Indian budget tech brand RealMe has launched its first wearable – the Realme Band – a fitness tracker with a dedicated mode for tracking cricket.
Unsurprisingly destined for the Indian market only, it’s a clear answer to the popularity of Xiaomi and its Mi Band range, which has been a huge hit across developing countries.
Like the Mi Band series it has heart rate tracking and IP68 water resistance, and will track nine sports. Of course, there’s no GPS built in.
It has quite a large screen with a 0.9-inch, 160x80 resolution, and watch faces that can be swapped from within the partner app. The screen will show notifications of calls and messages from the paired smartphone.
Aside from steps and heart rate, it also acts as a sleep tracker, and will last 10 days on a single charge, which is pretty impressive going.
And the secret sauce? It costs just $20 (₹1,499) – which should more than compete with the likes of Xiaomi. The Mi Band 3i, which Xiaomi launched for the Indian market last year is slightly less at ₹1,299 ($2 cheaper), but doesn't have a heart rate monitor, let alone cricket tracking.
Budget fitness trackers have swallowed up the market in recent years, and Xiaomi’s repeated success with the Mi Band range means it's set to launch the Mi Band 5 in June this year.
And that’s contributed to a huge decline in Fitbit’s market share over the past three years, as it struggles to differentiate.
When brands can sell trackers with heart rate sensors for just $20, it’s hard to convince people to spend 5x more to get a nicer app – even though quality health and wellness tracking is nothing without the algorithms that monitor your stats.
How we test
James is the co-founder of Wareable, and he has been a technology journalist for 15 years.
He started his career at Future Publishing, James became the features editor of T3 Magazine and T3.com and was a regular contributor to TechRadar – before leaving Future Publishing to found Wareable in 2014.
James has been at the helm of Wareable since 2014 and has become one of the leading experts in wearable technologies globally. He has reviewed, tested, and covered pretty much every wearable on the market, and is passionate about the evolving industry, and wearables helping people achieve healthier and happier lives.