![]() Because the cute factor matters, I also appreciate the color options with the band. (FYI: Amazon has an earlier, screen-less Halo band that I haven't tried but offers the same app functions as the View.) It's sleek and minimal, and honestly, so lightweight I barely notice I'm wearing it. ![]() I've been around the block when it comes to fitness trackers, and I have to say that Amazon's Halo View is among the more aesthetically pleasing ones. Check it out from your desktop or on our web app! During a recent media excursion to the Catskills, I got the chance to put the Halo View to the ultimate test - here's how it stacked up. (I recently upgraded to the Series 7.) So, of course, I was excited when I heard about Amazon's Halo View, a just-launched wellness tracker that helps you monitor everything from fitness activity to sleep. The earliest iPhones were still rolling out, so the mere idea of having everything from steps to heart rate monitored on a teeny-tiny (touch!) screen on your wrist? Talk about the future.Īs a self-proclaimed nerd and lover of all things techy (I used to ask for Best Buy gift cards for my birthday and am not the least bit embarrassed to admit it), I was an early adopter of smartwatches for years, I rocked the FitBit Charge 2 before switching to the Apple Watch Series 3. The Halo launches on Friday in the US, where customers can request early access at a reduced rate of $64.99, including six months of the Halo membership service.There was a time (and that time was the early 2010s) when wearable tech was truly cutting edge and brands were on the cusp of something revolutionary. ![]() ![]() Rounding out the feature set is a sleep-tracking service, which “uses motion, heart rate, and temperature to measure time asleep and time awake”. That’s why Amazon Halo and Body were built with privacy in mind,” the company says. “Health is inherently personal, and taking photographic scans of your body is about as private as it gets. The feature asks users to take whole-body selfies using the app, which are analysed in the cloud to uncover metrics such as body fat percentage, before being deleted and stored locally. Those recordings are never uploaded to the cloud, Amazon says, nor will any humans ever listen to them: instead, they are analysed on a user’s device, and then deleted.Īnother new feature, Body, comes with similar promises. Instead, they power Halo’s Tone system, which provides “tone of voice analysis”. The always-on microphones, for instance, aren’t connected to Amazon’s Alexa service, as one might expect. “A wearable device that scans your body and polices your tone of voice is very on-brand for a company that seems hellbent on bringing dystopian science fiction to life,” she added. They harvest enormous amounts of data about the most intimate details of our lives and use it to fuel their profit machine and strengthen their monopolistic grip.Īmazon’s Halo claims to be able to assess mood and stress levels. “Amazon is building a surveillance empire, a privately owned panopticon,” said Evan Greer, deputy director of Fight for the Future. We are using Amazon’s deep expertise in artificial intelligence and machine learning to offer customers a new way to discover, adopt, and maintain personalised wellness habits,” said Dr Maulik Majmudar, Amazon Halo’s principal medical officer.įor many, those AI tools may prove a step too far. “Despite the rise in digital health services and devices over the last decade, we have not seen a corresponding improvement in population health in the US. “Halo analyses the intensity and duration of your movement, not just steps,” the company says, citing guidance from the American Heart Association. Instead, Amazon hopes that it will make up with its AI tools what it lacks in pure sensors. But without a GPS system, for instance, it can’t accurately track movement, while advanced features like the Apple Watch’s EKG are also absent. An accelerometer, temperature sensor and heart rate monitor allows it to do simple tracking of exertion levels and basic health. The Halo Band itself, which costs $99 and resembles a wristwatch turned inside out, has a relatively simple array of sensors compared with its competitors. The company says these features allow the Halo system to do more with less. Meanwhile, a set of AI tools built into the accompanying service, which will cost $3.99 a month in the US (it is not currently available in the UK), will attempt to gauge information such as weight and body fat percentage by asking users to take undressed selfies with the app.
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