These days, you can find decent smartwatches for PHP 5,000 and below. They come with all the basic necessities you look for in a smartwatch. But add a little more, and you can get one with extra health and fitness features and premium materials – all from a respectable brand such as Xiaomi.
That’s exactly what you get from the Xiaomi Watch S4 (41mm). It has all the basic health and fitness monitoring features (with a little extra), a solid build, and a design that exudes both simplicity and elegance at the same time.
Design & build
It comes in four color options for the strap – namely Black, Mint Green, White, and Sunset gold. The first two are rubber straps, aiming for more of that sporty vibe. The white is made of leather and the gold is a Milanese strap, both giving off a more premium aesthetic.
Personally, I would prefer a larger size than the 41mm, especially when it comes to smartwatches. But I wouldn’t put it past myself to rock the Black Fluororubber variant since I tend to lean more towards the sportier looking models.
The middle frame is made of stainless steel. While it is already compact in nature given the 41mm diameter, it is also quite lightweight and slim, clocking in at 32g (excluding the strap) and 9.5mm respectively. The watch wasn’t intrusive whatsoever, whether I was playing tennis or sleeping, which is excellent.
On the Sunset Gold edition, you can find a shimmering lab-grown diamond on the crown. I truly wish I got to see this in person as the unit I tested was black variant. The crown itself does have haptic feedback, but it isn’t as satisfying as I would like it to be.
In terms of water resistance, it does feature a level of 5ATM. This means that you can take the watch with you in shallow waters. But deep diving is definitely a big no-no while sporting this device.
Display
The watch face is a 1.32-inch AMOLED display. It features a 466 x 466 resolution, a 60Hz refresh rate, and a high brightness mode of 1500nits. The display offers crisp and smooth visuals and is quite responsive.
You do get a lot of watch face options right off the bat. It’s a mix of classic watch faces to mimic actual timepieces, and your smartwatch faces that track health and fitness. By downloading the Mi Fitness app, you gain access to a vast library of watch faces you can download as well.
I want to give a special shoutout to the cute pet watch faces as well. My pet of choice was Lola the sheep. You can tap on the screen to interact with them and honestly for some reason, it makes everything feel less lonely. (Wow, that got so emotional).
The display does support AOD. But it’s important to note that with this enabled, battery life will be significantly affected (from 8 days slashed down to 3 days).
Health and fitness features
Health and fitness tracking are some of the main draws of smartwatches. The Xiaomi Watch S4 comes with a whole host of these features, with some being upgraded for more accurate tracking.
The heart rate module has been enhanced to ensure better accuracy. Real-time heart rate monitoring can even be tracked while swimming. The usual suspects are tracked as well such as sleep, stress, blood oxygen saturation and skin temperature. The latter, combined with other vital signs, is used to track menstrual cycle predictions.
For sports, there are over 150 modes available. I often used the watch while playing tennis. Like I mentioned, the device isn’t intrusive at all, so I didn’t mind capturing my activity data during each session. I hope a pickleball mode will be added in the near future.
Good news for all the runners and bikers out there: the watch has a GPS system that can accurately track your routes during the activity. It is also compatible with Health Connect, as well as other fitness apps such as Suunto.
While not necessarily related to health or fitness, the device can also act as a portable safety guardian for added security. Emergency SOS allows you to call your emergency contact by pressing the lower button thrice. Siren mode on the other hand sounds a loud alarm to draw attention to yourself. Live location sharing can also be done for that added peace-of-mind.
Connectivity and compatibility
I didn’t have a Xiaomi smartphone on hand to pair with the device, so I did have to use it with my iPhone 16 Pro. Thankfully, smartwatch is compatible with any smartphone with the aforementioned Mi Fitness app. Although I would assume that the experience is much more seamless when using a Xiaomi phone.
In terms of connectivity, the device supports Bluetooth 5.4. Taking calls on the watch is possible and the speakers are quite decent. You can check email or message notifications, but you cannot respond to them. For me, this isn’t a big deal in any case since I’m not one to communicate using a smartwatch anyway.
Based on Xiaomi’s global website NFC payment is supported, but perhaps only in China so far. So hopefully this is something that will eventually be integrated in the Philippine market for contactless payments.
The Xiaomi Watch S4 runs on Xiaomi HyperOS. This offers seamless interconnectivity with other Xiaomi devices, including those for the home. The OS also supports snap gesture control wherein you can either reject calls or take photos literally with a snap of the finger.
Battery and charging
A 320mAh battery powers the Xiaomi Watch S4. Xiaomi claims that it has an 8-day battery life on light usage, while 3-day battery life with heavier usage. These claims I found to be quite accurate upon testing.
Charging was quick as I was able to get from 0 to 40% in around 15-20 minutes. For a full charge though, it would take up to an hour.
Verdict
Admittedly, you can get smartwatches with similar functions for a lot less than the Xiaomi Watch S4 41mm. While it is able to cover the basic health and fitness functions, the watch is able to offer more durability, a sleek design, and a responsive and crisp AMOLED display which are major plus points.
The various strap options will have an effect on the price. But with the fluororubber straps, the price of the Xiaomi Watch S4 41mm starts at Php 7,399 (as of the time of writing). If you’re willing to pay a little extra for better build quality and a few additional health features, then I say this smartwatch would be worth pulling the trigger for.
Photos by Mica de los Reyes
