Willful Fitness Tracker With Heart Rate Monitor Review

Willful Fitness Tracker

Willful Fitness Tracker SW352

The Willful SW352 fitness tracker is a good option for the price. With an IP68 waterproof rating, long battery life and smartphone notifications it competes functionality wise with more expensive trackers. Given its price point it would be ideal as a first fitness tracker or as a gift for children.

Pros

  • Charges with standard USB cable
  • Long battery life
  • Inexpensive
  • IP68 Waterproof rating so can swim with it
  • Easy to use and lightweight

Cons

  • Not a recognized brand name
  • No stop watch
  • Hard to see screen in sunlight
  • Display only stays on for 10 seconds
  • Only 1 day of history on watch itself

Willful Fitness Tracker SW352 Design

Design wise the Willful Fitness Tracker SW352 goes for a slimline, narrow rectangular look. This means that it wouldn’t look out of place on your wrist at work.

Available in 6 colors and there is a single button to control the functionality. that wouldn’t look out of a place on your wrist at work.

The straps are interchangeable and extend from 5.5 to 8.3 inches by 0.59 inches wide so should suit most shapes and sizes of wrist.

App

To get the most out of the Willful tracker you will need to downloafd the VeryFitPro app which is available within the respective app stores.

Because the device itself is relatively simple, the app is where you control settings, phone notiications, alarms, historic data and time settings.

Like a lot of fitness tracker apps you need to sync to it daily before midnight then you will be able to see your workouts especially as the device itself resets at midnight

You can set up to 10 alarms in the app which then cause vibrating alerts on the tracker itself.

Can you use it without a smartphone?

In theory, you can use the SW352 without a smartphone but you would be limiting yourself to the very basic functionality that is on the device such as counting steps.

You would also lose the ability to track trends in the app as the device resets at midnight every day.

Accuracy

When it works it measure steps taken and the program coverts it to miles. It does not ask you stride length so it is all approximate distance.

this watch counts steps are implemented through a 3D gravity sensor, it will record some steps when you move your hands, so it may have some tolerance errors when you are using, but you can walk 100 steps to test if it is accurate or no

Battery life

The battery life weights in at around 4 to 7 days for normal usage.

The Willful SW352 makes use of a standard USB charger which is extremely convenient. No more hunting around for the charging unit that you can never find.

To charge the watch you will need to :

  • separate the main body by pulling on the strap to expose the metal pins that plug into your USB port
  • clean the pins to ensure good contact and plug into your USB port
  • give it 2 to 3 hours and your device should be fully charged

Display

The display is a 0.96″ OLED Color Screen which generally gets the job done.

However, some users report a couple of issues they have with the screen:-

  • hard to see in bright sunlight
  • tapping the screen to display the time can be a bit hit and miss
  • screen only lights up for about 5-10 seconds which can be too quick to see

Heart rate monitoring & sleep tracking

The Willful SW352 has sleep tracking and built in heart rate monitoring. It is fair to say that the implementations are slightly more limited than those on more expensive trackers.

The heart rate sensor is not continuous and takes intermittent samples throughout the day. There is no onboard display of heart rate so any details require you to go into the VeryFitPro app which is where you can also set details like maximum heart rate.

As with most trackers the Willful measures your sleep by interpreting the lack of movement of your body or wrist. It is quite limited by the fact that it only records the data between 9pm and 8am and only for periods of 4 hours or more. Again, to get the most from it you have to connect to the VeryFitPro app and ensure that all your personal information is complete.

Smartphone compatibility

Although not really a fitness tracking must have one of the best features of the Willful SW352 is the ability to integrate with your phone for notifications and remotely controlling your phone’s camera.

The VeryFitPro app allows you to choose which apps send you notifications and sends it to your wrist. It’s a really useful feature and does have its uses. However, the size of the display does mean that the text can be quite small

Water resistance

The good news is that the SW355 is IP68 rated so you can take it with you into the pool or the shower.

The bad news is that there is no swimming specific functionality so you can only real track your heart rate and activity when doing your lenghts.

The other issue that is common with a lot of touch screen trackers is that sometimes the water from the shower can inadvertently kick off an activity. Not the end of the world but a little bugbear.

Willful Fitness Tracker Specifications

Alarmsup to 10 set in the app
Move RemindersYes
Step CounterYes
Calorie CounterYes
Heart Rate MonitorYes
Sleep TrackingYes
Water ResistanceIP68
Smartphone NotificationsYes
Display0.96″ OLED
Battery life4-7 days
Charging Time2 – 3 hours
Interchangeable StrapsYes
Weight2.4 Ounces
PriceCheck Price

Who is the Willful SW352 fitness tracker for?

The Willful SW352 is a great choice if:-

  • You’ve never owned a fitness tracker before and want to get insight into your daily activity and whether a fitness tracker is for you
  • Want a cheaper alternative to Fitbit if you’re kids are pestering you for a tracker this is a great inexpensive choice which offers a lot of similar functionality to a Fitbit at a fraction of the price
  • You’re fed up of trying to find your charging cable – the ability to plug this directly into the USB port is a great advantage