Apple Watch Series 8 In-Depth Review: Sports & Fitness Tested!

While all eyes last week were on the Apple Watch Ultra, the reality is that the Series 8 will sell the most units (by far), has almost every software feature of the Ultra, and includes the same slate of massive sports and feature changes as part of WatchOS 9. The Apple Watch Series 8 hardware itself was a modest update at best, instead, relying heavily on new sports & fitness software features like triathlon support, deeper structured workout/interval features, a revamped compass app with backtrack functionality, and running power/efficiency metrics.

To be sure, the hardware features – however minor, will likely be important to Apple’s longer-term vision. These features include vehicular crash detection (using high-impact detecting sensors & algorithms), but more notably on the health/fitness side include a new skin temperature sensor set at the wrist. This sensor set aims to track your wrist temperature while sleeping, primarily with the goal of providing women’s menstrual cycle tracking. However, in this iteration, it falls short of cycle prediction like we’ve seen from some of Apple’s competitors, who leverage similar temperature tracking hardware.

I’ve been putting the Apple Watch Series 8 through its paces in a variety of workouts, including running, cycling, swimming, and more. This is of course in addition to testing WatchOS 9 most of this summer as well, using the new features there – even in a triathlon. I’ve also got an Apple Watch SE In-Depth Review slated for tomorrow, and of course, in due time you’ll see a review of the Apple Watch Ultra.

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[landrysooner]

Thank you for not just spitting out facts from a spec sheet but actually providing useful information on what it's like to live with and use this watch! Great video!

[smithe]

Crushing it this week! Really looking forward to the Ultra review.

[ScotsWomble]

You said the SE 2022 review was a few days away.. what happened to it?

[michaozga]

When u open the watch and there’s nothing new, I feel sorry. Just ordered AW 7

[bryanacevedo]

Very helpful review, how does its accuracy compare to the new apple watch SE? I am a sports enthusiast so I do not require an elite watch with very precise tracking but would like to take a convenient decision. Also, the always-on-display feature is not a deal breaker to me. Thanks in advance

[deepcoolclear]

for the sleeping data in the health app they need to add more context rather than just time spent in each stage and respiration- garmin gives meaningful context such as “you slept x hrs, but most of it was light, so you may feel tired’ or “you had less REM last night so you may have concentration issues today”. Simply stats by themselves aren’t helpful for majority of ppl who may not understand sleep stages and impact on performance or health.

[SarahDoesSass]

Apple hater watching, commenting and liking for the algorithm. I'm here for Ray!

[tiwaboonchu]

Your review is interesting. It would be even better if you could slow your talking speed a bit and divide video into sections.Thanks

[OldDolio]

Can I play golf with it without it detecting my swinging arms as steps or something?

[markatemiles]

Buying my series 8 today thank you sir

[martinkessler]

They finally made some interesting moves after years not really changing much around WatchOS’s exercise tracking capabilities. I agree it’s not quite enough to abandon my Epix quite yet, but they’re getting quite close. If they release another wave of updates of this caliber for watchOS 10, then they might actually get there.

[ZachGrabill]

WorkOutDoors pretty much makes the Apple Watch complete.

[icecreamforever]

Will never buy an Apple watch but am hugely glad that they're taking on Garmin who over the past years have started getting a bit too big for their boots. #competition

[dbg]

I have an Apple watch 7 series. I really like the new Watch OS9 for health data updates. As far as the new Apple watch series 8 I see no reason to update my watch from 7 to 8. I think Apple missed the boat by not including solar charging on the new Ultra series watches. That would be a real plus and a reason for a lot of people to upgrade their Apple watch. If Garmin can figure out hot to add solar charging to their watches I don't understand why Apple can't do the same.

[siwi]

Thank you so much! Just discovered your channel while checking out new WATCHOS features and what to do before upgrading from Series 5. All my mates have Garmin and try to convince me to switch. I'm keen on the Ultra and await a review.

[stevephla]

Excellent. Looking forward to your Ultra review. Curious how much GPS run time you can squeeze out of it.

[RamonBalthazar]

If I go underground, when there’s no signal, I wonder if the backtrack feature will drain my battery trying to use the GPS

[test-mlwr]

I've got a series 4 and I still can't really see a reason to upgrade.

[cylien]

Oh le t-shirt vintage de la corrida d'Issy 2014 ou 2015!

[vzimm]

I want less connection and a better heart rate monitor. Hopefully garmin will sort that out!