Best fitness trackers that will get you moving, from Fitbit to Garmin

Fitness is all about consistency. Moving more will help to improve your cardiovascular health, strengthen bones, reduce excess body fat and boost muscle power. Getting started and hauling yourself out and about every day won’t always be easy, but a fitness tracker can provide motivation.

Most fitness wearables will record step count, log exercise and other activities, as well as monitor your heart rate, so you can see how much you’re doing every single day and hopefully notice improvements over time. Trackers can range in price from less than £20 to more than £400, with the more expensive options offering more features, from blood oxygen levels to a comprehensive app for accessing fitness stats and bespoke exercise programmes.

When choosing a fitness tracker, it’s a good idea to think about what it’s mostly going to be used for. If you’re only using it to count steps, the most important thing is comfort and a bright display that you can read in sunlight. If you want to take it jogging or swimming, a waterproof rating of IX7 or more and GPS tracking will give you more detailed data about your workouts.

Finally, you might want to consider how it looks. If you’re going to be wearing it all day, you need to make sure it’s the right size for your wrist and in a colour that goes with the majority of your outfits.

How we tested the best fitness trackers

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We put each fitness tracker through its paces by using it during our swims, running between 20km and 30km and strength training. To assess how well each one performed, we compared the different metrics each device tracked, how our fitness data was presented and analysed over time, ease of use and the design of each watch.

The best fitness trackers for 2024 are: