Wearables Round Up: Breaking the grounds at IFA 2016

IFA in Berlin presents the latest products and innovations in the heart of Europe‘s most important regional market. Only IFA offers such a comprehensive overview of the international market and attracts the attention of trade visitors each year from more than 100 countries

Certainly this year at IFA has seen some landmark innovations, be it brilliant smartwatches, great VR headsets and sublime fitness trackers, all building on a strong heritage in the wearable world.

Here we bring you the list of  ground breaking wearables from this year’s showcase event.

1. Fitbit Charge 2

The Fitbit Charge 2, an upgrade to the Fitbit Charge HR, was showcased at IFA 2016. Its predecessor already being the most popular fitness tracking device paves way for a grand welcome to Fitbit Charge 2 among the user community.

With guided breathing, phone notifications and an improved heart rate monitor, along with a larger screen, this seems to be just the update we were looking for from Fitbit.

It might hit the markets shortly, costing around $150 (£130, AU$250). Priced little more than the Fitbit Charge HR, the new upgrades are likely to compensate for the money.

 2. Samsung Gear S3 Frontier

This is the watch that really could take the fight to the Apple Watch, with all the smarts you could think of in a smartwatch.

That means GPS to watch you run, a barometric altimeter for hiking, an LTE connection so you can stream music or take calls on the go – and a smooth design as well.

Samsung’s Tizen OS is soft touch too, meaning it’ll munch minimal battery and offer multiple days between charges. Excellent.

3. TomTom Touch

This is a clear attempt from TomTom to take on the likes of Fitbit, making its own fitness tracker but with some surprisingly smart features.

It’s smooth, well-designed and comes with all the kinds of tech you’d expect from a fitness tracker, from multi-sport monitoring to heart rate and sleep monitoring. On top of that there’s the ability to monitor ‘body composition’ so you’ll be able to get a more holistic look at your flabbiness.

It costs $129.99 or £129.99 (about AU$227), so it’s not cheap but it does sound fancy.

4. Withings Steel HR

When is a smartwatch not a smartwatch? Well, when it’s the Withings Steel HR, which will track your heart rate but not do all the other fancy bits like poking you whenever someone you’re following tweets.

It looks only slightly chunkier than a normal watch but still has a lot of fitness tracker smarts, with the ability to even track you when you’re sleeping (if you can handle wearing such a thing in bed).

The 36mm Steel HR costs $179.95/£169.95 (about AU$300), while the 40mm model is a little more at $199.95/£179.95 (about AU$315).

5. Asus ZenWatch 3

New Asus ZenWatch 3 comes with an elegant design and has all the functions that most of the Android based smartwatches bring. It promises a long lasting battery, thanks to the use of the new Snapdragon Wear 2100.

It has customizable buttons, super fast charging and everything that adds value to your gadget lobby.This is the sort of watch we’d expect from a much higher-end brand, although it may be a little too shiny for some.

It costs around 229(£190, $250, AU$340) for a rubber strap variant, while the leather strap variant may cost touch higher, around 249 (around £210, $280, AU$370).