Welcome to our exploration of the world of smartwatches with the TicWatch Pro 5 from Mobvoi. As someone who has been following this brand since the days of LG and Fossil smartwatches, I was excited to see how the TicWatch Pro 5 holds up to the competition after almost a year.
The Sandstone color of the watch is truly stunning, with a natural titanium vibe that is currently trending. Weighing in at only 44 grams, the TicWatch Pro 5 is incredibly light and durable, certified with a military standard durability and 5 atmosphere water resistance rating. The textured top and shiny inner circle of the stainless steel bezel add to the watch’s aesthetic appeal, especially in the sunlight. The rotary crown doubles as a button and has a smooth rotation with haptic feedback, making it easy to use. The rear middle ring of the watch is packed with sensors and has a charging connector on the side for wired charging. While the stock silicon band is comfortable, it catches things like pet hair, but it’s easy to swap out for any 24mm standard watch band.
The TicWatch Pro 5 still remains one of the most powerful Wear OS watches on the market. It features the 4nm Snapdragon Wearable chipset paired with 2GB of RAM and 32GB of storage, making it great for combined fitness tracking and NFC for contactless payments. The 1.43 OLED display with 466 by 466 resolution covered with Corning Gorilla Glass is impressive, but the ultra-low power display is truly unique. Instead of using the OLED as always-on display, you can save power by using the digital clock on the secondary display, similar to a G-Shock watch. When you lift your hand, it turns on the backlight for viewing in the dark, which can be changed to one of 18 available colors. The TicWatch Pro 5 has a giant 628 mAh battery, the biggest on any Wear OS watch, promising up to 80 hours of endurance. The magnetic cable should bring it up to 65% charge in just around 30 minutes, and it even shows you the two decimals of the battery percentage to demonstrate how fast it goes.
The TicWatch Pro 5 is perfect for sports and outdoor activities. On the watch itself, you will find all the health-related apps starting with Tic for everything you can imagine. To test the accuracy, I went for a hike around the lake, taking some other watches with me too. The GPS tracking was pretty accurate, with minor differences, possibly due to reception. During the workout, the low power display comes in handy, changing the backlight based on your heart rate intensity, ranging from blue to red if you reach the maximum. The thick also drew up a map on the exercise screen. The sleep tracking works as expected, and while the watch supports a skin temperature sensor, it does not give you a specific temperature reading. Instead, it tracks the changes of the temperature throughout the sleep. The TicWatch Pro 5 also supports sync with third-party services, currently limited to Google Health and Strava.
The TicWatch Pro 5 comes with Wear OS currently at version 3.5, with the version 4 update yet to be announced. While it brings only minor changes, for most users, they likely won’t notice a difference. The UI is aesthetically pleasing, like something you would find on a pixel watch. The navigation happens with two buttons, with a single press on the upper button bringing you to recent apps, while a double press is a shortcut for Google Wallet. If you press the crown, it opens the app drawer or works as a home button. Clicking both together does a screenshot. While there is still no official support for Google Assistant or button remapping without third-party software, the powerful hardware ensures there is never any lag or slowdown.
The TicWatch Pro 5 also has a power-saving feature called Essential mode, which goes together very well with the ultra-low power display. With this feature enabled, you can significantly extend the battery life by sacrificing some smart parts of the watch. Overall, the TicWatch Pro 5 is an impressive smartwatch that offers a unique set of features and capabilities.
