The Best Fitness Trackers Turn Your Body Into a Video Game

If you’re looking to crush major workout goals—or just cram in more hours of deep sleep every night to find that elusive balance between grind and recovery—you’re gonna want to strap on one of the best fitness trackers. Today’s wearables are so high-tech that it’s like having a scientist and coach literally within arm's reach. “It takes so much guesswork out of the picture,” says John Peel, a master trainer for iFit. “And it just makes achieving goals a lot easier.” Science backs him up: One 2022 study found that wearing an activity tracker led to an average of about 1800 more steps and 40 more minutes of walking each day.

Evidently, the best health trackers are a way to gamify wellness and push you to train harder/better/faster/stronger. The trick is choosing a device with the features that actually make sense for the workouts you like to do, and a design that fits into your overall lifestyle. Luckily, the top fitness trackers on the market right now can be a damn good-looking addition to your overall style while giving you the data you need to max out your potential.

Our Top Fitness Tracker Pick

Our expert testers chose the Whoop 4.0 as the best fitness tracker overall. Unlike other trackers, it doesn’t get bogged down with the minutiae of counting steps, active minutes, or stairs climbed, but instead captures what it takes to improve as an athlete or everyday striver—like hard physical efforts and the time needed to recover from them. The Whoop’s subtle band is easy to wear full-time on your wrist (or even tucked into Whoop-brand boxers), and it doesn’t add yet another screen to your life.

Best Fitness Trackers: At a Glance

No matter what you're training for, these are the best fitness trackers that will help get you there faster and better rested than you thought possible.

• Best Fitness Tracker Overall: Whoop 4.0
• Best Fitness Tracker That No One Knows Is a Fitness Tracker: Oura Ring
• Best Garmin Fitness Tracker: Garmin Vivosmart 5
• Best Value Fitness Tracker: Fitbit Charge 6
• Best Fitness Tracker Watch: Apple Watch Ultra
• Best Fitness Tracker for Runners: Garmin Forerunner 165
• Best Fitness Tracker Battery Life: Fitbit Inspire 3
• Most Stylish Fitness Tracker: Samsung Galaxy Watch 4
• Best Analog Fitness Tracker: AmazFit GTR 4
• Best Budget Fitness Tracker: Xiaomi Mi Watch

Methodology: Our team of fitness enthusiasts got our hands on dozens of the best fitness trackers, checking out a number of brands at various price points. We strapped in and sweated it out for multiple weeks (and sometimes months) to analyze the devices’ accuracy, comfort, battery life, and durability. We also cycled through the many, many features to separate what’s helpful from what just sounds good. Want to know more? Here’s the full rundown of how we test fitness equipment.

In This Roundup: You don’t have time to take all the best activity trackers for a test run, so we did it for you. Here are the ones that made our podium.

When you sleep better, you can train harder and when you train harder, you can sleep better. It's not rocket science, but somehow it's easy for a lot of athletes to overcomplicate. Whoop helps simplify things with easy-to-understand metrics that guide each of these tenents.

We don’t all have the funds to hire our own coach who can tell us when to push our workouts and when to chill to the F out. But a Whoop can do that for you. Every day you wear it, you get customized “strain” and “recovery" scores to dial in exactly what you should do, and track how your various habits affect your body. For instance, Peel says wearing a Whoop helped him figure out that eating late at night was messing with his sleep. He’s also realized that certain workouts don’t actually do as much for his fitness as he’d thought. “It’s really helped me dial in the specifics of [my] body’s needs and just be way more efficient,” he says.

For those of us prone to over-training injuries and a “No Days Off” mentality, the Whoop’s insights can be life-changing. Its detailed app gives you easy-to-grasp insight into how changes in your heart rate, respiratory rate, and resting heart rate reflect what’s happening after a workout or zero day. The newest version also introduces tracking of your blood oxygen levels and skin temperature, which can help steer you toward pushing yourself harder or pumping the brakes, based on your body’s needs.

