Xiaomi Smart Band 7 Pro review

introduction

The line between smartwatch and smartband is thinner than ever in 2022. It usually comes down to the ability to run third-party apps, make and receive calls, and have mobile data. Xiaomi Smart Band 7 Pro is a smartband disguised as a smartwatch and aims to further blur the gap between the watch band and form factors.

It retails for € 100 / £ 120, which is more than double the current price of the regular Xiaomi Band 7. You get a larger screen, built-in dual-band GPS, a battery rated for 12 days of mixed use, and a few other extras. Is the price justifiable and the extra features worth the premium or should you just go ahead and get a non-Pro Smart Band 7? Let’s examine.

Xiaomi Smart Band 7 Pro specifications

• Screen: 1.64 “color AMOLED, 280 x 456 pixel color screen, 326ppi pixel density, 500 nits peak brightness, 2.5D curved glass
• Straps: Detachable silicone straps, 22mm width, 130-205mm adjustable length
• Features: 5ATM Assessment, Real-Time Heart Rate Monitor, 24/7 Blood Oxygen Level Monitoring, Sleep Tracking, Stress Tracking, Sports Tracking, VO2 Max, Pedometer, Meditation, Smart Notifications, Inactivity Alert , Beverage Reminder, Find Phone, Weather Forecast, Music & Camera Control, Amazon Alexa Voice Assistant
• Sports modes: Outdoor Run, Indoor Run, Outdoor Walk, Indoor Walk, Outdoor Bike, Indoor Bike, Strength Training, Soccer, Yoga and Cricket (100+ in Mi Fitness app)
• Sensors: PPG optical heart rate sensor, SpO2 sensor, 3-axis accelerometer, rotor vibration motor
• Connectivity: Bluetooth LE 5.2, dual-band GNSS, compatible with Android 6+ and iOS 12+
• Battery: 235 mAh
• Colors: Black, ivory
• Dimensions: 44.7 x 28.8 x 11 mm
• Weight: 20.5 grams

Drawing

Our review unit is available in Ivory color which brings a whitish tint. It looks great when brand new, but it collects a lot of dirt after a few days of use, especially on the underside of the case. The casing is made entirely of plastic, while the top half boasts a shiny metal border around the display that adds style. A welcome addition to the Pro model is the wider strap which also features a buckle mechanism for a more secure fit while the regular Band 7 has a hook closure which is harder to secure and loosens over time.

The Band 7 Pro weighs 20.5 grams, exactly 7 grams more than the Smart Band 7 but is still super light and we found it comfortable to wear all day. You forget it’s on your wrist after a few minutes even though the larger body tends to stick out more when you’re wearing long sleeved shirts than the Smart Band 7. While the 7 Pro strap case is larger, Xiaomi has decided not to add any physical button which we believe is a missed opportunity.

There is a larger 1.64-inch AMOLED display on the Band 7 Pro with a resolution of 280 x 456 pixels, peak brightness of 500 nits, and 2.5D curved glass. The 326ppi display is very sharp and has 40% more horizontal screen space than Band 7. The larger screen is especially useful on watch faces as you can have complications for almost any important device and health and metrics also become easier -read notifications.

Band 7 Pro also offers automatic brightness control which is something you don’t find on Band 7. Always On Display (AOD) mode shows the time and date even when the screen is off at the expense of battery life.

Band 7 Pro is 5ATM waterproof, which means pool swimming sessions are worth trying. The watch strap is made of silicone and features a patented buckle mechanism. Xiaomi also offers more premium vegan leather options. There is no official IP classification for water or dust. The box contains the Band 7 Pro and a proprietary two-pin magnetic charger that ends with a USB-A cable.

Features

Xiaomi has included all health and fitness monitoring features from Band 7 to Band 7 Pro, including 24/7 heart rate monitoring, as well as continuous SpO2 monitoring, sleep and sleep monitoring. stress. The new bit on the Band 7 Pro is the added dual-band GNSS sensor with support for GPS, QZSS, BeiDou, Galileo and GLONASS positioning that allows you to track runs without the need for your paired phone.

Main features of Xiaomi Smart Band 7 Pro

You can access sports tracking for over 110 activities, including guided running courses on the device that combine walking and jogging at intervals with instructions on the band. Unfortunately, there is no recovery time advice or guided workouts for non-running sports. The Mi Fitness app can store up to a month of health and training data that you can export to share with friends or track your progress.

Xiaomi’s Mi Fitness is the go-to for pairing and managing settings, watch faces and everything else on your paired Android or iOS smartphone. The app has a neat layout spread across four dashboards – Health, Training, Device, and Profile that lets you activate settings and other features on the band.

There is no NFC on our international unit while the Chinese units support the contactless system for payments and transit cards. You can’t even take calls here, which is another notable omission and something competitors offer at this price point. There is a built-in microphone that you can only use to talk to Amazon Alexa although you must first set up the app on your phone and connect with the Band 7 Pro. Once you have everything set up, you can ask Alexa to set your alarms, check appliances and show you the weather forecast.

