Withings ScanWatch Nova Brilliant Smartwatch Review

Electronics provide advancements in products we use. This is also true for healthcare products. Withings is one such company. They provide innovative healthcare products to help us live better. One of those products is their Withings ScanWatch Nova Brilliant Smartwatch. MSRP is $599.

 

Features and specs:

 

24/7 Temperature tracking:

Baseline variation of temperature day & night, Temperature zones during workout, Awake, temperature zones**

 

Heart health:

ECG - AFib detection*, Daily heart rate, Overnight heart rate, High & low heart rate notifications, Sleep parameters

 

Sleep Quality Score:

Sleep stages (deep, light), Sleep duration, Interruptions, Regularity

 

Respiratory insights:

Blood oxygen levels, on-demand & nighttime average, Breathing quality index

 

Activity tracking:

Heart rate zones during workout, Fitness Level via VO2 max estimation, Active minutes, Steps, Calories burned, Connected GPS: distance, pace & elevation, Elevation: meters & floors

 

Cycle tracking:

Cycle phases, Period log, Cycle length, Cycle symptoms log, Period flow log, Calories burned, Mood & feelings log, Symptoms & flow trends

*Available via Withings Scan Monitor. Scan Monitor is not indicated for use on patients with a pacemaker or other implanted electronic device.

**Feature expected in 2025

 

Weight & Dimensions

Dimensions: 39mm

Weight (without wristband): 42 gr

 

Screen display:

High resolution grayscale OLED display

14504 px, 282 PPI, 0.63"

 

Materials

Stainless steel case

Anti-reflective box-shaped sapphire glass fluted bezel (Titanium on Silver model)

Stainless steel crown

Super-LumiNova hands and indexes

 

Sensors

TempTech24/7 Module

High Dynamic Range Accelerometer

Multi-wavelength PPG 16 channels

Altimeter

 

Water resistance

5ATM

 

Battery

Up to 30-day battery life

Charging time: 2 hours

Docking station (USB-C compatible)

 

Connectivity

Bluetooth Low Energy

 

Withings App

Available on: App Store (iOS), Google Play Store (Android)

Apple Health, Google Health Connect & Google Fit compatible

Withings App Web dashboard

iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch with iOS 15 and higher, or Android device with OS 9 and higher

Cannot be set up from a computer

Learn more about the Withings App +

AppStore

Google play

 

Storage & memory

Free and unlimited storage of all health data online

Up to 7 days of health data stored on the watch

 

The Withings ScanWatch Nova Brilliant came in a nice-looking color printed box. Opening the box revealed a well-protected watch held in place with custom foam. Materials used in the construction was stainless steel. Quality of materials used as well as fit and finish was excellent. Also included was a silicon band, charger and cable, extra stainless steel band links, tools to add/remove band links, and owner’s manual.

 

I love the design of the Withings ScanWatch Nova Brilliant. Unlike most smart watches, the Nova Brilliant has a classic dress watch look. The face is a classic dress watch with analog face hands. At the top of the face is a small round high resolution greyscale OLED display. This makes for an extremely efficient watch with a 30-day battery life.

 

The ScanWatch Nova Brilliant, like a lot of smart watches, are designed with health in mind. There are multiple sports modes, to track your exercise. These include walking, running, cycling, and swimming, and a multitude of other sports. And thanks to the connected GPS, and automatic activity detection and workout mode, you can track your activity. Over 40 sports can be tracked on your wrist for your workout durations, steps, heart rate, movements, and duration.

 

Unlike a lot of smart watches, the Withings ScanWatch Nova Brilliant takes health functions a step farther. It uses clinically developed scans to better monitor your health. It can access part of your respiratory system, perform a medical grade electrocardiogram, and could indicate the beginning of an illness. It performs ECG measurements and aFib detection. While you can perform your own ECG on demand, the Withings ScanWatch Nova Brilliant can detect low and high heart rates, and send a notification to take an ECG. And the ECG could be shared with your doctor to track your heart health. By measuring your blood oxygen level, it can assess part of your raspatory health. While most people won’t have major health issues, it’s nice to be able to monitor for them, just in case.

 

But even just getting sick, the Withings ScanWatch Nova Brilliant can monitor for that too! It performs day and night temperature tracking. By monitoring your temperature throughout the day and night it can establish a baseline temperature. With a baseline temperature established, it can give warning of an oncoming illness when there are fluctuations. Temperature monitoring can also help performance and recovery from physical activity.

 

While all of these health features start thanks to the incorporation of sophisticated sensors, it’s the app that makes it possible. The sensors take the measurements. But it’s the app that stores the measurements, and tracks them. And it’s the analysis of this data that allows us to see that all is good. Or if there is a potential problem, we can see the data which tells us the size of the problem. And also tells us what should be done next, based on the data.

 

And lastly, the app also allows us to analyze our sleep patterns. It shows our deep sleep, our light sleep, and uses Withings proprietary AI calibrated using polysomnography, for sleep analysis. This analysis of sleep duration, interruptions, time taken to fall asleep and wake up, are used to develop a sleep score every night. In addition to this, your sleep heart rate is also monitored, respiratory scans are also done as well as overnight breathing disturbances are monitored.

 

I am blown away by the Withings ScanWatch Nova Brilliant! Not only can I keep my phone in my pocket and see who is calling me or text message content, it also tracks my workout activity. But the game changer is the clinical grade sensors to monitor your health. Some of which can be life altering! Yet also helps to give you a heads up of incoming smaller illnesses. And while I am spending long hours at my desk working, it also sends me notifications that I should consider going for a walk for some activity. It can be a little annoying, but it is overall helpful and a good idea. And they do also offer a pay service, that basically will monitor your health data, ad give insights and assessments for how you can improve.

 

The Withings ScanWatch Nova Brilliant is an excellent smartwatch that gives a ton of functionality. It helps with productivity, with peak performance of workouts, as well as minor and potentially major health issues. And it does it all in an extremely well made and classic analog dress watch look. It’s a synergy of functionality that is…well…brilliant! If you have any concern for your short term and long-term health, the Withings Nova Brilliant smartwatch should be on your short list. Based on its design, features, quality and performance, the Withings ScanWatch Nova Brilliant has earned our Editor’s Choice Award. For more info and complete specs. Check out their website at www.withings.com.