Recently released in 2019, the Fitbit Inspire HR was meant to replace the Alta, Alta HR and Flex. The Fitbit Charge 3, on the other hand, is an evolution from the Fitbit Charge 2. Both pack numerous features for sports tracking, health tracking and wellness, at a reasonable price. So if you're weighing up which of the two trackers you should go for, we've served you up a comparison to help you decide.
Design
This is an undeniably huge factor for most buyers. As it will be on your wrist all the time, you will want to know about things like fit, comfort, ease of viewing data and generally just being a good tracker to use day and night.
Unlike the Alta HR, Inspire HR has the base of the Charge 3, in slimmer edition. Although it’s not as slim as the Alta HR, Inspire is much more discreet than the Charge 3. And both have changeable bands, in distinct colors and materials.
Display
In the display department, both offer touchscreens and a secondary way to navigate through the data screens. In the case of the Charge 3, you can squeeze the side of the device to drift through screens, and it works surprisingly well. On the Inspire HR you're getting a solitary physical button that can be pressed or held down to access features. Ultimately though, you're going to spend most of the time swiping your hands on that touchscreen display, and while they're not colour OLED displays, they are bright enough to view throughout the day.
The Charge 3 does have a larger screen, which makes the notifications less cramped up. The Inspire HR’s display is slightly improved over the Alta HR, but if you’re a fan of big screen, go for the Charge 3. And if you like elegance and minimalism, then go for the Inspire HR.
Fitness Tracking Features
Looking for waterproof trackers? Fortunately, both trackers have this ability. You can shower, sweat it out in the gym and go swimming with the Inspire HR and the Charge 3. In terms of swim tracking, the Charge 3 is more specific, as it can capture swim lengths, duration, distance and pace data, which is available in Fitbit's companion smartphone app.
Talking about overall tracking, both bands feature all-day tracking, offering basics like step counts, distance coverage, calories burned and reminders to move. The Inspire HR, however, does leave out one big piece of tracking data: it will not track stairs climbed because it doesn't have an altimeter, which the Charge 3 does. Climbing stairs is a really good way of burning calories, so it's a bit of a disappointing omission.
Both offer sleep analyzing, and guided breathing, so you can make sure how well-rested are your mind, therefore, improve on your sleep quality, and relieve stress during the day.
Both of them don’t have many differences when it comes to heart rate monitor, as well as sports tracking department: no built-in GPS, goal-based exercise modes, several sports tracking: swimming, treadmill, aerobics or cycling.
There's one feature you'll get on the Charge 3 that you don't get on the Inspire HR. Like Fitbit's smartwatches, the Charge 3 also includes SpO2 sensor, with its inclusion aimed at offering serious health monitoring features around the areas of sleep and heart health. That health tracking support is still lying dormant at the moment though, so it's a future-proofing feature more than anything right now.
Smart Features
Both offer the ability to view notifications for first and third-party apps like Twitter and Facebook. On the Inspire HR, however, you can't respond to notifications – that's only available on the Charge 3 (when paired to an Android phone). The Charge 3 does offer some very basic apps that let you see upcoming calendar appointments and view the weather, but as mentioned, you won't get big apps like Uber or Starbucks on there.
Another big advantage of getting the Charge 3 over the Inspire HR is payment support. The Charge 3 does work with Fitbit Pay to offer contactless payments, but only on the special editions of the Charge 3, which is unsurprisingly more expensive than the standard version.
If all those exclusive features on the Charge 3 matter to you, then just go for it.
Battery
While the Inspire HR’s battery life lasts up to 5 days, the Charge 3 wins in terms of battery life, with a duration of 7 days. Additionally, both require several hours to be fully charged.
Price
When it comes to pricing, the Inspire HR is a sub-$100 tracker while the Charge 3 comes in at $149.95 and is roughly $40 to $50 extra that you're going to pay for Fitbit's flagship fitness tracker. If you're looking at the Charge 3 special edition to get the model with Fitbit Pay, then that bumps the price up to $169.95.
Conclusion
From my point of view, Fitbit has certainly done a great job, squeezing most smartwatch features into these two trackers. The Inspire HR may win many hearts with its super affordable price, but the true winner here, is the Charge 3.
Comments