The Fitbit Edge landed as Google's answer to shoppers who want a smartwatch feel without the smartwatch price, slotting in between the Pixel Watch line and the screen-free Fitbit Air in the company's wearable lineup. It's meant to be the easy first rung on that ladder.
But the Edge has company in its price bracket, and a lot of it. Android Authority put the question to its readers directly: if not the Fitbit Edge, then what? The outlet offered five options and let more than 2,000 people vote.
The Fitbit Air came out on top with 26% of the vote, the only option to clear a quarter of the total. It's the Edge with the screen stripped out, built for people who'd rather wear an analog watch and let a separate band do the tracking.
Right behind it, at 22.5%, was the Samsung Galaxy Fit 3, a budget tracker that first shipped back in 2024 and is due to be replaced by a successor at some point. The Fitbit Charge 6 took third with 20.9%, a device that's now several years old and still pulling nearly as many votes as anything newer.
Google's own flagship came up short
The real surprise sits in fourth place. The Pixel Watch 5, Google's most capable and most expensive wearable, managed only 20.3% support, trailing not just the Charge 6 but the company's own cheaper Fitbit Air. For a device meant to sit at the top of Google's wearable range, finishing behind an older Fitbit by that margin is a rough result, even allowing for the fact that it's a different kind of product aimed at a different buyer.
Smart rings didn't fare well either. The Oura Ring 5 pulled just 6.1% of the vote, suggesting Android Authority's audience still associates serious fitness tracking with something worn on the wrist rather than the finger.
Another 4.2% of respondents wrote in devices that weren't on the ballot at all. The Garmin Venu 3, Hume Band 2.0, Fitbit Sense 2 and Suunto 9 Peak Pro all got mentioned in the comments, a reminder of how crowded this corner of the market actually is.
None of this settles the question of which tracker is objectively better. It's reader sentiment from one outlet's poll, not a lab test or a sales chart, and Google hasn't commented on how the Edge, Air and Pixel Watch 5 are meant to coexist in its own lineup. What it does show is that Google now has to compete for budget-tracker buyers against its own hardware as much as against Samsung or Fitbit's older models. With Samsung expected to refresh the Galaxy Fit 3 before long, that competition for the under-smartwatch segment is only going to get more crowded.
GDFiled by The Gadgets Desk
Audio, wearables, cameras, tablets, chargers and every other device worth carrying or plugging in.
More from this desk →
Be the first to comment
Join the argument. No password, just your email or a passkey.