Xiaomi Mi Band 4 Fitness Tracker, 0.95 Inches, Colour, AMOLED Display, Heart Rate Monitor, 50 Metres, Activity Tracker, Waterproof Smart Bracelet, 2019 Model, Black, 21.6 mm

Things I like:Battery life: About 14 days. I have everything turned on max. HR, sleep etc.Watch faces: Loads of cool 3rd Party options.Notifications: Texts, Calls, Any other App. It's really handy to glance at messages and not need to life your phone.Sleep Analysis: Works well and really interesting to monitor over time.Heart Rate: I have this set to get HR every minute, which is the max you can set. Really interesting to see your HR over the day. Monitoring how high your HR gets and your resting heart rate are great for monitoring health.Steps: A great way of motivating you to keep activeExport: You have the option to export data to Google fit which is a really nice feature.Thinsg that could be better:The App could be more polished(Android). It has a good amount of options but the interface for viewing your data could be a little bit better.I did have notifications stop working and had to fix by un-pairing and re-pairing with my phone(Huawei P20 pro)Sports tracking: Even for walking I found distance to be not very accurate. I think this watch is more everyday rather than sports tracking focused. I would reccommend using Strava or an app on your phone to track with GPS for that kind of activitiy.

I will start this review by tucking into a slice of leftover pizza from last night because I believe that is the most honest way to start a review for a fitness tracker. With that out of the way...This year I made the decision to finally make my body my new hobby and like with a lot of hobbies, this one called for a purchase of gizmos and gadgets to steer me in the right direction. I initially looked at the Fitbit range of products for my fitness tracking needs but deemed their entire range a waste of time purely because their compatibility was appalling for almost any entry level Samsung phone which is what I happen to use. Their prices are also rather on the high side.After several days of research I spotted the Mi Band 4 and with the price being around the £29 mark I thought I might as well take a punt and ordered one. Delivery was slightly on the slow side taking almost a week but not the end of the world for me personally. I will say pay attention to the seller and their reviews as apparently there has been some sellers trying to sell fakes which I'm happy to report, was not the case with the seller I chose.Upon arrival, charging the device didn't take long at all and putting it into use was effortless as the Mi Band was more than happy to talk to my phone and the other way around. I have spent a good deal of time now living with my tracker on my wrist and I'm ready to leave a review. The score I've given is based not only on the device itself but the mobile app as well as you can't really have 1 without the other. I will mainly focus on my gripes with both the app and the device and summarise at the end.The Band: The band itself is generally quite comfy around the wrist but I did find that the holes for me were either a tad too snug or a tad too loose with nothing in between but this was easily fixed by moving the band slightly higher or lower on your wrist and it didn't seem to affect any readings I was getting. One annoyance I found was that when you exercise the band had a habit of collecting sweat under it quite quickly which reduced the comfort a little but this was to be expected since we're exercising at the end of the day! What I didn't expect was that as the exercise got more intense and the band got even even more damp from my sweat, it seemed like the device was unable to take a manual heart rate reading which is something I like to do as I workout. Even weirder was that the automatic heart rate tracking still seemed to work fine and do its thing in the background.Carrying on on the subject of heart rate tracking on the device, I find myself agreeing with some of the reviews I've read for the device in that the resting heart rate seems to be off by around +10bpm or so and this I'm sure has a direct impact on the sleep tracking function on the device. During physical activity the heart rate tracking seemed pretty solid but I haven't done any actual comparisons on that front and am merely echoing what some of the other users and reviewers have found.As for the sleep tracking, I think this feature is best used... almost never. It really feels like more of an after thought feature as I've had a relatively accurate result maybe once. You might wake up several times during a night and the band will miss these but then the next night you might sleep like a log only to find the band recording several periods of you being awake. I'm not 100% clued up on the sleep data accuracy of fitness trackers in general but the impression I've had is that a lot of them aren't that great at the job anyway. The Mi Band 4 however scores a few extra points for its comical tips it provides you after your apparently mediocre bit of kip, golden nuggets of info such as "Don't strain yourself too much" and "keep good mood".So how does it track your steps ? pretty well I would say which is one of the main reasons I bought the band for. I would once again echo other users in that the band does seem a bit generous when it tries to count your steps but in my use the results have been pretty consistent and there hasn't been a whole lot of difference when compared to what my phone in my pocket was counting. When the band works with your phone's GPS, it also seems to do a pretty decent job at tracking your route and adds a little milestone on the route for each km you hit but do expect this to be off by +/-20 or so meters every so often.I haven't taken my band for a swim, or a run yet and I don't own a bike and I rather save my gym membership fee's for more pizza so unfortunately I cannot comment on how the band performs in those scenarios. I can however confirm that most of the more smart watchy features work pretty effortlessly from controlling your music to checking out an incoming notification or a text, though prepare to have your glasses out if you have issues with your eye sight. Also the battery life is simply outstanding on the band itself and it will easily do 2 weeks and more on a single charge.The touchscreen is a joy to use and responds to your swipes and taps well, a bit too well at times I might add and that brings me to another nitpick or frankly one of the bigger issues I have with the band itself. As the screen is quite sensitive to touch, you might find yourself inadvertently putting in commands when wearing a jacket or a coat. Several times during my walks I've found my wrist buzzing and when checking the band it's asking if I wish to stop the exercise, all because it was scraping or tapping against the inside of the sleeve on my jacket. Now the app for your phone does give you the option to lock the exercise when you start it but this doesn't seem to affect the band in any way.The Mobile App: This is where the product definitely loses points. It's not that the app is the worst thing ever made, although a lot of the detailed info is hidden under menus and sub menus and lord knows where else but I'm willing the overlook that as once you get used to the baffling logic of the design team, you kinda learn to live with it. What I however cannot forgive is the sheer amount of battery this app drains from your mobile. My phone is a Samsung Galaxy A40 which is quite a champ when it comes to battery life and it can merrily go 2 or even 3 days on one charge if not in constant demanding use. Thanks to the Mi Fit app, my phone now needs a charge to full at least once a day, sometimes twice if I feel like I need to plan ahead.Some of the notifications from the app are just downright weird. During the typing of this review I opened my phone and the Mi Fit app and got greeted with a pop-up with stars and stuff saying "Congratulations, Well done!"... for what !? for opening the app ?... but then at the bottom of the pop-up it said "Please rate us".I don't think enough can be said about the overall confusing layout of the app. One of the first things you'll be doing when getting your Mi Band is to adjust its settings and functions and as an example, most people would be looking for a settings button or a little cog icon which is pretty standard stuff from any app ever made. You'll soon realise that no such button can be seen and you'll access your settings under your Profile and then tapping your Mi Bands name on the device list that opens a whole world of settings to play with. This is just a tip of the iceberg in a sea of equally confusing design decisions. Again, you learn to live with it but its far from what I would call intuitive.The app also won't talk very well with other fitness apps like Samsung Health without some workaround solutions so I opted to use Google Fit purely because the Mi Fit app seems to like it the most. One other thing worth pointing out is that when there's an update for the app, that usually means an automatic new firmware install for your band too as the bands software gets updated which is great, except it tends to forget some of your settings so expect finding some features you may have disabled having been re-enabled for your inconvenience.Summary: So after all the moaning above, would I recommend this product ? Well yes, yes I would but with some reservations and caveats. If like me, you're new to these things and are maybe looking for something that will give you a rough idea of your performance and need something that pretty much nails the basics, then at £29 you can afford to take a punt and possibly later upgrade to something a bit more serious if you get equally serious about your exercise routine. People at intermediate levels and above and who take their exercise more seriously look elsewhere.Score breakdown: 1 star knocked off for the silly app you have to use, 1 star knocked off for general nitpicks with accuracy. This could have been a 2 star review but when you consider the price, the product starts to redeem itself. I would have even been willing to grant the product 4 stars if the mobile app wasn't such a battery hog and a boat load of crazy design.

