Switching from a Samsung Galaxy Watch 5 Pro to the new Galaxy Watch 6: Good upgrade?

The Samsung Galaxy Watch series is one of the best smartwatch in the Android space. Now, I don’t say this because of any bias. I say this after testing quite a lot of smartwatches that are available for Android users in India. Be it a OnePlus, Garmin, or Fitbit, there is no smartwatch out there that matches the level of convenience, seamlessness, and quality that Samsung’s Galaxy Watches offer.

When Samsung launched the Galaxy Watch 6 series alongside the new Galaxy Z Fold 5 and the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 5, I was very excited to try out the new watches. While the Galaxy Watch 6 Classic was the obvious choice given the comeback of the rotating bezel, it was a bit too chunky for my tiny wrist, so I picked up the vanilla Galaxy Watch 6. Now, just by the sound of it, it doesn’t feel like a big upgrade since I was coming from the “Pro” variant of the previous generation. However, to my surprise, the Galaxy Watch 6 did feel like an upgrade, and a substantial one at that.

ALSO READ: I used the Samsung Galaxy Watch 5 Pro for 5 weeks and here is my experience

Bigger, brighter display

Now from the moment I set up the Samsung Galaxy Watch 6, it felt better. The display feels much bigger than the one on the Galaxy Watch 5 Pro. Now, while this is just 0.1-inches bigger than the Galaxy Watch 5 Pro’s 1.4-inch super-AMOLED display, the thinner bezels make the display appear much bigger and gives a bit of an edge-to-edge feeling when you’re wearing the watch. 

The display is much brighter and sharper as compared to the Samsung Galaxy Watch 5 Pro. Like on the wrist or while resting elsewhere, the Galaxy Watch 6’s display looks super clean, almost like the watch face is pasted on the round dial. Even in bright sunlight, the Samsung Galaxy Watch 6’s display feels very clean and very sharp.  

The 1.5-inch Super AMOLED display on the Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 is brighter and goes up to 2,000 nits, which is double as compared to the Samsung Galaxy Watch 5 Pro’s 1,000 nits brightness. Further, this also has a better resolution, making for a greater pixel density, meaning we get a sharper, more detailed display as compared to last year’s flagship watch. The experience also shows it, since I found this display to be substantially more crisp as compared to the Samsung Galaxy Watch 5 Pro’s display.

Battery is everything

Throughout my rather long-term usage, I found the Samsung Galaxy Watch 5 Pro’s battery to be very disappointing. For example, there were days when the smartwatch died in a single day’s usage. However, with the Samsung Galaxy Watch 6, the battery experience is much better. The smartwatch easily lasts for a couple of days on a single charge. Even with features like Always-On Display and with location enabled constantly, the Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 still gives a better backup as compared to the Samsung Galaxy Watch 5 Pro.

While using the Samsung Galaxy Watch 5 Pro, I always fretted that my battery may not last the whole day if it was anything under 50 percent. With the Galaxy Watch 6, at 50 percent battery I feel confident about my watch easily lasting a whole day or more, if I have AOD or the location settings of the Galaxy Watch 6 off. A very substantial improvement. Now, this Samsung has been able to achieve by just optimising the battery usage on the newer Galaxy Watch 6 series. On paper, the Samsung Galaxy Watch 5 Pro has a 590mAh battery, while the Galaxy Watch 6 comes with a 425mAh battery. Still, the Watch 6 offers a much better battery backup. And this is despite using payments on the newer Samsung Galaxy Watch 6. During my time with the Watch 5 Pro, I didn’t use the payments feature even once. 

ALSO READ: Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 launched: 6 things beyond specs that are worth knowing

Samsung Galaxy Watch 5 Pro vs Galaxy Watch 6: What’s changed?

So the major difference or major upgrade in the overall experience was with the battery and display. Yes, with the Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 I used payments quite often and eventually realised I could have done the same with the Samsung Galaxy Watch 5 Pro, but well. We adapt and we learn. 

Like I said, my experience with Samsung’s smartwatches has been superior as compared to anything in the Android space. I get all notifications and calls straight on my watch without doing too much. I get accurate health data, and to top all of that off, there are convenience features like Samsung Wallet and LTE, where you don’t need to worry about leaving your phone and wallet behind.

As far as health and fitness features are concerned, the Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 has all the health features that we got with the Galaxy Watch 5 Pro, and the sensors on the newer watch are also the same. This year, the vanilla Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 now also has a thermometer, which measures your skin temperature, similar to the one we saw on last year’s Galaxy Watch 5 Pro. The only thing that the Watch 6 does better than last year’s “Pro” variant, is that it sends you a notification for irregular heart rate. 

As far as all these features are concerned, the Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 does everything with exactly as much ease and accuracy as last year’s Samsung Galaxy Watch 5 Pro. In fact, the Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 does things slightly more smoothly. Furthermore, the smaller, flatter dial makes the smartwatch look better or less chunky on my slim wrist. 

Another thing to note here is that the Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 was running on a newer platform at the time of writing this story. The Watch 6 was running on Google’s WearOS 4.0, while the Samsung Galaxy Watch 5 Pro was running on WearOS 3.5. The WatchOS 4.0 software brings a few new features to the Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 with things like a new backup-and-restore tool that makes switching between different Wear OS watches less of a hassle, improved text-to-speech performance, and a new permissions system that automatically grants permissions approved on your phone to the corresponding watch version of apps. Additionally, Watch OS 4 brings better integration and control with Google Home.

So yes, even after using the “Pro” variant of the Samsung Galaxy Watch 5 series, I still found the vanilla variant of the Galaxy Watch 6 to be an upgrade, since it does everything last year’s flagship watch did, and in some cases, does it better than the Watch 5 Pro. To know more about our experience with Samsung’s Galaxy Watch 5 Pro, read our review from last year, where we used the smartwatch for 5 weeks and have given you an extensive lowdown of how the watch looks, feels, and works in regular life.

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Darab Mansoor Ali