Amazfit Helio Ring review: I may never track my sleep with a smartwatch again
Introduction
The Amazfit Helio Ring is a slim wellness-tracking smart ring, free of buttons, screens, and physical controls for a discreet appearance on the hand. Inwardly, the sleek device holds sensors to collect health monitoring data, connected to Apple or Android smartphones through direct synchronization in the Zepp Health application.
Besides, the Helio Ring also supports other widely used health-related apps, such as Apple Health and Google Fit, making a wise choice for users across the various platforms.
Fundamentally, this is the same as many other smart rings in this high-end category, offering only basic activity tracking but across four sports modes with no auto-detection. Amazfit is also eager to combine the Helio Ring with one of its full-fat smartwatches, the Amazfit Balance, to call upon a fuller suite of physical activities or activity modes. That would offer fitness monitoring in totality, combining what the Helio Ring offers with what the smartwatch offers, for a full, well-rounded experience.
But, unlike the competition—in the form of the Oura Ring Gen 3, which demands that one subscribes to a monthly plan to unlock such premium features—though, the Amazfit Helio Ring charges no recurring fee to use its core features. Indeed, this includes energy level; sleep patterns; stress management; fitness recovery features; and menstrual health tracking. The ability to unlock more detailed insights and data does, however, require a subscription to one of the company's paid services—an approach similar to what Samsung does with the Galaxy Ring.
Amazfit Helio Ring Overview
The device is exclusively available in titanium finish and costs around ₹24,000. Sizing options include 10 and 12. It is slightly lighter compared to Oura Ring Gen 3, but it slightly weighs more than the Samsung Galaxy Ring. The device provides up to four days of battery life and can be fully charged in less than hours. It comes fitted with much the same health sensors as rivals for tracking sleep, activity, recovery, menstrual health, and stress. The Helio Ring is light weighted because it has a titanium alloy outer shell, and water resistance is 100 meters, but the finish is easily scratched.
Design and Build
On the design front, the Amazfit Helio Ring features a titanium alloy coating on the outside with a plastic interior. At 2.6mm in thickness and about 4 grams, it's super thin and remains lightweight on the finger, even being quite suitable to wear during sleep. It weighs between the Oura Ring Gen 3 and the Samsung Galaxy Ring for a well-balanced feel.
It can be deduced that on the outside is where the sensors are since the outside has a vertical line. These ideally need to point to the inside of the finger for optimum tracking and ideally should hang on either an index, middle, or ring finger. While the ring is built with relatively robust materials, it can slightly be scratched, which happened after a couple of days of continuous use involving car washing, biking, woodworking, and outdoor cleaning.
The design of the Helio is quite indestructible and has been tried out by dropping and bumping many times with no visible signs of damage. On the downside, the finish will scratch easily, but, then again, users who are very hard on their jewelry or use it for a lot of work may not find that particular little drawback of any significance. At the same time, it is fairly safe for undertaking most water-related activities with its water resistance at a depth of about 100 meters, apart from hardcore scuba diving.
Health Tracking Capabilities
The Amazfit Helio Ring sports an amassing complex of health monitoring technologies as found in other high-end smart rings in this category, such as the Oura Ring Gen 3 and the Galaxy Ring. Having in-built sensors for heart rate monitoring, oxygen levels in the blood, body temperature, electrodermal activity, it also comes on top with an incorporated electrocardiogram, gyroscope, and accelerometer.
It gets the most accurate readings when the ring fits well; a loose fit may lead to some misleading metrics. All health data collected by the Helio Ring is accessible through the free Zepp Health app, but some users may find that the data presentation is somewhat cluttered. For example, in key metrics, the changes in body temperature captured during sleep are quite difficult to find, making the user purchase the paid Aura app for those who are seeking more serious analysis.
The app, or in all fairness the Zepp app, though, supports some flexibility in the arrangements of the on-screen components, and it pairs easily with the Helio ring when duly opened. Sleep data pinpointed with a Helio Ring compared to the information received by a user from the app accompanying a Samsung Galaxy Ring—such as the number of average nightly breaths, the body movement data, and even snore detection—may seem quite limited; however, it offers quite a number of valuable sleep insights. For those who prefer any kind of wearing method—it can easily be interchangeable from wrist to finger to the other—than the wrist design of a smartwatch while not feeling so confident if they charge nightly.
Sleep and Recovery Insights
The Zepp Health app gives me an elaborate sleep report every morning, providing information on my time asleep, rest, and the way this relates to my established sleep habits. For instance, if a person usually sleeps for eight hours a night, but one night only has six and a half, the app can indicate a low Sleep Regularity score and thereby suggest relatively correct measures.
The app breaks down one's sleep into "light," "deep," and "REM" cycles, then compares the quality of the sleep with that of other users. As an example, 21% of the time in REM might be normal but is not so "optimal"; probably 64% of others have it longer.
Quite critically, the Helio Ring does not just track the number of sleep stages, but also records heart rates and the quality of breathing during sleep and gives morning reports on both counts.
Over several weeks of use, the recorded heart rate of the Helio Ring largely corresponded with other sleep-tracking devices, thus indicating its accuracy. It checks the quality of breathing and talks of signs related to the breathing of the obstructed airways or irregular respiratory-right patterns It also reports the no of events that are such take place together with the comparison reports that.
