Samsung Galaxy Watch 7 vs. Galaxy Watch 6: Should You Upgrade?
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Price
Both watches start at $299.99 and are available in 40mm and 44mm versions. Samsung offers two color options for each size. The small Watch 7 comes in green or cream. The larger variant comes in green or silver. The small Watch 6 comes in graphite or gold and the larger in graphite or silver.
You should be able to find the Galaxy Watch 6 at a discount more easily, but we'll give credit to the newer model as we always like upgrades that keep a consistent price.
Winner: Tie
Power
The Galaxy Watch 7 has a five-core Exynos W1000 processor with 2GB memory and 32GB of storage. The Watch 6 uses the Exynos W930 processor with the same 2GB of memory and half the storage at 16GB. Samsung claims the processor on the Watch 7 is three times faster with 30% better power efficiency.
The Watch 7 also has an upgraded operating system with Wear OS 5 with Samsung's One UI 6 interface, both one generation above the versions available on the Galaxy Watch 6 at launch. That said, the Galaxy Watch 6 is still relatively new and now has access to One UI 6 and Wear OS 5 via an update.
Winner: Galaxy Watch 7
Battery Life
Our biggest gripe with the Galaxy Watch 6 is its battery life, and the Galaxy Watch 7 doesn't improve that. The 44mm Galaxy Watch 7 has a 425mAh battery and the 40mm model has a 300mAh cell, both matching the respective numbers from the Watch 6.
Samsung claims that the Watch 6 lasts 40 hours with the always-on display off and 30 hours with it active. Our testing put those numbers at 28 and 20 hours, respectively. The more power-efficient processor doesn't do much to improve things on the Watch 7. It lasted 28 hours without the always-on display active and 22 hours with it.
Winner: Tie
Screen
The Galaxy Watch 6 and the Galaxy Watch 7 have identical screens. The 44mm models have a 1.5-inch, 480-by-480-pixel Super AMOLED screen. The 40mm versions have a 1.3-inch, 432-by-432-pixel screen. In terms of brightness, the Watch 7 shines up to 2,000 nits, the same as the Watch 6. We'll give the win to the older model here, as you definitely don't want to upgrade just for the screen.
Winner: Galaxy Watch 6
Fitness and Health
The Galaxy Watch 6 is a good smartwatch for tracking exercise and monitoring sleep. Most of the Galaxy Watch 7 improvements focus on making these features even better.
Both models monitor key health metrics such as heart rate and blood oxygen levels. They also measure body composition and body fat levels through bioelectrical impedance analysis (BIA), similar to a smart scale . Both track a wide variety of exercises and offer in-depth sleep monitoring and snore tracking if you have a paired Samsung phone nearby.
The Galaxy Watch 7 gained FDA approval to detect sleep apnea. It adds advanced glycation end products (AGEs) index tracking to provide a more detailed picture of your metabolism. Thanks to the new, dual-frequency GPS, the Watch 7 is better able to follow your workouts and excursions through tall trees and buildings. The Watch 7 also offers revamped gesture controls, so you can double tap your fingers to take a picture or silence an alarm, similar to the gestures available on recent Apple Watches .
Using Galaxy AI , the Watch 7 encapsulates all of its collected fitness and sleep metrics into a holistic Energy Score from 0 to 100 to track your performance. It also offers personalized wellness tips on how to improve the score and feel better as a result.
Most of the new features of the Watch 7, including the AI guidance and the gesture controls, are only available to those who have a Samsung phone. You have less reason to upgrade if you have the Watch 6 and a non-Samsung phone. That said, Samsung is offering some nice improvements on the Watch 7 that solidify its strengths for Samsung phone users, especially as those AI insights did prove helpful in our testing.
Winner: Galaxy Watch 7
