Xiaomi backed Huami announces Amazfit 2 smartwatch; offers everything apart from Android Wear at CNY 999

While there is plenty of variety when it comes to smartwatches these days, it’s getting harder to offer something new unless manufacturers step away from the norm, which it Google’s Android Wear and its hardware limitations. [caption id=“attachment_4257307” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] The Huami Amazfit 2[/caption] So it’s no wonder that Xiaomi backed Huami has launched yet another smartwatch called the Amazfit 2 that offers a stylish, activity tracking smartwatch that does not let you down when it comes to battery life either. The Amazfit Smart Sports Watch 2 as it’s called was announced in China alongside an Amazfit Smart Sports Watch 2S Premium Edition model well, which basically offers a premium quality strap over the standard model. The regular Huami Amazfit 2 is priced at CNY 999 (or approximately Rs 9,700), while the premium model that ships with an additional leather strap is priced at CNY 1,499 (or approximately Rs 14,500). That leather strap sure seems mighty expensive considering that the rest of the hardware is identical to the standard model. Starting with build quality, the smartwatch seems to made of premium quality materials, but that’s when you compare it with the first generation Amazfit smartwatch. [caption id=“attachment_4257313” align=“alignnone” width=“1280”] The Huami Amazfit 2[/caption] The Amazfit 2 offers a case or chassis that’s made of carbon fiber reinforced polycarbonate with a bezel that is made of polished ceramic. The buttons are built from 316L stainless steel, while the 2.5D curved screen is made of sapphire crystal. There’s a 1.34-inch colour touch display (320x320 pixels) that is not entirely round and looks more like the first Motorola **Moto 360** Android Wear offerings with a notch at the bottom. Under that sleek exterior lies a 1.2 GHz dual core SoC paired with 512 MB RAM and 4GB internal storage. Powering it all, is a 280 mAh battery, which Huami claims can deliver up to 5 days of battery life, with the GPS turned off or 35 hours of intense usage with the GPS and full heat-rate monitoring switched on. And this is exactly where the talk of software and features begins. Clearly, Huami is able to pull this off because it does not run the power hungry Android Wear OS from Google. This also means that the Amazfit 2 can do plenty of other stuff that your regular Android Wear-powered smartwatch can’t. [caption id=“attachment_4257311” align=“alignnone” width=“1280”] The Huami Amazfit 2[/caption] It already packs in a plethora of sensors which include a PPG hear rate sensor, Triaxial Accelerometer, Gyro, Geomagnetic Sensor, Barometer and an Ambient light sensor. Also part of this assembly is low-powered GPS chip. As for the features, it is water resistant up to 50 metres and with that comes with plenty of tracking options for a variety of activities including swimming. The smartwatch can also measure VO2 max, TE, TD and recovery time, making it really useful for those who are serious about measuring their fitness performance. At the moment, there are no indications of an international variant as the device is currently on sale only in China.