Amazon takes on Google Fitbit with the new Halo View fitness tracker

Amazon today revealed the new Halo View health tracker which will compete with the Google Fitbit lineup. The Halo View features an AMOLED color display with haptic feedback. As expected from a modern fitness tracker, Halo View allows you to easily access activity, sleep scores, blood oxygen levels, live workout tracking, text and move notifications, and more. It also comes with an optical sensor to monitor heart rate and blood oxygen, a skin temperature sensor, and an accelerometer. Amazon claims that Halo View will offer up to seven days of battery life, and can fully charge in under 90 minutes.

The purchase of Halo View includes a full year of Halo membership which provides full access to exclusive Halo features, workouts, and programs. Halo membership includes the following:

• Discover: An ever-expanding catalog of workouts, sleep resources, nutrition programs, mindfulness exercises, and meditations created by Halo experts, as well as experts from 8fit, Aaptiv, American Heart Association, Exhale On Demand, Headspace, Julian Treasure, Mayo Clinic, Openfit, P.volve, Russell Wilson, Relax Melodies, and more. Over 150 programs are designed to drive useful discoveries, like if a lower temperature aids sleep, if yoga stretches contribute to a lower heart rate, or if a program of strength training reduces body fat percentage.
• Body: Medical research shows that body fat percentage is a better measure of overall health than weight or body mass index alone, but tools that measure this can be expensive or difficult to access. Using computer vision (CV) and machine learning (ML), Amazon Halo enables customers to measure their body fat percentage from the comfort and privacy of their own home. Body is as accurate as methods a doctor would use, nearly twice as accurate as at-home smart scales, and has been clinically validated by Pennington Biomedical Research Center and Massachusetts General Hospital.
• Activity: Informed by American Heart Association physical activity guidelines and the latest medical research, Amazon Halo awards points weekly, based on the intensity and duration of movement, not just the number of steps taken.
• Movement Health: Improving physical movement helps prepare the body to handle the demands of everyday life. Using just a smartphone camera and the Halo app, Movement Health uses CV and ML to assess mobility, stability, and posture, then recommends a custom program of corrective exercises.
• Sleep: The health benefits of consistently good sleep are well documented. Amazon Halo uses motion, heart rate, and temperature to measure time asleep and time awake; time spent in the various phases of sleep, including deep, light, and REM; and skin temperature while sleeping.
• Tone: The globally accepted definition of health includes physical, social, and emotional well-being. Tone uses ML to analyze energy and positivity in a customer’s voice so they can better understand how they may sound to others, which can help improve their communication and relationships.
• Alexa for Halo: Customers can connect their Alexa to Halo, giving them the ability to simply ask for updates on their health and wellness information—including activity score, sleep quality, body composition—from an Alexa-enabled device. Just ask, “Alexa, how did I sleep last night?” or “Alexa, how many activity points do I have?”

You can pre-order Amazon Halo View here from Amazon.