And you truly never have to take it off, because the charger attaches right to the band so that you'll charge on the go. You can even shower with it on, though be warned that it’ll hold onto that water for a while afterward, our tester warns. “I sweat all summer here in the South, so it’s just a wet band around my wrist for a good portion of the day,” she says. To avoid that, you’ll want to upgrade the included fabric strap for a HydroKnit or silicone version, or get yourself some boxers with built-in pods.

What Our Tester Said: “A huge reason I wanted to try this tracker is that I have a sleep disorder, and I want to find ways to improve my sleep quality and identify why and when I'm sleepwalking. I need to test the tracker longer to figure out if there are identifiable patterns causing me to get up and cruise around, but I already appreciate the sleep journal, which allows me to add info about drinking and screen use before bed so that I can see what's helping or hindering my sleep. Of the many trackers I tested for this roundup, the Whoop seemed to capture my sleep with the most nuance—it even caught brief little naps that other trackers missed.”

Our Editor’s Take: “Wearable technology does exactly nothing if you're not, you know, wearing it, and Whoop is still the easiest to keep strapped to your wrist 24/7.” —Christopher Cohen, Deputy Editor, GQ.com

This smart ring measures over 20 biometrics, like respiratory rate, heart rate variability, and body temp. But it really shines when it comes to tracking your sleep—and explaining what all the numbers actually mean and what to do with them.

Sure, the Oura Ring gathers impressively accurate measurements. But what makes this stealth tracker really stand out is the connected app, which takes your data one step further, explaining what it all means and what the heck you should do about it. And the recs only gets better over time as you rack up more and more nights of sleep. In particular, our tester says the info on sleep efficiency makes it “really easy to see not just the quantity of sleep, but also the quality and how it breaks down into different sleep phases.” She found the Oura Ring scored her sleep totals much lower than her Garmin when she was wearing both, and scrutinized her z's in far more detail.

But sleep tracking isn’t the Oura app’s only lane. It also excels at measuring your cardiovascular age, daytime stress, and other health indicators without overwhelming you with numbers. And if you want to go further down the data rabbit hole, you can sign up for experimental features through the Oura Labs section of the app. This gives you access to functions like Symptom Radar, which is designed to help you detect when you might be about to get sick based on body temperature, respiratory rate, and other biometric data.

It also just looks—and feels—damn good. Peel points out that for regular weightlifters or other athletes who do lots of hands-on work, the bulky band can sometimes get in the way. But our tester, an avid cyclist and runner, says that once she slid it on, “I immediately forgot it was there.” Oura claims its finger-based design is not only more comfortable to sleep in than a wrist-based tracker but also more accurate in its heart rate measurements.

What Our Tester Said: “As a Strava nerd I can get caught up in just tracking how much I run or ride my bike every week, thinking those numbers give the full picture of my fitness life. I like that the Oura Ring picks up on all the other little things in life that are elevating my heart rate, like walking or dancing. It feels like it’s presenting a more holistic view of my health.”

Our Editor’s Take: “Ever since I had kids I realized how inescapable screens are. The one strapped to my wrist? Oh yeah, my toddler wants in. Happily, the Oura provides a screen-free alternative that you can check in with whenever you want to. Its metrics for sleep, fitness, stress, and the like are robust but the thing I like most is that it helps you to understand those metrics by giving you actionable tips and insights into how to move (or not) on a given day.” —Ali Finney, Associate Commerce Director, GQ.com

We love the sporty, sleek design of this streamlined health tracker. With 24/7 insights into the usual fitness and rest metrics, it’ll keep you honest about your stress and sleep.

The best health trackers not only give you accurate stats, but also look good enough to make you want to wear them full-time. The Vivosmart checks both boxes with a slim screen and data on everything from your blood oxygen saturation to your sleep stages. It’ll even give you a reminder to relax (and offer a breathwork timer) if it sees your heart rate soaring when you’re not at the gym but just screaming at your latest Slack notification.

