HUAWEI Band 9 Review: Feature-packed smart band

HUAWEI launched its HUAWEI Band 9 smart band, in India earlier this year. It still has a 1.47-inch AMOLED 2.5D touch screen, offers up to 14 days of battery life, and has 5 ATM water resistance.

This finally adds ambient light sensor for auto-adjusting display brightness, has 9-axis IMU sensor for enhanced motion detection, features glossy gilded bezel, and offers more color options. This has a slightly cheaper price tag as well. I am coming to HUAWEI bands after 4 years, after using the Band 6 back in 2021. What are the improvements did I experience in the latest band? Is it worth the price? Let us dive into the review to find out.

Box contents

• HUAWEI Band 9 with Black colour strap
• Charging connector
• Quick start guide

Design and Build

Starting with the design, the HUAWEI Band 9 still has a same smartwatch-like design instead of band, thanks to its large 1.47-inch screen. You can see bezels around the screen. This measures 43.45 × 24.86 × 8.99 mm and weighs 14 grams (without the strap), almost the same as the predecessor.

It has a polycarbonate body. It has 5ATM water resistance, so you can even wear when swimming. There is 9-axis IMU sensor (Accelerometer sensor, Gyroscope sensor, Magnetometer sensor), Optical heart rate sensor as well as PPG heart rate sensor and also comes with a SpO₂ sensor. It still uses Bluetooth 5.0 LE.

The HUAWEI Band 9 straps are compatible with the same accessories as the  Band 8, including skin-friendly, UV-treated silicone straps with multiple color options. It is adjustable and look like a normal watch strap, which we had seen in the older models.

The strap has a plastic buckle which gives a metal look. It is tight, and doesn’t come out easily, unless removed. You can remove the band with a press of a button.

There is a button on the right side to launch apps menu or go home.

HUAWEI sells the Band 9 in Black, Pink, White and Yellow colours in India, but it doesn’t sell the strap separately. There are third-party straps online.

On the back, you can see the heart rate sensor that has glowing green LED lights when you are using it to measure heart rate. The SpO2 sensor glows in red colour when you measure blood oxygen saturation. You can also see the charging pins on the back. Overall, the build quality is good.

Display and features

Coming to the display, the Band 9 continues to feature a large 1.47-inch (194 × 368 pixels) 282PPI AMOLED color touch screen 2.5D cured glass display that is bright. There is 3D scratch-resistant glass. You can set it to turn on when you lift your hand, and the screen turns off in a few seconds to save power. It still attracts fingerprints and is not completely scratch resistant. The touch screen is smooth to use.

The screen is bright, and there is no outdoor visibility issue. You can adjust the brightness from Settings→Display→Brightness Settings. You can adjust it from level 1 till level 5. Since the band adds an ambient light sensor for auto brightness adjustment, you can set it to auto and need not worry about the manual brightness adjustment. This is defintely a welcome move.

When you swipe from the top, you get the quick settings toggle that has shortcuts for Stopwatch, Timer, Keep screen on for 5 minutes, Brightness adjustment, Settings, Torch, Alarm, DND, and Sleep.

You can add 5 of these widgets from favourites in the settings and rearrange the order. Other options available are Healthy, Sporty, Sleep, Activity, Weather and Music controls when the band is connected to the phone. There is no camera control option that is available in a lot of bands in the price range. You can read or clear the notification you receive from the smartphone, but you can’t reply to them directly from the band. You get notifications for calls. There is an option to reject or auto reply with a message.

Pressing the hardware button lets you launch workouts, Workout records, Activity records, Sleep, Heart Rate, SpO2, Stress, Breathing exercises, notifications, Music, Weather, Calendar, Alarm, Timer, Stopwatch, Torch, Find phone, and Settings. In the settings under the Display, you can choose different watch faces, choose widgets from favorites, adjust brightness, and in the Advanced option under it, there are options to set screen timeout period (10, 15, 20 or auto). You can also choose the vibration strength (Strong, Soft or off), DND schedule, Enable option to auto-detect workouts, System menu to Update, Restart, Power off, Disconnect or Reset the band.

Software

The smart band runs Harmony OS 4.2, and supports both Android and iPhone via HUAWEI health app, and you can only side-load the APK for Health app since it is not on Google Play Store any more. The Health section shows activity data on the top in the form or rings or clovers, and there are other sections such as exercise records, heart rate, SpO2, sleep, and emotional well-being. You can also customize them by adding Cycle calendar for mensural cycle tracking, but other features such as skin temperature monitoring and Weight are not supported by the band.

