The cost and positioning of the Apple Watch range makes it ambitious and maybe a bit excessive for many of us, but what it has achieved is making smartwatches more appealing in general. The outcome of this is a thriving budget Smartwatch segment, supported by numerous brands leveraging their expertise in smartphones and Bluetooth connectivity to offer capable wearable technology at fair prices. This includes Xiaomi, which recently introduced the Redmi Watch 3 Active, a health-focused smartwatch priced at Rs. 2,999.

I’ve had mixed experiences with budget smartwatches when it comes to fitness tracking; affordable devices tend to be best used for core functionality, such as mirroring notifications and customizing watch faces. It will be interesting to see if the Redmi Watch 3 Active can live up to its name and function effectively as a fitness and health tracker, in addition to meeting the requirements of a budget smartwatch. Discover whether the Redmi Watch 3 Active is worth the price in this evaluation.

The Redmi Watch 3 Active has heart rate and blood oxygen monitoring, along with step tracking and more

Redmi Watch 3 Active design and features

The budget smartwatch segment focuses on offering as many features as possible while keeping the price low. As a result, design and form tend to be quite simple in this space, and the Redmi Watch 3 Active adheres to this basic and straightforward look. The absence of distinctive elements and logos means that you won’t easily recognize this as a Redmi product. Whether that’s a positive or negative thing is subjective, but personally, I found the appearance to be too plain and ordinary.

That said, it is practical, and some might appreciate the glossy exterior blending with the 1.83-inch color screen. There are thick borders around the edges of the screen, but if you use a watch face with a black background, you won’t really notice them, and the front will appear relatively uniform unless you examine it closely. There is only one button on the right side of the watch, which controls power, opens the app drawer, and wakes the screen from stand-by.

Conveniently, the screen can also be activated with the lift-to-wake gesture (twisting your wrist to face you, as you would normally look at a wristwatch) or by double-tapping the screen. You can quickly turn it off by covering the screen with your palm or let the screen timeout put the Redmi Watch 3 Active into stand-by mode after a set duration.

The underside of the Redmi Watch 3 Active features the only logo on the device, placed just above the optical sensors that enable heart rate and blood oxygen tracking. Below that are the contact points where the magnetic charger attaches, with the other end connecting to a USB Type-A port, although a power adapter is not included with the device. The removable and replaceable straps can be detached from the smartwatch at the bottom as well.

The Redmi Watch 3 Active is available in two color options – Charcoal Black and Platinum Grey. The review unit sent to me is the former, but the latter arguably looks a bit better and more distinctive. The default strap is quite comfortable and also completely waterproof, matching the 5ATM water resistance rating of the smartwatch itself. For connectivity, the Redmi Watch 3 Active utilizes Bluetooth 5.3, with support for Bluetooth calling when paired to your smartphone. There is, of course, a built-in speaker and microphone for this feature to work as well.

There is only one button on the Redmi Watch 3 Active, which controls power and other functions

Redmi Watch 3 Active software, interface, and application

Compatibility with both smartphone operating systems (and sometimes even within the Android ecosystem) is not always guaranteed on budget smartwatches, but the Redmi Watch 3 Active meets the requirements in this regard. The device works with the Mi Fitness app, which is available for both Android and iOS, and supports the smartwatch on both platforms.

For my evaluation, I had the Mi Fitness app installed on a OnePlus 9 Pro (Review), paired with the Redmi Watch 3 Active. The app uses Bluetooth to manage the connection between the smartwatch and smartphone, also facilitating voice calls and synchronizing notifications between the two devices. Fitness and health data collected on the watch is sent to the app to provide better insights and analysis as well.

The app itself is presented neatly, with widgets for activity, sleep, steps, heart rate, blood oxygen levels, and more. You can also initiate workouts from within the app, and outdoor workouts seem to integrate mapping into the tracking, but this relies on your phone for location information; the smartwatch itself does not support location tracking. Device settings and basic tools can be easily adjusted, and overall, it’s a simple, functional, and adequately equipped app for the device.