Workout-wise, the Vivosmart can track a variety of activities, whether you’re on cardio machines or in the weight room or outdoors. “The strength option provided optimal rest and active times, allowing me to keep up the pace while moving through sets in the gym,” our tester says. Bonus: It will even automatically count your reps for you. But as a registered nurse and cyclist, our tester says her favorite part is probably the integrated safety features, including automatic incident detection and emergency assistance. “It’s nice to know that in case of an accident, my pre-registered emergency contacts would be alerted as well as 911,” she says.

What Our Tester Said: “Overall I loved the watch. It allowed me to track it all—my cardio and strength sessions, as well as view my active time, heart rate zones, and rest times. The battery has a much longer life than I expected, given how often I used it. I also wore it in the pool without any issues. ”

Save your cash for rigging out your home gym. This solid activity tracker makes collecting your health and fitness stats seamless—and affordable.

This tracker proves you don’t need to drop multiple Benjamins to get the data you’re after. For just $160, the Fitbit Charge 6 boasts the brand’s most accurate heart rate tracker (including an ECG), along with sleep, skin temperature, breathing, and blood oxygen measurements. All these metrics are used to score things like your cardio fitness and daily readiness to work out.

With more than 40 exercise modes, it automatically detects whether you’re cycling, swimming, doing yoga, and more, and it’s actually trustworthy. One 2022 study, for example, found that the Fitbit Charge had consistently accurate step counts compared to several other trackers on the market, and our tester agrees. “I found this pretty accurate and really helpful for an inclusive snapshot of my day since all activity was tracked," she says.

We will admit that we wish the display showed more stats at a glance. “​​The lack of ability to view more than one metric at a time while exercising made me have to tap the screen more than I would have liked to cycle through metrics,” our tester says. Also, if you’re looking for a fitness tracker that streams your workout playlist, know that the Charge only integrates with YouTube Music, and you have to pay extra for that. The device does come with a six-month membership to Fitbit Premium (normally $9.99 a month), which gets you access to coach-led workouts, and things like detailed stress, sleep, and wellness analyses. But even without it, you still get on-wrist access to Google Maps and Google Wallet for super-easy navigation and payments. So when there turns out to be a surprise beer garden just a few blocks off your route, you’ll be prepared.

What Our Tester Said: “I found the on-wrist ECG super useful! I have never used a fitness tracker that provides that, so it was fun to experiment with. I also really liked the Google Maps integration. It made navigating by foot or bike super simple.”

Do you need a smartwatch that can measure depth and temperature 40 meters underwater, or pull up topographic maps of 1,000 U.S. parks? Probably not, but we won’t judge if you want to flex.

The Apple Watch Ultra is a cinch to set up. If you’re already an Apple user, it seamlessly integrates with your devices in the user-friendly way Apple is known for. But if you actually want to make the most of what you’re paying for, you’re gonna want to spend some time getting familiar with all the features it offers, from automatic track detection and virtual pacers for runners to the full-on dive computer for anyone who scubas or freedives.

Of course, this watch is more than just one of the best fitness trackers—it also lets you call and text, stream Smartless, or use Apple Pay from your wrist. Since it’s designed for adventures, you don’t have to be precious about it. “The durability is top-notch,” says our tester. “I've owned this for about a year now and there's nary a scratch on the screen.”

Her favorite feature might be the customizable—and intuitive—action button on the left side, which you can customize to control whatever app you use most. “For me, that's starting a workout, but you could also start a text, a timer, check the weather—no more fumbling around,” our tester says. She uses it to track her day-to-day movement like dog walks, which she probably wouldn’t put the effort into recording otherwise. “It’s really given me a better picture of how active I am,” she says. However if you also just want a shortcut to message your mom, the watch can handle your task.

