I love adventure watches, from analog Casio G-Shocks to the Apple Watch Ultra and Garmin’s Instinct and Fenix ranges. But there hasn’t really been any of the best Android smartwatches in that space: the Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra and Galaxy Watch 5 Pro are there, but they use Wear OS filtered through Samsung’s One UI Watch 6 interface.
Now, Mobvoi’s latest TicWatch, the Mobvoi TicWatch Atlas, looks like a rugged adventure watch designed to challenge Garmin and the Ultras, and it runs on Wear OS. This means it could be a natural choice for users of the best Android phones looking for a tough, durable watch to see them through hikes, trail runs, and all manner of other outdoor adventures.
With a 90-hour battery life in smartwatch mode and 45 days in ‘essential’ or low-power mode, it also uses fast charging: 30 minutes on the charger gives you another two days of use. The Ticwatch Atlas packs an AMOLED display overlaid with an “ultra low-power display” detailing time via a digital watch face, steps, heart rate, notifications, alarms and battery life. Sort of a souped-up Casio: it’s a feature that’s shared by the well-reviewed Mobvoi TicWatch Pro 5, although it seems a more natural fit here.
The AMOLED display looks ideal for displaying topographical maps of your surroundings, along with the usual navigational toolsets: compass, barometer and altimeter (ideal for climbing), GPS and four other GNSS systems (likely Glonass, Galileo, Beidou and QZSS). It’s also got a heatmaps feature for ball games like soccer, showing you where you’re most active on the pitch, alongside Fall Detection and automatic workout detection, which Mobvoi refers to as ‘TicMotion’.
The watch retails at $349.99 / €359.99 Euros in Black and Silver, with pricing for other regions TBC, and is available to order now.
Analysis: a watch to get excited about
The TicWatch Pro 5 received 4.5 stars in our review, with the writer stating it was “one of the best Wear OS smartwatches around”. That ran Wear OS 3, and the TicWatch Atlas is stated to run Wear OS 4. It’s unknown at this point whether it’ll receive a Wear OS 5 rollout, but as even Google is struggling with it right now, I wouldn’t bet on that happening anytime soon.
Nevertheless, for Wear OS fans, this might be a Garmin-beating watch, earning its place alongside contemporaries like the OnePlus Watch 2 and Google Pixel Watch 3. Stay tuned for a full review.
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matt.evans@futurenet.com (Matt Evans)