Xiaomi has a large list of watch faces on its Mi Fitness app and you can store up to 7 watch faces at a time on the Band 7 Pro, but the 5 pre-installed are not replaceable, so you only have two additional watch faces on a rather limited time.

The vibration motor here is powerful in its default state and can be programmed for an even louder hum setting from the menus. The various features include alarm clock, timer, weather widget, controls for music and Amazon Alexa, as well as a camera shutter for the paired phone.

Performance

Navigating the interface on the Band 7 Pro is done purely via taps and swipes, although I initially found myself looking for a physical button as most smartwatches I’ve tested in the past with this form factor usually have at least one button to the controls. There is a quick setting to switch to the left of the lock screen, notifications above it, and up to eleven widgets on the right side. Swiping up displays the full list of apps which can be organized in icon mode with two rows of app icons next to each other or in list mode with larger icons.

Notification scrolling is sometimes delayed, especially if you have multiple messages. Band 7 Pro stores up to ten notifications before you have to clear the queue. Handling of band notifications was inconsistent for the most part. If my phone is unlocked and close to the band I will be notified immediately but when my phone is locked it will take a few minutes to get the notification on the band.

I would need to open the Mi Fitness app on my phone and manually re-sync the band on several occasions. You can’t directly respond to notifications from the band, and you also don’t get emoji previews which are both features offered on other similarly priced bands and watches.

The GPS connection on the Band 7 Pro is solid, and like other smartbands and watches, the receiver takes a short period of 5-10 seconds to find your location outdoors. Once your location is locked in, you get reliable coverage that works well even in parks with lots of trees around. It’s nice to have GPS built into your wrist even if the tracks recorded by the Band 7 Pro are still not as accurate as those on any recent smartphone or more sophisticated smartwatch. Band 7 Pro regularly displayed my location on the opposite side of the road from where I was walking / running.

Running, cycling, and swimming tracking get bonus metrics like active calories burned, cadence, stride length, and average heart rate. Swim detection gets average SWOLF and average strokes for a lap in the pool.

Heart rate and SpO2 measurements are on par with other fitness trackers from last year, which means they show an accurate representation of health tracking but are by no means medical grade. The band only takes a few seconds to collect these types of data, which is better than some competitors that require waiting up to a minute or require multiple reads.

Sleep tracking showed accurate times to go to sleep and wake up and also features the average beats per minute (BPM), average SpO2 readings, and rapid eye movement (REM) for each sleep session. You can read your metrics right on the watch which is a nice bonus.

One strange thing to note is the slow firmware update process. As soon as I set up my Band 7 Pro with the Mi Health app, I received an update. Xiaomi said the update might take some time, but in my case it took over an hour to download and install the firmware, something I’ve never had on any other wearable device to date.

Battery life

Xiaomi claims that the Band 7 Pro’s 235mAh battery can last up to 12 days of typical use on a single charge. I managed 7 days of use during my two-week test period which included all features except the always-on display enabled with at least three one-hour workouts per week. GPS and health tracking alone burn between 10 and 12% per hour of use.

Lighter use should reach the stated values ​​of 12 days although you would sacrifice most of the features offered by the Band 7 Pro. However, the regular Band 7 and its predecessors regularly offer more than a week of use between charges. , so if you want to charge less, you need to stick to one of those models. A full charge on the Band 7 Pro with the included 2-pin proprietary charger takes just under 60 minutes.

Verdict

Xiaomi Smart Band 7 Pro is a great fitness tracker with a large display and all the features you will find on the smaller Smart Band 7 along with some known improvements such as a built-in GNSS receiver. Get 24/7 heart rate tracking, continuous SpO2 tracking, stress and sleep tracking, as well as sports tracking for over 110 activities. Health tracking is fast and offers reliable data as long as you don’t use it for medical analysis while fitness tracking is on par with other wearables we’ve seen in the last year.

The wider and slightly sharper AMOLED display here is excellent and is easier on the eyes when reading notifications and navigating the OS than previous entries in Xiaomi’s smart band range.

Band 7 Pro looks and feels good on the wrist. You could easily mistake it for a more premium smartwatch and the lightweight build materials and beautiful watch strap make it easy to wear for days. A physical button or crown element would have been a great addition for navigating the UI when you don’t feel like touching the screen. The built-in dual-band GNSS tracking is a nice built-in feature and does the job albeit less accurately than the receiver on most smartphones.

However, we feel that the Band 7 Pro is priced too high in its current state and most users will be better off with the regular Xiaomi Band 7 or a smartwatch in the € 100 range. We can confidently expect prices to drop in the coming months. which would make the Band 7 Pro an easy recommendation.

Professionals

• Great AMOLED screen with AOD and auto brightness
• Dual band GNSS
• Lightweight design
• Decent battery life

versus

• No Bluetooth calls
• Synchronization problems
• Slight UI stutters in some areas such as notifications
• Few reasons to surpass the Xiaomi Smart Band 7