Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 Classic review: An excellent generational mashup

While the return of a physical rotating bezel may be one of the highlight features of the new wearable, the Galaxy Watch 6 Classic brings some additional improvements over the prior generation. But looking at the big picture and the fact Samsung is asking for $400, the new watch is much like the rest of the devices from Samsung Unpacked — relatively boring. It also has some very frustrating features. However, that doesn't mean this is a bad watch. In fact, it is very good in many ways. The battery life is solid, the overall hardware is excellent, the performance is snappy, and the list of health-tracking features is impressive.

About this review: This review was written after a week of testing with a Galaxy Watch 6 Classic provided by Samsung, and the company did not have any input into its contents.

Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 Classic: Pricing and availability

Samsung took the wraps off its latest wearables at Samsung Unpacked back in June and opened preorders that day. The watches are finally available starting today. The Galaxy Watch 6 Classic is available in black and silver, in either 43mm or 47mm watch sizes. You can also get the watch with Wi-Fi only or add LTE cellular connectivity at an extra cost.

Speaking of cost, the 43mm variant will run $400 and $450 if you opt for the LTE model; $430 and $480 if you want the larger 47mm option. The watches ship with a hybrid eco-leather band that matches the case color.

Hardware and design

Welcomed refinements in the return of a fan-favorite

I'm reviewing the 47mm variant of the Galaxy Watch 6 Classic, and from a design perspective, it looks like a natural evolution of Samsung's two preceding wearables: the Galaxy Watch 4 Classic and the Galaxy Watch 5 Pro. The highlight is the aforementioned physical rotating bezel, which is back from the Watch 4 Classic, but it's been slimmed down to make room for a larger 1.5-inch display, up from the 1.4-inch screen on the 46mm Watch 4 Classic and matching the one on the larger Watch 5 Pro. The Watch 6 Classic is also sporting a Super AMOLED panel protected by durable Sapphire Crystal glass that gets a bump to a max brightness level of 2,000 nits, making it very easy to see in direct sunlight.

While there is plenty of hullabaloo about the return of the physical rotating bezel, it doesn't offer any new features or options. Spinning it allows you to scroll through messages, navigate the UI, adjust volume, and more, just as it always has. But that satisfying click you feel as it rotates is so nice, and it's just a great way to use the watch without smudging the display.

The watch's case also looks very much the same as the previous models, with two buttons and the speaker and microphone holes on the right-hand side. You'll find the sensors for tracking heart rate, temperature, blood oxygen saturation, and more on the back. Samsung is still charging wirelessly, so there are no POGO pins to deal with.

Even though the watch's overall design isn't a drastic departure from previous generations, I like the changes Samsung made.

For a battery, Samsung has managed to stuff a 425mAh battery into the 47mm Watch 6 Classic and a significantly smaller 300mAh cell in the 43mm variant. These differences bring the weight of each watch to 59g and 52g, respectively. While the weight is up significantly over the Watch 4 Classic and Watch 5 Pro, the battery is a downgrade in capacity from the Watch 5 Pro. A knock on one of the other contenders for best smartwatch, the TicWatch 5 Pro, is the weight at 44.35g, but in comparison to the Watch 6 Classic, it's lighter than both variants and has a much larger battery.

All of this is to say that the Galaxy Watch 6 Classic is not a slim or light watch. Aside from the battery, a stainless steel case also weighs it down. But it does aid in the watch's IP68 water and dust resistance rating, 5ATM water depth rating, and MIL-STD-810H certification. It's not the heaviest watch, but you'll probably feel it during certain exercises, like long-distance runs or hikes.

Even though the overall design of the watch isn't a drastic departure from previous generations, I like the changes Samsung did make. The entire package feels solid and premium, as the price suggests.

Samsung did make a major change in how its bands attach to the watch. It went with a quick connect style band that has an integrated button you press to retract the pins connecting it to the watch's lugs. This is an easy way to remove the band for cleaning and whatnot. And it still supports 20mm bands, so you can grab any number of excellent replacement bands for the Galaxy Watch 6 Classic.

What I don't like about the band included with the Watch 6 Classic is the material Samsung used. At a glance, the watch band looks like leather, but according to Samsung, it's made of high-quality ecological leather that's derived from plant-based sources such as corn. In use, it's stiff and not very comfortable.

Performance and battery life

Upgraded processor brings a smooth experience

After two years of using the same Exynos W920 processor, we got a bump to Exynos W930 this year, along with 2GB RAM and 16GB of internal storage. While the previous watches weren't slouches, the new processor improves both performance and efficiency. In daily use, the watch has been buttery smooth. I was able to swipe and rotate through the watch with no stutters or slowdowns. Jumping between apps also worked beautifully.

The Galaxy Watch 6 Classic also did a great job of maintaining its connection to my Galaxy S23 Ultra, even over long distances. When I was out of my phone's Bluetooth range, I had a few instances where the watch wouldn't switch over to Wi-Fi for cloud connection automatically, but I had no complaints otherwise.

The Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 Classic was nothing but smooth when navigating through its UI, thanks to the new Exynos W930 processor and 2GB RAM.

However, a better processor couldn't massively improve battery life. If you want a smartwatch that will get you through an entire day and night without needing to charge it, the Galaxy Watch 6 Classic can do it. Samsung rates it for up to 40 hours of use on a single charge, and I was able to reach that most of the time. The amount of time you get between charges will vary based on your personal use and settings on the watch, of course.

