Hands On: Samsung Gear Fit 2 and Gear Icon X Earbuds

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Samsung has a new fitness band and fitness earbuds, which I tried on for size at a recent event in New York City.
The $179 Gear Fit 2 arrives June 10, though pre-orders open tomorrow, June 3. The $199 Samsung Gear Icon X fitness earbuds, meanwhile, are aimed toward more casual users and arrive in the third quarter.
First up: the Gear Fit 2, which looks like it's built for fitness-tracking enthusiasts. With built-in GPS, heart rate monitoring, and push notifications, it seems Samsung has its sights on the Fitbit Surge, a tracker with similar features. The Gear Fit 2 automatically tracks activities, including cycling, elliptical, rowing, running, and walking, as well as sleep. You can also track pilates and yoga, though the band merely estimates the results of those workouts based on age, height, and weight.
You can view your stats on a 1.5-inch curved Super AMOLED screen. It looked great indoors, with big, bright, colorful graphics, and a small bezel that allowed for more screen real estate—the bezel on the Fitbit Blaze was a minor sticking point, so it's nice to see a manufacturer try to eliminate wide bezels altogether. Samsung also increased the display's width from the original Gear Fit, and the picture is in portrait mode, so it's now possible to better see information.
The overall design is lighter, thinner, and easier to slip under a jacket or shirt sleeve. Samsung increased the Gear Fit 2's curvature, too, so it can fit your wrist better. There will be two band sizes—large and small—and three colors available at launch, including black, blue, and pink. Rated IP68, the Gear Fit 2 is dust and water resistant. At the demo, I got to dunk one in a jar of water, with the display on. It still worked, so the Gear Fit 2 should be able to survive showers and pools with no problem.
One thing I really like about the Gear Fit 2—and I wish more trackers with displays would do this—is the option to choose what metrics you want to see on the screen. You can choose up to three stats, including your average speed, calories, heartbeats per minute, floors climbed, intensity zone, steps counted, workout duration, and the weather. Viewing more than one metric, as indicated by diagonal stripes on the same screen, is a huge convenience.
There are some smartwatch-like elements as well, like push notifications from calls, social media, and texts, and pictures that you can receive and view on the Gear Fit 2's display. You can also reply to messages directly on the band. Samsung's S Health app, which will receive a major update to coincide with the Gear Fit 2, lets you challenge friends right on the band, too. And if you want to share the route you just ran to Facebook, you can do that from the Gear Fit 2.
If you want to listen to music, connect a Bluetooth headset or pair of earbuds directly to the device. Similar to the TomTom Spark Cardio + Music, there are 4GB of built-in storage that will allow you to play, pause, skip, and control the volume of MP3s. You can even view album art on the Gear Fit 2's screen, and listen to Pandora, Spotify, or Samsung Milk, though you'll need your smartphone on you for streaming features.
Rounding out the Gear Fit 2, you'll get three to four days of battery life and up to five days of juice on standby. The device charges on a cradle, and stores up to 28 days of data, which you can later pair with the Samsung S Health app.
Speaking of, S Health is getting a big update. Soon it will have coaching programs, similar to Moov Now. For example, you can start a 10-week "From Couch to 5K" program, complete with an audio coach who will tell you to keep pace and let you know how many days you should be running. You can set goals and achievements, as well as rest days, which you can keep track of on a calendar. Weekly insights, personal summaries, and comparisons to friends through challenges and leaderboards will also play a major part in getting casual athletes and hardcore gym rats to track their workouts. S Health will soon be able to connect with Strava and Runkeeper and share data, too.
As stated earlier, the Samsung Gear Icon X earbuds are for more casual users who want to track fitness stats while listening to music and receiving guided audio feedback, similar to what you'd find with the Pear Mobile Training Intelligence System.
A standalone fitness device—you don't need the Gear Fit 2 for these to work—the Gear Icon X earbuds are lighter than a quarter at 6.3 grams. They come in blue, black, or white, along with a wireless charging case. They're sweat-resistant and come with ergonomic wingtip gels in three sizes. I tried on the default large size and found it held comfortably in my ears.
You control the Gear Icon X by pressing or tapping them. If you want to start a workout, you just hold an earbud and wait for a voice to say the workout has started. Hold the earbud longer and it will activate the audio coaching feature. A voice will tell you distance traveled, current speed, and even current heart rate zone, similar to the Pear. You can choose when the voice will chime in, whether it's every mile or every five minutes.
An ambient sound mode also allows you to be mindful of your surroundings. If you want to know when someone's coming up on you, whether on foot, bike, or in a vehicle, the Gear Icon X uses microphones to let sound come through your music (or audio coaching) so you can feel safe when cars or people are encroaching upon you. You can toggle this feature on or off by holding the earbud button down. I tried this indoors and heard the voices of PR representatives and other journalists around me as Daft Punk played in the background. It has kind of a weird echoing effect, but that could be because I was in such close quarters; it could be different story out on the pavement.
Like the Gear Fit 2, the Gear Icon X can connect with a phone and stream services like Pandora and Spotify. It works by itself, too, thanks to 4GB of onboard storage; just copy music from your phone to the buds and control by tapping on the device. You'll get almost four hours of playback and a little over three hours of music playback and fitness tracking at the same time. When streaming music from a phone, you'll get an hour and half of playback. The Gear Icon X can also act as a Bluetooth headset and take calls.