What Our Tester Said: “It may not be a Rolex, but the Apple Watch Ultra is recognizable and iconic in its own right. Unlike other fitness trackers, it feels hefty and looks significant on your wrist—which I like, since it is priced as a more luxe smartwatch. If you want something slimmer or more low-profile, the Ultra isn’t for you.”

Our Editor’s Take: “The Apple Watch is still light years ahead of its Android-driven competition for a million reasons, and if you're going to use yours for Strava or other battery-hungry fitness-tracking tasks, this is the one to get.” —Cohen

Other Garmin Forerunners might have a more exhaustive list of features. But unless you’re training for the '28 Olympics, this one’s got everything you actually need (without draining your bank account).

In theory, running is a simple sport, but activity trackers can sometimes make it feel more complicated. Before you know it, you’ve wasted your limited workout time trying to figure out how to optimize your “stride ratio” and what you’re supposed to do about it. The Forerunner 165 offers plenty of metrics—even for advanced runners—yet it lets you focus on just the essential ones, if that’s all you’re looking for. “It's easy to ignore all the metrics and features you don't want with this watch (and even reprogram the main screen to remove or add metrics) so it can be as simple or as feature-packed as you want,” our tester says. You can get personalized daily suggested workouts, sleep scores, and race time predictors. Or, you can just track your pace, distance, and heart rate with a bright screen that’s easy to read, no matter how sunny it is.

Our tester particularly loved Garmin’s custom “Body Battery” score to get a sense of how her sleep and workouts affected her energy levels, and to figure out how hard to run in the summertime Texas heat. “The screen makes it easy to see heart rate during the run at a glance,” she says. “It also has vocal cues if you do a programmed workout that lets you know if you're outside of your chosen zone.”

What Our Tester Said: “The GPS upload after a workout was instant—a huge leap forward from previous Garmins I’ve owned, which often required manually syncing at least once a week. I like how light and small it is, and I love how vibrant and crisp the AMOLED screen is. I was concerned it would be too complicated and overwhelm me with features and data, but it’s actually very intuitive and easy-to-use, and doesn’t pack in a roster of features that only World Championship-level athletes would need.”

Our Editor’s Take: “Running watches have come SO far in the last few years—this mid-range option from Garmin has features that would have been top of the line just a year or two ago. My favorite is the AMOLED screen: I would never have guessed I wanted more resolution in my running watch screen until I powered this thing on, but it's so bright and crisp it's unbelievable, and super helpful for a quick pace check at twilight.” —Cohen

It may be basic, but it’s hard to beat the value of this wallet-friendly tracker, and it still gives you all the standard fitness stats for less than you’d spend on a nice dinner and a couple of drinks.

If you’re that guy whose smartwatch is always dead right when you want to use it, the Inspire 3 could be for you, given its 10 days of battery life. “You really can forget about it for well over a week or more before having to recharge,” says our tester. Honestly, all you have to do is wear the thing. It automatically detects your sleep and “active zone minutes,” which our tester found helpful for maximizing her workouts. It’s also eerily accurate at detecting the difference between near-comatose horizontal states. “Only once did it misread my extreme lack of movement watching Netflix for actual sleep,” she says. “Not bad.”

If you upgrade to a Premium Fitbit membership, you’ll get access to stress insights and mindfulness activities. But the standard version will track all the baseline stuff like heart rate, breathing, and sleep stages. And the tracker itself is only $100. Just know that the small screen does mean you see limited stats while you’re working out—you have to pull up the app afterward to really do a deep dive. That said, our tester found the AMOLED display easy to use, even if it does require some scrolling.

What Our Tester Said: “Using the small display while working out proved a little bit challenging, but it was no problem to track the workout and check the Fitbit app later. When I first started using it, I found health metrics like variations in skin temperature and oxygen variation rate while asleep to be especially interesting. I also really liked that it’s super lightweight and discreet in design.”

Data-gathering doesn’t need to be dorky or dull. With high-contrast, eye-popping graphics, the Galaxy Watch6 makes its own style statement.

