Huawei Band 7 review

introduction

The Huawei Band 7 is for those who want a smartwatch that is compact enough to be worn every day, which can last a long time on a charge, and covers all the basic features. And the fact that it doesn’t break the bank makes it even more interesting.

Available in black, green, pink and red and priced at € 59 / £ 50, this is one of the most affordable options on the market.

What makes the Huawei Band 7 impressive is the long list of features it managed to satisfy at that price point. It is waterproof to 50 meters, only 16g (28g with the strap), supports 96 training modes, tracks heart rate, blood oxygen and sleep, displays notifications, and has a battery life of up to 14 days. Best of all, this is a very comfortable wearable that you’ll forget you’re on your wrist for hours on end.

Huawei Band 7 comes in a simple box with a proprietary magnetic charger.

Hardware

Huawei Band 7 is very light, but also very robust. The low weight is achieved by not using any metal on the casing, which according to Huawei is made from polymeric materials. You would be forgiven if you think the case itself is metal, however, as it gives a very plausible impression.

Upfront, there is a 1.47-inch 194x368px AMOLED display. The rectangular shape makes the display appear larger than it is, while the viewing experience is exceptional: vivid colors and great contrast. The display is also very bright even on the hottest sunny days. However, there is no automatic maximum brightness option.

There is a setting to dim the display at night, which is a great feature for those who plan to wear the Band 7 in bed and use its sleep tracking feature.

There’s also the all-important Always-on display, and you can choose from five watch faces – four digital and one analog.

The glass at the top of the display is slightly curved from top to bottom and the screen ends on a bevel where it meets the frame, providing a comfortable, borderless tactile experience.

The casing is dark gray on our Black model. There is a single button on the right side of the Huawei Band 7 that brings up the training modes. A second touch takes you home.

Looking at the underside of the Huawei Band 7 reveals the optical heart rate sensor and the two pins for the proprietary magnetic charger.

This is also where you access the pins to remove the strap. It’s a proprietary shape, so you can’t use a standard strap. You have to push the pin down to remove the band, which is a bit difficult to do as the band folds towards the pin. It’s not something we expect many people to do often, so it’s not a problem.

Third party bands are readily available through online retailers which is great.

Software, fitness and sleep tracking, battery life

Huawei Band 7 runs a real-time operating system that brings functionality to the home screen and has no installable apps. It’s not exactly smart in the sense that you can’t easily expand its capabilities.

Instead, a clock screen acts as an app. By default, a screen for heart rate, SpO2 reading, weather, music control and activity widget is displayed. You can choose which screens to show and rearrange them, but strangely it isn’t done through the screen itself (unlike many smartwatches where a long press on a screen would allow you to remove or move it). You have to go into the settings menu, which is not intuitive and boring.

Another annoyance is that you can’t change the side button function, nor add a long press action.

The Huawei Health app is available through the Play Store, but once configured, Huawei will ask you to download the latest version from its website. There is also an iOS app.

There are 10 pre-installed watch faces and over 4,000 via the Health app. Most are of good quality.

But the lack of functionality also translates into simplicity. Once you’ve set up the Huawei Band 7 or got used to its default state, it will do a great job of showing you what you want to see.

Let’s talk about notifications. You can have Band 7 show notifications from every app, but you will only be able to return a response in some apps. For example, you can’t reply in Viber, but you can do it in Messenger, and therefore only with preset phrases like OK, NO, YES, etc. or with an emoji.

Fitness tracking is very robust. You have 96 training modes at your disposal, covering everything this reviewer does. Get detailed analysis during training. There’s a nifty graph that tells you how busy you are, based on your heart rate.

I did a side-by-side comparison with my trusty smartwatch, which I wear every day, and found the Huawei Band 7 to be slightly more consistent. While my other wearable device occasionally jumped up or down in bpm reading, the Huawei Band 7 was more stable.

I’m confident the Band 7 was accurate in tracking my progress.

I tracked my sleep with the Huawei Band 7 and once again compared it to my proven smartwatch. Here the Band 7 was not so accurate.

Think that you fell asleep the moment you lay down, while my other watch correctly detects how long it took before I fell asleep. This led to my usual device saying I slept for just over 6 hours, while the Band 7 said I slept just over 7. On that particular night, I slept for 6 hours.

The other problem is the seemingly overly exaggerated deep sleep data. One night, the Huawei Band 7 says I had nearly two hours, while my other watch tracked 40 minutes. I consistently got a reading of over 2 hours a night with the Huawei Band 7.

Overall, the Huawei Band 7 gave me excellent sleep scores even on nights when I know I haven’t slept well. If you are serious about improving your sleep, the Huawei Band 7 will not give you the information you need and you will think you are sleeping great.

Concluding on a very high note, let’s talk about battery life. Huawei claims up to 14 days of typical use. We have 8 days of intense use: about 5 days with active notifications with always-on display enabled and 4 workouts. The other 3 days the Band 7 was set to get up to wake the screen, notifications disabled. We have no doubt that the Huawei Band 7 would last almost, if not a full 14 days if you only use it as a watch.

Wrap

Huawei Band 7 is one of the best options for a capable smart wearable at an affordable price. It’s well built, has a solid feature set, and solid health and fitness tracking capabilities.

Battery life is great, in line with this type of device. There is a color for everyone and the price is very competitive. Huawei Band 7’s only strong rival is the Xiaomi Smart Band 7, which shares the price and is equally capable. Then you should decide which of these wearables is more to your liking.

Overall, you can’t go wrong with the Huawei Band 7 and we highly recommend it to a friend!