HUAWEI Watchfit SE Hands-On: What I Learned During This Test

I’m fresh back from my honeymoon in the Maldives, where I tested the HUAWEI Watchfit SE. It’s a small smart fitness tracker that came out in July 2023. Huawei provided me with the device for the test. My first question was compatibility: Does a Huawei watch still work with iOS or Android? The short answer: yes, extremely well. The smartwatches run via the Huawei Health app from the App Store and the Play Store.

Case and display

Two things pleasantly surprised me. One is the weight: Without the strap, the tracker weighs only 21 grams, and the included plastic strap doesn’t weigh much either. The strap could be higher quality and has a quirky clasp. For that, there are plenty of straps on Amazon, for example.

The second is the display: It’s very bright despite only 300 nits. Unfortunately, there’s no sensor that adjusts the brightness automatically. If you set the slider to maximum, the display is easy to read even in direct sunlight.

Operation and apps

On the touch display, you swipe left and right through the widgets, customize the watch face and open the quick settings. The side button opens the menu with sports tracking, heart rate and oxygen measurement, sleep and cycle tracker, music control, stress management and breathing exercises, plus alarm, stopwatch and other standard apps. There are no Google apps on a Huawei watch, and you can’t install additional apps from the Huawei Store either. Operation is intuitive and simple overall, and the watch responds quickly to input.

Fitness features

The Watchfit SE is a dedicated fitness tracker. It has GPS, so you can record outdoor workouts without a phone. There are over 100 workout modes, and some sports like running, walking, cycling, cross trainer, rowing and indoor walking are even recognized automatically. On the treadmill, the distance was measured relatively identically to what the treadmill showed.

Sleep tracking isn’t quite as accurate, but it delivers accurate information on total sleep duration. The watch is water resistant to 50 m, but according to Huawei you shouldn’t use it for diving.

What’s missing

• No microphone and no speaker: You can’t make calls.
• No NFC: You can’t pay with the watch.
• Notifications from messengers like WhatsApp and Telegram come through. Replying with configurable quick replies only works with an Android smartphone.

Battery

The battery has 180 mAh and lasted six days for me. With the always-on display turned on, the runtime is halved. What surprised me is that the watch was fully charged again in 45 minutes with the included cable, as stated. Well-known manufacturers could learn a thing or two from that.

Huawei Health app

In the app, you see all the tracked data clearly laid out. There’s also sleep and fitness coaching, running coaching, nutrition coaching and stress management. You can also have it remind you to take medication. That’s quite extensive, I hadn’t expected it.

Who is the Watchfit SE worth it for?

For anyone who primarily wants a smart, accurate fitness tracker that’s feature-rich for its size with a few smartwatch functions, such as notifications and info on calls. It cost €79 at the time of the test. For €119 there’s the Huawei Watch Fit 2 with a speaker and microphone for making calls via Bluetooth and a bigger battery.

Verdict

The Watchfit SE is a really nice little fitness tracker. My biggest lesson: Huawei smartwatches are fully compatible with iOS and my Android devices. That suddenly puts them well ahead for me, because Huawei has some really stylish watches on offer. After my positive experience, I’ll definitely take a closer look at them.