Visual guys will get into the swervy graphics on this watch face—and if you don’t like the vibe it comes with, you can easily swap in a different look. We particularly loved the fitness-tracking diagrams, which helped us easily see our progress on whatever stats we wanted, like daily steps and activity minutes.

But it’s not just basic metrics you’re tracking. There are Vo2 max estimates to tell you how well your cardio training is working, body composition analysis to give you fat and muscle percentages, real-time ECGs, and some of the best sleep stats we’ve seen. “I've had several different types of fitness trackers, and the sleep tracking [on the Galaxy Watch6] was far more detailed than on my Garmins or Fitbits,” says our tester. You just have to streamline the apps down to the ones you actually want—you don’t need every app from your phone to show up on your watch.

What Our Tester Said: “I really like the fitness tracking visuals. Some of the many watch faces I could select give me a tracker for steps, activity minutes, and calories. The one I've been using is a heart-shaped track with an outer green lane for steps, a middle blue lane for activity, and an Smartwatch inner pink lane for calories. All three can be adjusted to your own goals on the watch or the phone. I also love that the watch band tail tucks inside the rest of the wristband, rather than being held in place by the little sliding loop that's on every other watch I've ever owned. It can never come untucked or snag.”

Yes, you can get a classic look without a Shinola price tag. And the battery life lasts longer than the free trial period at your local gym.

With several old-school analog watch faces to choose from, AmazFit says the design of this tracker was inspired by modern sports cars. But what really makes it stand out is the battery life—it’ll typically last you two weeks before needing a recharge. Meanwhile, it can auto-detect eight exercise modes, or you can manually select one of more than 150 activities. This fitness watch is especially useful for outdoor cardio workouts, thanks to dual-band GPS that doesn’t freak out around tall buildings or trees. However, some users report their health metrics are sometimes suspect, particularly heart rate. So if you’re training with heart rate zones, we suggest investing in a separate chest strap.

Long-distance runners and cyclists looking for a fairly low-cost watch will appreciate the high-end location tracking. And when we say long-distance, we mean long-distance: You can run GPS for 50 hours straight before the battery dies.

If you’re not looking to fork over major cash for one of the best activity trackers, the Mi Watch will get the basics done while giving you plenty of data to nerd out over. Outdoor endurance athletes in particular will like the top-notch GPS chip, which connects to four major positioning systems for extra accuracy, even next to skyscrapers. And the battery will last you 50 hours in active GPS mode so you don’t have to worry about switching watches in the middle of your Ironman. Just beware that some reviewers say the health metrics are tough to trust, so if you’re looking for exact sleep and stress measurements, you’ll probably have to spend a bit more on a Fitbit or Garmin.

Other Fitness Trackers We Like

This lightweight GPS watch boasts 17 days of battery life (38 hours with full GPS enabled) for ultra-long adventures. It’s a streamlined, minimalist design without tons of “extras.”

You get a boatload of features like nightly recovery measurements and offline maps on this tracker. It’s just slow to navigate through different pages to find the one you’re after.

If you really want to geek out on data, the Garmin Fenix 7 is a tech bro’s dream. But let’s be honest—how often are you actually going to measure your cross-country skiing power or mountain biking “flow” and “grit”?

To figure out which devices deserve a spot on your wrist (or finger), we took the best fitness trackers running in the Texas heat, wore them to waterparks, strapped them on for indoor cycling and weight-lifting sessions, and used them to respond to texts and check the weather. Throughout it all, we analyzed how quickly and smoothly the screens functioned, how easy it was to see (and understand) our data, how the materials held up to heavy use, how comfortable the bands felt, and, of course, how accurate the metrics actually were. With all that in mind, plus essential details like battery life and water resistance—and, importantly, the value you’re getting for your money—we determined that these ten rose to the top. Yes, we put every piece of fitness equipment we recommend through rigorous testing before giving it the GQ seal of approval.