Next up is the exercise tab, which we will check out later in the fitness section, and the devices section shows the devices added. The ‘Me tab’ shows medals, reports, plans and more for workouts.

When you click the HUAWEI Band 9 in the devices tab, you get the battery data and option to choose watch faces. There is a separate store that lets you download hundreds of watch faces, both free and paid. You can store up to 25 watch faces in the band.

Next up, you have the health monitoring, notification, alarm, weather reports, troubleshooting and help. For notification, you can choose which app should show you notifications. Device settings have more option including option to disable music playback control and raise to wake.

Fitness tracking

The HUAWEI Band 9 has 100+ Different Exercise Modes including 11 professional workout modes such as indoor and outdoor running, cycling, and rope skipping, and more customized modes, including fitness, ball games, and dancing types. There are automatic workout tracking for walking, running, elliptical and rower.

The app also has AI running plan, which you can try if you are a beginner or a competitor runner, since there are plans for 3K up to 42K training. There are also running courses for basic, fat-burning, cardio and endurance runs, or you can set a custom course.

For outdoor workouts like running, you get route map, distance, calories burnt, steps, average speed, cadence, stride, average heart rate, heart rate zones and even recovery time right from the band. Steps tracking is decent, but it is slightly more compared to Amazfit BIP 5 smartwatch I use. Even without built-in GPS, tracking using phone’s GPS is good. It hardly takes a couple of seconds to get the GPS from the phone for outdoor workouts. However, there is no GPS lock directly from the band, so you have to manually start the running or cycling option from the app, and it shows in the band. Since there is a button in the band, you can press it to pause or stop the workout.

You can share the workout data as an image with a custom photo such as a selfie. You can share your data with Adidas running or Strava, but it is hidden under Me→Privacy management→Data sharing and authorization. Remember, the feature is available only to Europe, Latin America, Asia Pacific and Africa, so make sure you have set the HUAWEI Health to India or any of the countries in these regions.

Sleep tracking

Sleep tracking is more accurate when compared to the Amazfit BIP 5. It shows light, deep and REM sleep as well as awake time as usual. In addition, you get breathing quality, heart rate SpO2 and respiratory data. The HUAWEI TruSleep 4.0 gives recommendations, which is good. It can also track daytime naps, which was also accurate.

Heart rate, SpO2 monitoring and Emotional wellbeing

The band uses LED lights and photo-diodes to illuminate the blood vessel for a while and monitors the heart rate via the change of green light absorbed. You can’t say this is 100% accurate, but heart rate recordings — both resting and active, are almost accurate compared to Blood oximeter device. It shows a graph for heart rate and SpO2 throughout the day in the band itself. SpO2 or blood oxygen monitoring is almost accurate compared to oximeter.

The app also has stress level monitoring throughout the day, which is now called emotional wellbeing. There are insights that show average stress rate.

Battery life

It has a 180mAh battery, and the company promises up to 14 days of maximum battery life, up to 9 days with typical usage and up to 3 days with AOD turned on. I have been using it for a week now, and I am yet to charge the device, and have 29% battery left.

This includes initial setup, daily workouts for half an hour, 24×7 heart rate,  SpO2 monitoring, stress monitoring, call and message notifications. With outdoor activity of 30 minutes, it only drained 2 to 3% battery. Battery life might vary depending on frequent use of the display with increased brightness, use of heart rate monitor during workouts and all the notifications turned on.

The band uses magnetic charging. When charging, it shows time, and useful information on how to use the band. The company recommends 5V-1A input. It also has fast charging. The company says that can be charged fully in 45 minutes, which is true.

Conclusion

Overall, the HUAWEI Band 9 is yet another worthy fitness band from HUAWEI that is a feature-packed smart band with a large display that adds ambient light sensor, has a of workout modes, the battery life is also good, and it also supports fast charging. Wish it had GPS, since some watches offer GPS in the price range.

Priced at Rs. 4,499, it is now available from Amazon.in and Flipkart for as low as Rs. 3,999. Even though it is priced slightly on the higher side compared to smartwatches, it is worth it for features you yet.

Alternatives

There is Samsung Galaxy Fit3 with similar features, but has a metal body, and is available at a slightly cheaper rate. If you can choose a smartwatch, there is Redmi Watch 5 Lite with GPS, Bluetooth calling and offers better battery life.

Pros

• Bright OLED color display with auto brightness adjustment
• 100+ workout modes with automatic workout tracking modes
• All-day heart rate, SpO2 and Stress Monitoring
• Accurate sleep tracking
• Water-resistant (5ATM)
• Good battery life with fast charging

Cons

• Doesn’t lock GPS directly from the band
• Doesn’t have a premium design