Samsung announced its new lineup of Galaxy devices this week, among them is the Galaxy Watch 9 and the Galaxy Watch Ultra 2. Pre-orders are now open at both Samsung and Amazon for each of the watches. Wherever you pre-order, you’ll be eligible to receive either a $50 credit (Galaxy Watch 9) or $100 credit (Galaxy Watch Ultra 2) to the storefront from which you purchase—either a instant credit on other Samsung products or a straight-up $100 gift card for use across Amazon.
Additionally, if you go through Samsung, you can trade in an old smartwatch and put that credit toward your purchase of the Galaxy Watch 9 or Galaxy Watch Ultra 2, leading to a total savings of up to $250.
Galaxy Watch 9
The new series of Galaxy Watches have a slightly longer battery life and now comes equipped with a better processor in the Snapdragon Wear Elite Platform (5 core, 3nm), but the bulk of new features show up in the health and wellness area.
First up. we have Vitals. This new function takes a look at five metrics including heart rate, heart rate variability, raspatory rate, skin temperature, and blood oxygen. After wearing your watch for a week, it will establish a baseline for these vitals and be able to show at a glance if anything becomes alarmingly high or low. The Samsung Health app breaks down each of these wellness aspects and tips on how to improve.
Heart Health is another new function that looks at your BMI, blood pressure, sleep score, and total duration of vigorous activates to calculate a summarized score. You can also gain insights into your daily cardio load which can help you determine how hard to go during a workout (or even to just take a rest day). Additionally, the fitness index which takes the form of a radar chart measuring your body composition, cardio, endurance, flexibility, and strength.
Galaxy Watch Ultra 2
The ultra-version of Samsung’s latest smartwatch shares the improvements found in the Galaxy Watch 9, but id designed for ruggedness in the outdoors.
When stacking it up against the predecessor—the Galaxy watch Ultra—one of the coolest new improvements is the watch’s IP rating. The watch is now rated IP69K rated, supporting a new diving feature which allows the watch to withstand up to 10 atmospheres of water pressure.
The Galaxy Watch Ultra 2’s body is slightly slimmer, but mostly looks the same as the original. The display reaches up to 5,000 nits which is the brightest smartwatch so far in Samsung’s lineup.
The Samsung Galaxy Watch 9 and Galaxy Watch Ultra 2 release on August 7.