The device also records if and for how long users wake up during the night. It collects sleep data and recovery insights, feeding them into a daily Sleep score and another for Readiness, both on a scale of one to 100. Basically, the Readiness score is to tell that you are ready for a hard physical day ahead, based upon how things like resting heart rate, heart rate variability, breathing quality, and body temperature went at night.
Activity and Fitness Tracking
The Helio Ring is definitely great at tracking sleep and recovery, although it does so with the help of only four of its recognized workouts: walking, running, cycling, and treadmill. Presumably, the former are to ensure another retail turnover for fully active Amazfit smartwatches.
Although slightly skinny on canvas, the Helio Ring shows total steps for the day and has deep metrics into workout information for distance, pace, heart rate, rise, calories burned, and heart rate zones. But you need to manually start activity on the Zepp app, as there are no auto-detect functions for it.
Competing fairly well in the fitness tracking test against the Garmin Forerunner 165, Apple Watch SE 2022, and Galaxy Watch 7, the Helio Ring delivers pretty accurate results. It even trumped the Garmin in a 5,000-step walk test. Now, for women's health tracking, it uses this same body temperature sensor, along with user-inputted data, to predict when a menstrual cycle is coming, when a woman is likely to be most fertile, and when it is ovulation day. That does differ from the Oura Ring, though, in that the data isn't fully synchronizable with current women's health apps, not excluding Natural Cycles, to offer deeper insights.
Battery Life and Charging
The Amazfit Helio Ring has a battery life lasting as long as 4-5 days, based on settings. For instance, the EDA sensor that checks an individual's stress is off by default since enabling it would use so much power, and even with it on, the Helio Ring works up to four days in-between charges, compared with seven for the Oura Ring and the Galaxy Ring. The Helio Ring ships with an itty bitty USB-C charging cradle that needs to be aligned just right so the contact pins on it can engage the charging pads on the inside of the Helio Ring, which can be kinda frustrating. Yet full recharging the battery takes less than two hours.
Conclusion
Overall, the Amazfit Helio Ring is a decent first-generation product that's well-built, easy to use, and tracks stuff accurately. Its best feature compared with other offerings is there are no monthly subscription fees with its core features, thus being more cost-effective than at least the Oura Ring Gen 3 and the Samsung Galaxy Ring. However, the Helio Ring has a smaller battery capacity and fewer options as far as sizing.
However, Amazfit plans to release more options in the future. While the latter may be worth spending a bit more for an alternative choice—the Ultrahuman Ring Air—it really does lack some of the capabilities regarding comprehensive health tracking compared to the Helio Ring. Last but not least, unlike the Helio Ring, whose data syncs easily with popular fitness apps like Strava, adidas Running, Google Fit, and Apple Health, the Ultrahuman Ring doesn't support the same type of compatibility.
FAQs
1. What is the current price of Amazfit Helio Ring in India?
Now selling for ₹24,000 in India, it is now selling for this feature-packed smart ring in the given price range that otherwise competes with other smart wearable rings designed for the same level of features and more. With Helio Ring, a customer gets to wear a premium health tracking device with advanced sensors packed into a sleek design.
It targets fitness enthusiasts or health-conscious users, given its cost, who are looking for a stylish and functional wearable. Make sure to check with local retailers and online shops for the latest pricing, as it might vary with discounting or regional offerings.
2. Is there any subscription needed for the Amazfit Helio Ring?
You don't need a subscription to access the basic features of the Amazfit Helioren, of course, such as sports and health tracking and sleep analysis. Most features are based on this subscription model for more advanced analytics and custom insights that some users would be looking for—the Zepp Aura app and its companionship in Zepp Fitness.
These provide even more functionalities, right down to the details: health reports, specialized fitness coaching, among other such elements, giving users a touch that is even more personal and making sure that they maximize on the way to health and fitness. This will give the user a chance to subscribe in the event they wish to, or not.
3. How does the Amazfit Helio Ring compare with the Oura Ring Gen 3 and the Samsung Galaxy Ring?
The Amazfit Helio Ring is overall much cheaper to buy compared to the Oura Ring Gen 3 and Samsung Galaxy Ring; it is quite a cost-saving one for their buyers. All three rings have it; full health-tracking presents—heart rate monitoring, sleep analysis, and monitoring activity. Except for the two latter features, the Helio Ring has the essential features bonded to it once purchased—there are no monthly subscription charges. It does have a couple of cons: something like fewer sports modes than its competition and just a bit lower in battery life. The second is for those not looking to break the bank but still want something functional—an option is the Helio Ring.
4. What kind of workouts can be recorded with Amazfit Helio Ring?
Amazfit Helio Ring is able to track many work-outs, like walking, running, cycling, and treadmill exercises. Although they become very detailed regarding measurements of distance, steps, or calories. It doesn't automatically do so. The user has to initiate and terminate the process of tracking for every exercise manually. The Helio Ring, on the other hand, will provide the user with extremely precise and trustworthy results which can be used to track exercise progress and, therefore, round the clock better health. Its simplicity and ease of use make the watch suitable for users who just want to have simple workout tracking.
5. Is the Amazfit Helio Ring compatible with popular health apps?
The Amazfit Helio Ring, yes, supports tens of thousands of the most popular health and fitness apps on the market, including, but not limited to, Apple Health, Google Fit, Strava, and Adidas Running. This results in a strong interaction because, during this time, the user continues to use their favorite applications with ease, accessing the Helio intelligent ring detailed data on health. This data synchronization among all data platforms helps the user to have an overall view of their health and fitness journey. It gives people all the flexibility and convenience when working with health data.