I tested the watch with all the health tracking sensors enabled and set it to continuous monitoring, along with wearing it every night for sleep tracking. Above are the screenshots showing how the battery fared between two charging sessions. One was with the always-on display enabled, and one without. You can see that leaving the always-on display disabled did make a difference, but it wasn't a massive change. It would be a good idea to pick up an extra charger, just in case.

Health features

It does a lot but is capable of more

While some folks use smartwatches to keep up with notifications, many lean towards these wearables for health and fitness tracking. But to be one of the best fitness trackers on the market, these wrist computers need to do more than track steps — and the Galaxy Watch 6 Classic very much does.

Samsung has put a huge focus on health over the years by including advanced sensors in its smartwatches and integrating them with the Samsung Health app. The Galaxy Watch 6 Classic doesn't get any new sensors over the Watch 5 Pro, but it didn't really need to. The Galaxy Watch 6 Classic does a great job of passively keeping track of metrics like heart rate, stress, blood oxygen, and sleep. But the watch can also alert you to readings that may be out of your normal range, so you have the opportunity to take action on them.

One of these new features sends you irregular heart rhythm notifications. It uses the ECG feature to check for abnormalities in your heart rate, so you can get tested for critical conditions like atrial fibrillation. But as with any health-related feature, be sure to consult a medical professional before you put too much into what the watch says.

As a comparison, I wore the Galaxy Watch 6 Classic and the Whoop Strap 4.0 together during my testing to see how similar the results were. My results were often very close to one another. Looking at sleep tracking and one of my workouts, you can see both devices tracked similar metrics and weren't too far apart, with heart rate being one of the exceptions.

However, the Galaxy Watch 6 Classic also offers advanced tracking features like ECG readings (Galaxy exclusive), body composition, and blood pressure (only available in some countries). While I'm quite happy with all the health metrics Samsung includes, it's frustrating that so many of them are either restricted or unavailable. For example, the temperature sensor only tracks your body temperature, which can be helpful for sleep, and that's about it. You can use it with a third-party app called Thermo Check to take temperature readings of objects and liquids, but I found it to be inconsistent regardless of what I was measuring. Then we have blood pressure monitoring, which isn't available in many regions​​​​​.

The Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 Classic retains all the sensors and health features from the Galaxy Watch 5 Pro to continue offering a wide breadth of metrics for you to monitor.

I'm aware that many of these features aren't meant to be detailed (you need to seek a medical professional for that). But the Galaxy Watch 6 is a premium watch with a premium price, and part of why it's so expensive is due to the components. So even though users can't get full value from the device's capabilities, and likely won't use a lot of the sensors, they are still expected to foot the bill. And Samsung isn't making region-specific watches either.

Samsung continues to do a great job of building out a wealth of health and fitness features for its devices. Combining the Galaxy Watch 6 Classic data with Samsung Health, you can do everything from tracking your daily activity to building custom workouts and taking ECG readings.

Software

Smooth but all too familiar

You may recall that Google partnered with Samsung to help revamp the wearable platform, which led to Samsung devices being among the first to have Wear OS 3. This is why it isn't much of a surprise that Samsung is the first to roll out a device running Wear OS 4. Just like the Galaxy Watch 6 Classic is a throwback to the Watch 4 Classic, using Wear OS 4 is like using Wear OS 3.5, at least on the surface.

As I mentioned earlier, the Galaxy Watch 6 Classic runs Samsung's One UI Watch 5 based on Wear OS 4. Visually, the differences between One UI 4.5 based on Wear OS 3.5 are very minute, with extremely subtle changes. This is a good thing if you're a fan of the UI on previous devices, but if you weren't or were just hoping for something different, you're going to be disappointed. Under the hood, Wear OS 4 brings improvements for efficiency, watch face creation, features for apps, and more. There are also improvements to backup and restore. But not much else.

Visual elements on other devices that will eventually run Wear OS 4, including the anticipated Google Pixel Watch 2, will be different from what Samsung is showing. But this isn't any different from what we see on smartphones, as each company wants to differentiate itself from the completion. This is something that wasn't really possible from the software side prior to Wear OS 3.

Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 Classic: Should you buy it?

You should buy the Galaxy Watch 6 Classic if:

• You miss the physical rotating bezel of the Galaxy Watch 4 Classic
• You want true full-day, or more, battery life
• You want to be on the bleeding edge of wearables with the latest software and advanced sensors

You shouldn't buy the Galaxy Watch 6 Classic if:

• You're on a tight budget
• You don't want to buy a watch with features you can't use
• You were hoping for a significant OS change

Samsung has long been considered one of the top smartwatch makers, and the Galaxy Watch 6 Classic won't change that. Though I may sound down on it in some aspects, don't take that as me saying that this is a bad watch. Because Samsung is a behemoth of a company and makes some very, very good tech, we expect greatness at every turn. But like other new devices, like the Galaxy Z Fold 5, the Galaxy Watch 6 Classic doesn't stray far from the previous generation.

I'd have no issues recommending this smartwatch to someone looking for a new one, but I would call out a few considerations before dropping $400 on the base model. You need to make sure you're comfortable with a larger device and are willing to pay for features they may never get to use. Still, the Galaxy Watch 6 Classic is a very advanced smartwatch that is also very easy to use. So, if you have the money and have been waiting for the return of the physical rotating bezel and can deal with the mentioned considerations — the Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 Classic won't disappoint.