Whether you’re training for an ultramarathon or just like to hop on your indoor rower every so often, “there's a fitness tracker for every athlete out there—and when I [say] athlete, I mean anyone trying to just better their health,” Peel says. You can get a new perspective on your health, with helpful info that just might convince you to spend a few fewer hours playing Apex Legends. “I highly recommend everyone trying [a tracker] and just testing it,” Peel says. “I think it makes you so in tune with where you're at with your workouts, with your recovery.”

Types of Fitness Trackers

The best fitness trackers make it easy and comfortable to gather data around the clock, without hindering your workout or work day. Here’s how to find one that fits your lifestyle—and your wrist, finger, bicep, or leg.

A smartwatch like the Apple Watch Ultra or Samsung Galaxy Watch6 is basically a miniature companion to your phone, giving you on-wrist access to your apps. That makes them convenient and versatile, but the extra features can drain the battery life—and your wallet.

Fitness bands are simpler and slimmer than smartwatches, typically with more basic displays and fewer features. Most require a connected app to really get into all your health metrics since the screen is pretty minimal (or non-existent, in the case of Whoop).

Fitness trackers with a GPS (aka global positioning system), can tell you how far you’ve traveled, which can be a key data point for outdoor endurance athletes like runners and cyclists. Lower-cost trackers sometimes require a smartphone connection to access GPS, so you’ll need to bring your phone with you for those stats. On the other hand, if accuracy is essential for you, consider a higher-end fitness watch with dual-band GPS so buildings and trees are less likely to mess with your Strava map.

How to Choose the Best Fitness Tracker

To find the best fitness watch for you, start by thinking about your personal goals and what metrics you’re actually going to care about. “The specifics of each fitness tracker are so different that you really can break it down to the sport, to the athlete, and what the ultimate goal is,” Peel says. Runners will likely want something with a GPS that can track their distance and stats like their cadence and heart rate zones. Serious lifters will probably be more interested in something like a Whoop that gives them insights on their strain and recovery. Just be sure to ask yourself how much you’ll really use fancy-sounding features like surfing cameras. “The smarter that tracker is, the more expensive it is going to be,” Peel points out.

We found the Samsung Galaxy Watch6 to be the best fitness tracker for health monitoring. It gives you real-time ECGs and body composition analysis right from your wrist, plus blood oxygen levels, VO2 max estimates and heart rate data. In particular, our tester—a registered nurse—found the sleep stats to be the best she’s seen.

The Apple Watch Ultra is our top pick for exercising since it’s loaded with more workout features than you will probably ever use in your lifetime. Any that you do take advantage of will be top-notch and user-friendly.

The Fitbit Charge 6 is the best fitness tracker you can get for the money. At only $160, it’ll auto-detect your workouts and give you exceptionally accurate heart rate data and step counting with a responsive, easy-to-use display. The Fitbit Inspire 3 may be cheaper, but we’d say spending the extra 60 bucks is worth it for the built-in GPS, bigger screen, and more advanced health tracking.

Most fitness trackers today are water-resistant and can handle some low-key laps in the pool. But if you’re looking to go deep-sea diving, both the Oura Ring and the Apple Watch Ultra will still function 100 meters underwater.

About the Experts

John Peel is an IFA-certified master trainer for iFit, the interactive fitness and workout app you’ll find on many of the cardio machines at your gym, and a former collegiate football player.

Pete Nastasi, is a NASM-certified sports nutrition coach and personal trainer with a degree in biochemistry.

Resources

1. Fergusun T, et al. (2022) Effectiveness of wearable activity trackers to increase physical activity and improve health: a systematic review of systematic reviews and meta-analyses https://www.thelancet.com/journals/landig/article/PIIS2589-75002200111-X/fulltext
2. Germini F, et al. (2022) Accuracy and acceptability of wrist-wearable activity-tracking devices: systematic review of the literature https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8817215/