2025 was a fun year to review fitness devices. We saw three companies introduce devices that could have been Whoop killers, and one definitely came closer to the mark than others. One running watch gobsmacked me with its accuracy, one device was so inaccurate it sent me down an investigative rabbit hole to figure out why, and two devices delighted me with how well they solved a real problem no other device even tried to tackle. Read on for the winners of my very subjective award categories.
Most accurate: Garmin Forerunner 570
Credit: Beth SkwareckiSee, Garmin’s previous watches, like the Forerunner 265, had a perfectly good heart rate sensor. I’d put them in the same tier as most Coros watches, a smidge higher than the Apple Watch, and generally as good as, or better than, most other high-end devices.
But Garmin put its very best heart rate sensor in the Forerunner 570. This same sensor, the Elevate version 5, is also in Garmin’s Forerunner 970, Venu 3 and 4, and Fenix 8. I was not prepared for how much better it would be. I test all my devices against an electrical heart rate chest strap, the gold standard for this sort of thing, and a good wrist-based sensor will only show a few small deviations between its heart rate graph and the one I get from the chest strap. But the 570 sometimes showed exactly the same data. The graph below shows what I expect from a good sensor (top) and what I got from the 570 (bottom). Yes, there are two lines in the bottom graph.
Credit: Beth SkwareckiAt first I thought I had screwed up, and gotten the chest and wrist data mixed up somehow, maybe uploading the same file twice—that’s how close they were. But with further testing, and also zooming in to see the occasional tiny difference between the two lines, I confirmed that the 570’s sensor really was that accurate. Damn, Garmin. I’m impressed.
Coolest concept (that actually works): Core 2 Thermal Sensor
Credit: Beth SkwareckiThe Core 2 sensor promised to handle this for me, and it worked well. You can read about my experience here. You clip the device to your heart rate chest strap, and it measures your body temperature in two different ways: a temperature sensor detects your skin temperature, and a heat flux sensor paired with a heart rate algorithm delivers an estimate of your core (internal) body temperature. From that data, the device can tell you when you’re hot enough that your workout counts as useful heat training, and it can warn you when you’re getting too hot and need to take a break.
I found the device incredibly useful, especially since it could broadcast my temperature data to my Garmin watch during runs. I could also log sauna sessions in the device’s app (without taking the device into the sauna) and see how heat-adapted I was becoming. The data I got from the app seemed accurate, and as a result I had probably my most productive and enjoyable summer of running ever.
Runner-up: DFC
Credit: Beth SkwareckiI took a chance on the DFC because I had canceled my Peloton subscription, but still wanted to use the Bike and sync my workouts to my fitness watch. The DFC did exactly what it promised: beamed power data over Bluetooth so that my watch or phone could pick up the information and log it in a workout. My Garmin was able to give me an FTP estimate and recommend power-based workouts, and there was no ongoing cost. (The $125 price costs less than three months of the Peloton All-Access subscription.) I can highly recommend the DFC for anyone with an OG Bike who wants to opt out of the Peloton subscription world.
Best upgrade and best overall: Coros Pace 4
Credit: Beth SkwareckiBut late this year, Coros introduced the Pace 4. Between the new features in that watch, and an extra thing or two that dropped in the December software update, it’s hands down the best fitness watch for the money and is my overall pick for the best fitness watch of 2025.
These notes are transcribed and attached to the workout in the Coros app, giving me information that I would pretty much never get around to adding after the fact. And then the December software update added a major feature that has kept Coros lagging behind Garmin and other watches: the ability to control media that is playing from your phone. The interface for that isn’t as smooth as I would like, but it’s there, and that’s huge.
Runner-up: charging features on the Pixel Watch 4
Credit: Beth SkwareckiI only needed half an hour for nearly a full charge—specifically, I charged the watch from 3% to 97% in 31 minutes. No other smartwatch out there charges this fast. The Pixel Watch 4 also ships with a new magnetic dock-style charger that is far more convenient than the back-of-watch puck that previous versions used.
Best Whoop alternative: Amazfit Helio Strap
Credit: Beth SkwareckiGarmin’s device turned out to be a $170 sleep tracker; fine, I guess, but not what so many of us were hoping for. Polar’s $200 device looks and acts more like a Whoop, in terms of hardware, anyway. It’s a welcome addition to the market, since Whoop had this product category all to itself for too long, but I have to admit I couldn’t get too excited about it.
None of the devices are even attempting to compete with Whoop’s subscription app on software features, which is to be expected—Whoop is really a software company that gives you a cool gadget to go with the app, while the other companies in this space are hardware companies that figure their app doesn’t matter very much as long as you’re happy with the physical device. I think that’s a fair take on the market: These new products are for people who like the idea of a screenless tracker but don’t want to pay for a Whoop-caliber app. I expect Amazfit will have a lot of happy customers.
Biggest disappointment: Powerbeats Pro 2
Credit: Beth SkwareckiAs I discovered through extensive testing (here, and then more in my review here), the heart rate sensor doesn’t make good contact with your skin unless your ears are a particular shape and size. Changing out the silicone ear tips doesn’t change the fit of the heart rate sensor (or at least, not enough to fix the issue), so some people simply end up with unusable or unreliable heart rate data.
A September software update improved the heart rate algorithm slightly, and included a feature that warns users if their fit is poor enough to affect heart rate readings. That’s a good start, since otherwise you wouldn’t even know if you’re getting inaccurate readings. But if you’re one of the people for whom tweaking the fit doesn’t give you usable data, you’re out $250 for a device that doesn’t actually work for you. On the bright side, they are good gym headphones even with the heart rate feature turned off.
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