Nokia’s Withings Steel HR looks like a real watch, has battery life to match

Yeah boooyyee, a new Withings activity tracker!

Well, that might be the most excited anyone’s ever been about a Withings activity tracker, but the new Steel HR does have plenty to get pumped about in its locker. At least on paper.

I’m getting psyched just looking at it, brother!

Stop with the Hulk Hogan stuff. But you have a point in that yes, this is a very nice-looking piece of design. It’s basically a classic wristwatch – stainless steel body, chrome hands, silicone strap – but with a boatload of health-enhancing tech built in: LED-based heart rate monitor, step counter, distance tracking and calorie counter.

How does that all come together?

The watch links up wirelessly with any Android or iOS phone running the Withings Health Mate app, feeding it all the data it’s collected and helping the user gain insights into the state of their health and their workouts: heart rate summaries, a daily timeline, sleep information, food logging (obviously you have to enter that yourself) and personalised advice.

And it’s all stuffed into an attractive package – not some obvious tracker wristband.

True. The watch is built to a decent standard by the looks of it, with waterproofing to 5m depth and what Withings says is the best battery life for any heart-monitoring activity tracker: up to 25 days per charge, and even after that it’ll go into a 20 day-long power save mode which is still able to track some activities. There’s also a digital screen on the Steel HR’s face which provides both health data and notifications from your phone.

And I can buy it when?

Nokia (who owns Withings now) says the Steel HR will be available from the beginning of October on the company’s site. There are two sizes of the watch, 36mm and 40mm, and these will cost £170 and £180 respectively.

We’ll be trying to get one on our wrist to test very soon, so stay tuned for that.