I bought two of these one for me and one for the missus. We are both very happy with the range of functions and the battery life is outstanding. I used most of the features running but my battery is still lasting 2 weeks before it drops to below 20%. The missus uses just the pedometer and heart rate monitor and her battery lasted over a month. Impressed for the price.

After about 6 months, the hole in the strap used for the buckle had enlarged so it keeps falling off

I haven't had a fitness band or smartwatch before, so I went for this one as a low risk option, because of the price and good reviews. I'm happy to give it 5 stars because I think it's truly excellent for the price! It keeps me aware and motivated about my activity each day.Pros:Comfortable to wearLong battery lifeIncludes sleep trackingWaterproof, excellent for tracking swimmingVibrates to notify me of texts and callsLots of straps available if you want them!Even better if:App isn't that intuitive and does not communicate that will with Google fit or my fitness PalSome gym work does not track well (problems with cross trainer, do not select treadmill for this!)Does not notify for anything else (eg WhatsApp)No GPSI'm aware that it is a fitness band not a smartwatch, so the GPS and notifications are not to be expected. Overall, I would highly recommend this fitness band.

I just wanted to buy a reasonable priced fitness tracker and made some research. Since I don't need complicated controls or app support on my device, Xiaomi Mi Band 4 looks as the best option for my needs. I checked some other Chinese products but with its very long battery life, Xiaomi was my first choice. I am using this product for around 2 months now and I am quite happy with its performance. I compared its tracking with some other apps and I can call it gives similar results. The only problem if you use a buggy, it doesn't count your steps since your arms are not moving. I love the ability to set up vibration alerts to wake up in the morning without disturbing my family, checking my steps, reading notifications from apps, get weather information with a device like this. Recommended.