Lenovo HW02 Plus Fitness band and HS10 Smart scale Review

Specifications and Features

Lenovo HW02 Plus comes with a heart rate monitor and sports a 0.42-inch OLED touch panel. The fitness tracker can track your steps, calories you burn, heart rate and can also monitor your sleep pattern. Lenovo has also added ‘PAI' feature that basically gives you personalized insights of how much exercise your body needs on a daily basis to maintain a healthy lifestyle. The fitness band is also IP67 certified for water-dust resistant and is powered by a 60 mAh battery unit. The band works on Bluetooth 4.2 and is supported by Android devices running Android 4.4 and above and Apple devices running iOS 8.0 and above.

As far as Lenovo's HS10 smart body fat scale in concerned, it measures 300 x 300 x 30mm and has a load capacity of 3 to 180 kgs. It comes with a smart auto-on/off feature and displays low battery and overload indication. The smart scale is capable to measure weight, body fat, body water, bone-muscle mass, BMI, BMR and visceral fat. It works on four AAA size batteries.

 

Design: Lightest fitness band around

The best thing about Lenovo HW02 Plus fitness band is its lightweight body. It can be worn for an entire day and even night without any issues, which is not the usual case with these wearables. I have tested a couple of fitness bands and I just couldn't wear any of them while sleeping. Lenovo HW02 Plus is indeed the most comfortable fitness tracker I have used till date.

The fitness band is also very sturdy and comes with a subtle appearance. The band has rubber straps and a metal buckle with Lenovo's branding engraved on it. The rubber straps feels durable and are made of good quality material. The fitness band did not feel itchy even after prolonged usage. Overall, HW02 Plus is by far the most comfortable band I have tested so far.

Display: OLED screen works indoors and fails in direct sunlight

Lenovo HW02 Plus has a small LED display up front that works wonderfully indoors but is very tough to read outdoors. The OLED screen has very low level of brightness which makes it impossible to check time and other vital statistics under direct sunlight. Your wrist movement cannot always invoke the screen readings as the sensors often fail to record the hand's gestures. I mostly found myself taping the small indicator on the screen to check time and other vitals, which is quite irritating. Instead of an OLED screen, a small LCD strip would have made things much simpler for users, even while using the band in daylight.

Performance: Personalized Activity Intelligence score is the USP

Lenovo HW02 Plus offers the usual set of tracking features plus one very important tool- PAI, the Personalized Activity Intelligence score, which is evaluated by combining the data from heart rate sensor and pedometer. Developed by an international team of researchers, PAI is basically a formula that converts your heart rate to a number of points, based on your age, gender, resting heart rate, and maximum heart rate. It is said that having a PAI score of 100 increases your lifespan by ten years and reduces the chances of having chronic diseases by 38%. Those who strive to live a balanced lifestyle can work hard to maintain a good PAI score.

PAI is integrated into Lenovo's fitness band with the help of companion app. The wrist band tracks critical activities like steps, heart rate and calories burned. The algorithm then converts the results into a comprehensive score, which is displayed on your smartphone screen via Lenovo Health application.

As PAI score is the outcome of readings from hearth rate monitor and pedometer, it is utmost important that these two sensors in Lenovo's band offer accurate readings. While the heart rate sensor did give correct readings, the pedometer seemed out-of-sync sometimes, which is a bummer as it can affect your PAI score. Overall, we can say that Lenovo HW02 might not deliver 100 percent correct PAI score but still offers a good measurement tool to help you accomplish a healthy lifestyle.

The band can also monitor your sleep pattern and calories you burn. It is backed by a 60 mAh battery unit that can last for a week on one full charge.

Lenovo Health app and Scale bar

A fitness band is nothing without an efficient companion app and thankfully, Lenovo has got most of the things right with Lenovo Health app. The free to install app shows everything of importance based on the data fetched from the fitness band and the smart scale. The app uses Bluetooth to upload your health statistics to give you PAI reading.

Lenovo Health app is fairly easy to use. It shows your PAI reading, steps taken, calories burnt, sleep pattern recorded and heart rate information fetched from the band. Besides, it also stores your profile with important health statistics fetched from smart scale such as weight with indication- overweight or underweight, BMI, Body fat information, Muscle and bone mass, body type, BMR, water percentage of the body and even visceral and subcutis fat information.

While you can store your body information, the app also allows you to add other family members who can check their weight without affecting your vitals' statistics. The app syncs the data from band without any issues and helps you keep a close eye on your health status.

Conclusion

Lenovo HW02 Plus can be a good buy for users who are looking for a feature rich fitness wearable in budget price-point. In addition to offer the usual set of features in an easy to wear light form factor, the band comes with PAI, which I believe is actually a neat trick to motivate you to attain a healthy lifestyle.

And if you want to go one step further, you can go ahead and purchase the Lenovo HS10 smart scale, which is priced at Rs. 3,799 and offers a suite of vital health statistics. Both combined can make a huge difference in the way you live your busy life, provided that you are serious for your health.