Wellness trackers are all about just that, wellness—helping people gain insights from these smart bands that motivate healthier lifestyles. But many of us also want the bands or bracelets to look good, placing vanity on equal footing with the benefits of fitness.
The folks at Fitbit are indeed stressing style and fashion along with the holistic health benefits promised with the $149.95 Fitbit Luxe trackers the Google-owned company announced on Monday. Yes, Luxe takes it inspiration from high-end jewelry.
Luxe is a buttonless bracelet that tracks your breathing rate, heart rate variability (HRV), resting heart rate (RHR), skin temperature variation, and eventually oxygen saturation (SpO2). Sleep tracking is also part of the mix, and the latest band comes with six-month trial of the Fitbit Premium service, adding mindfulness and stress management tools previously reserved for the Fitbit Sense and other smartwatches.
Stress is top of mind for just about everyone these days. Covid-19 alone has adversely affected the mental health of one out of two people, according to a recent International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) survey, impacting how we sleep, eat or deal with chronic conditions.
Tools in the Fitbit app include guided breathing and other exercises, and a stress management score derived from responsiveness (based on heart rate data), exertion balance, and your sleep patterns. The Premium subscription gives you access to more than 200 guided audio and video workouts from certified personal trainers, and brands like Aaptiv, barre3, Daily Burn, obé and POPSUGAR. Foodies take note: It also comes with healthy recipes.
Renowned spiritual guru Deepak Choprak is part of the Premium experience as well; he has created more than 30 curated mindfulness sessions for the Fitbit crowd.
Keep in mind that once the Premium trial expires, you'll have to pay $9.99 monthly or $79.99 a year to continue.
As for the fashion part, Fitbit approached Luxe as if it was designing jewelry. The tracker, which I can only say looks good in pictures since I haven't seen versions in person to this point, has a stainless steel case created through a metal injection molding process. Fitbit says it is the thinnest fitness tracker it has produced. It comes in gold, platinum, or matte graphite, with a wide range of available silicone, leather, and stainless steel mesh accessory bands costing between $29.95 and $99.95.
Luxe will be available later this spring, Fitbit says.
A special edition gorjana Parker Link Bracelet (shown in the image above) will cost $199.95 and become available in June.
Of particular note for those of you who might want to use Luxe to track sleep, Fitbit claims up to five days of battery life.
The band can also deliver call, texts, and smartphone notifications. Luxe is compatible with iOS and Android devices and has a feature for quick pairing with Android.
“If the last year has taught us anything,” says Fitbit vice president for brand and product marketing Lisa Swift, “it’s that wellness is always in fashion, and more important than ever.”
Hard to argue with that.
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Photos courtesy of Fitbit.