a great way to work on improving how you understand your overall health. 

Smartwatch Capabilities

Some fitness trackers double as smartwatches, giving users the ability to receive calls and text messages, download apps, make contactless payments and track their activity, all from a wrist wearable device. 

Battery Life

Battery life on fitness trackers varies greatly depending on several factors: Display, features, processing power, frequency of use (tracking activities or using GPS will drain the battery) and the battery itself. If you don’t like the idea of charging your device every day or several times a week, look into a fitness tracker that boasts a longer battery life for more regular use. 

Design

Some fitness trackers really look like fitness trackers, while others have started to hedge towards sleek watches. If you prefer the idea of a fitness tracker that you can wear out to dinner or to an event, the Oura Ring, Withings ScanWatch or Garmin Lily are all good options, as they feature sleek and elegant designs that wouldn’t be out of place on an evening out. 

Price

Fitness trackers can vary greatly in cost, from excellent budget fitness trackers under $100 to fancier models that can cost upwards of $400. If you care about specific fitness features or know that there’s a certain brand you want, you may have to accept paying more for those things, but if you want a more generic tracker for monitoring your activity, you can easily find a solid option at a reasonable price.