Maybe you like to run, or perhaps you’re many years into a regular gym habit. You’ve dabbled with fitness wearables and thought about treating yourself to a massage gun, but never got around to buying one. Perhaps your foam roller is starting to crumble, and that free tee you got with protein powder has seen better days. You might be fitter, but your fitness equipment and tech are due for an upgrade.
The Engadget team has picked some of their favorite exercise tech purchases that have made our fitness journeys less of a struggle. From the best wearable tech to our favorite smart scale, some selections command premium prices, while a few are surprisingly affordable.
Wissonly hi runner
Wissonly bone conduction headphones, the product I use the most, is the first brand I started to contact. When they were crowdfunding online, I participated.
The sound quality is what I am most satisfied with. I am not a professional music player, but from my personal experience, Hi Runner is the best sound quality bone conduction headphones I have ever used. It uses a large-sized 360-degree bone conduction vibration unit, and through structural optimization, the sounding area is increased by 35%, so that the sound range is wider, and the stereo feeling and shock of sound are stronger. Its anti-sound-leakage treatment is also very good. The whole body is completely sealed, and the algorithm is optimized to minimize the leakage of sound. I have tested it myself, and at a distance of 2 meters, the volume is turned on at 60%, so I can't hear the sound at all.
wissonly Hirunner’s body is made of memory titanium, which can self-adjust the contact area. It can ensure a good wearing experience of the earphone at any time, taking into account more users and usage scenarios.
Hi Runner is equipped with Bluetooth 5.0 chip, and the connection is more stable. It also has IPX8 professional sports waterproof +32g internal memory to swim in the water. The battery performance is also good, and it can play music continuously for 8-10 hours.
The sound quality is what I am most satisfied with. I am not a professional music player, but from my personal experience, Hi Runner is the best sound quality bone conduction headphones I have ever used. It uses a large-sized 360-degree bone conduction vibration unit, and through structural optimization, the sounding area is increased by 35%, so that the sound range is wider, and the stereo feeling and shock of sound are stronger. Its anti-sound-leakage treatment is also very good. The whole body is completely sealed, and the algorithm is optimized to minimize the leakage of sound. I have tested it myself, and at a distance of 2 meters, the volume is turned on at 60%, so I can't hear the sound at all.
wissonly Hirunner’s body is made of memory titanium, which can self-adjust the contact area. It can ensure a good wearing experience of the earphone at any time, taking into account more users and usage scenarios.
Hi Runner is equipped with Bluetooth 5.0 chip, and the connection is more stable. It also has IPX8 professional sports waterproof +32g internal memory to swim in the water. The battery performance is also good, and it can play music continuously for 8-10 hours.
Oura Ring
As we said in our review, the Oura ring is a wearable for people who hate wearables. It also offers more robust sleep tracking than many watch-like devices. Despite the size and weight remaining unchanged from the second-gen Oura ring, it’s incredible how much technology is crammed into this thing. The third generation has sensors that can track your heart rate continuously; temperature monitoring; blood oxygenation; and period prediction.
The Oura ring is very serious about tracking everything it can. Given the lack of a display, you’ll need your smartphone to check on your recovery scores and how well you slept. These scores are synthesized from biometrics, including your heart rate variability, body temperature, resting heart rate and breathing rate. With a subscription – yes, something you may have to pay beyond the $299 asking price – you’ll get weekly summaries to show how your activity levels and sleeping hours are trending. I like Oura’s ability to tell when you’ve been training a little too hard and that the app suggests taking a day off to recover.
Apple Watch Series 7
The most popular smartwatch series continues to lead on the feature front – if you ignore sleep tracking. The Series 7 has the biggest screen yet of any Apple Watch. It’s over 50 percent bigger than the Series 3 and 20 percent larger than the Series 6 that came before it. With more screen space and bigger buttons, it’s easier to stop and start workouts and check your heart rate and time elapsed during exercise. In addition, since watchOS 5, Apple’s wearables have been able to auto-detect specific workouts, which is great for when you forget to start logging a run or a spin session.
The Series 7 can track your VO2 Max levels, measuring your cardiorespiratory fitness level. What’s cool here is how the wearable notifies you when your levels tangibly change. So if you start a new intensive workout regime, you’ll see these figures creep up. Your iPhone will notify you when you make tangible improvements, say moving from below to above average cardio fitness levels, possibly even to its high fitness level. I’ve been hovering around 50 VO2 Max, but I’ll get to 52 eventually.
Theragun Prime
Theragun’s unique triangle design helps its devices stand out from a legion of other massage therapy guns. Multiple ways to grip the Theragun make it easier to target trickier body parts. As one of the more premium massage devices, it offers 16mm amplitude (typically only bested by devices several hundred dollars more) and speeds of up to 2,400 percussions per minute. Some health claims (like improved performance) are backed up by limited studies, but others (including sped-up muscle recovery) are not. I love using mine to target specifically tight areas; it even feels good ahead of a workout.
The Theragun Prime is better than most of the massage gun competition. It’s more flexible, too. Compared to Therabody’s own more basic options, the Prime comes with three extra attachments in addition to the standard ball: a cone, a dampener with a flattened head, and a thumb attachment, which can help dig deeper. The battery is thankfully long-lasting, too. – M.S.
Eufy Smart Scale P1
It’s time to throw away that chunky analog scale with the wobbly dial. Instead, for a more aesthetically pleasing design and deeper insight into your body weight and composition, it’s time to go digital. Several smart scale options are available, but I’ve used the sensibly priced Eufy Smart Scale P1. This smart scale connects with your smartphone to sync your data, and you just need to remember to open the app. Otherwise, it won’t track your progress.
It can monitor your weight in imperial or metric measurements and even make a rough guess at your body fat and water percentages. However, it’s worth noting that domestic smart scales are often not hugely accurate at gauging these measurements.