Like any decent smartwatch, the Redmi Watch 3 Active offers a variety of watch faces to choose from. In addition to the three default options, there is a reasonably large selection of downloadable options, sorted somewhat randomly. If you find something you like, you can download it to the smartwatch through the app and can store up to two additional watch faces besides the three default choices, which can be removed and replaced as often as you want. While many of them were too unconventional for my taste, there were a few decent selections that I liked.

The Mi Fitness app, available for iOS and Android, works with the Redmi Watch 3 Active

Redmi Watch 3 Active performance and battery life

Almost every smartwatch, regardless of price, offers basic fitness tracking. However, the accuracy and usefulness of these features can vary on budget devices, although the Redmi Watch 3 Active aims to distinguish itself as a fitness-friendly option, given its ‘Active’ label.

However, the reality is largely on par with the rest of the budget smartwatch market, and the Redmi Watch 3 Active does not exceed its claims significantly. While there are over 100 tracking and sport modes with supposedly tailored tracking performance, most of these are niche, and it’s difficult to determine the accuracy of the tracking data.

For my evaluation, I focused on tracking the basics – steps, heart rate, and blood oxygen primarily. In our 1,000-step test, the Redmi Watch Active measured around 1,060 steps compared to my manual count of 1,000, indicating an error rate of 6 percent. This is fairly consistent with what other smartwatches in this price range deliver, and falls short of the much more accurate step tracking data that high-end devices can provide.

Heart rate tracking is similarly unreliable, especially when trying to measure it while moving around; the readings were often too low or fluctuated wildly. Remaining still or sitting down with a steady arm was the only way to obtain a somewhat accurate heart rate measurement, and the same applied to blood oxygen tracking, both of which were compared to the Apple Watch Series 7 for accuracy.

The Redmi Watch 3 Active is 5ATM water resistant

Sleep tracking was extremely basic and only provided an estimate of the actual time spent asleep, while the specifics of sleep tracking did not provide sufficient detail or accuracy. Overall, the health tracking capabilities of this smartwatch may give users a general idea of what’s happening, but it’s too inconsistent to rely on for anything important. The general performance of the Redmi Watch 3 Active is decent, with the basic UI and apps working as expected for the most part. Although the screen is not as sharp or visually pleasing as some of the competition in this segment (which utilizes OLED displays), the Redmi Watch 3 Active is bright and sufficiently satisfactory considering its price.

I was able to use the smartwatch for about seven days on a single full charge, wearing it all day, including during workouts and occasionally while sleeping. You can extend the battery life by turning off continuous connection for calls and minimizing the number of calls made directly on the Redmi Watch 3 Active.

If that’s a feature you plan on using, it’s easy to enable it through the Bluetooth settings. Importantly, even with the connection active, answering a call on your paired smartphone instead of the watch ensures that audio is directed to the correct device, and the Redmi Watch 3 Active will only activate for calls if you answer the call on the smartwatch itself. Call quality is acceptable for short calls in relatively quiet environments. For longer calls or in noisy environments, the audio may be too soft and inconvenient to use, and you may prefer to switch to your smartphone or proper earphones.

Final Thoughts

While the Redmi Watch 3 Active is marketed as a fitness-focused smartwatch, its actual fitness capabilities are not particularly impressive. However, that doesn’t mean it’s not a valuable smartwatch; it’s a capable budget wearable, performing functions such as notifications and calls fairly well. Additionally, it has an appealing appearance, a decent screen and software, and can run reliably for about seven days on a single charge.

Therefore, there is not much to criticize here, but there is also not much that sets the Redmi Watch 3 Active apart. Consider this if you are in the market for an affordable smartwatch priced under Rs. 3,000, primarily for the reliability and durability that you can expect from a Xiaomi device.