Why you don't need to spend more than £50 on a fitness tracker

With lots of fancy smartwatches on the market from big brands like Apple, Samsung and Google, it can be tempting to spend a lot to track your activity. But if you're after a device to help record your heart rate, steps and sports, we've found fitness trackers under £50 that could help you stick to your new year fitness goals.

Not every cheap fitness tracker is a winner and we've seen some with sensors with recordings that are over 20% off the accurate values. But our reviews can help you find the real gems.

Read on to find out the perks of cheaper trackers and our reviews of some of the most popular.

Our fitness tracker reviews and smartwatch reviews include lab tests of all the most popular models. And check out our guide to the best smart rings to see if they're a better option.

Battery life on cheap fitness trackers

If you're tempted to buy an expensive fitness tracker to get a better battery life, you can save your money. We've averaged the battery life of the fitness trackers we've reviewed and it's actually cheaper fitness trackers that usually last longer. On average, fitness trackers under £50 will last just shy of 10 and a half days with typical levels of use. Pricier trackers last around nine and a half days on average.

A lot of expensive trackers have a built-in GPS or they can connect your to your phone's GPS. This can help track your distance more precisely when exercising, but it can also drain the battery significantly, with some devices lasting just a few hours before they go flat. So turn off the GPS when you don't need it to save your battery. 

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Accuracy of cheap fitness trackers

You might think that the more you pay, the more accurate a fitness tracker's health sensors will be. But Which? lab data reveals that the differences in accuracy are not that substantial. On average, the heart-rate sensors we tested varied by no more than 4% when resting, walking or during higher-intensity training. When tracking steps on average, the differences are negligible between trackers under £50 and over £50.

If precise distance tracking is important to you, like if you are training for a long run, price can have more of a factor here. This is because more expensive devices have built-in GPS, which generally give more precise readings.

On products under £50, we've seen good and bad levels of accuracy, so it's worth checking our guide to the best fitness trackers for 2025.

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Activities and extra tracking on cheap fitness trackers

Buying a cheap fitness tracker doesn't always mean you have limited functionality. Most trackers we've tested this year have a long lists of activities and sports you can track (often over 150), and some offer extra health insights such as estimating the quality of your sleep, your stress levels and menstrual tracking.

We've tested ones under £50 that measure your blood oxygen levels accurately. More and more will also approximate your VO2 Max, which gives you an impression of your aerobic endurance.

Many will create graphs you can view on the tracker's screen or on the paired app to give you more details of your progress too.

What about cheap smartwatches?

Buying a smartwatch instead of a fitness tracker doesn't necessarily give you more accurate sensors, but smartwatches generally have more features than fitness trackers.

The first are what we call 'smart features', which pair with a smartphone. This includes being able to respond to messages, take calls, store and control music on the go, and make contactless payments directly on the watch. The smaller screens on fitness trackers wouldn't be a comfortable way to control these smart features but it's easier on a smartwatch. Cheap smartwatches have a good range of smart features and extra features like fall detection and crash detection are becoming more common, but it varies from model to model.

Some smartwatches also have specialised health and fitness tracking features. Many cheap ones have a built-in GPS for precise distance tracking without needing to stay connected to a smartphone. When you get more expensive, some are made from rugged materials to survive activity in harsh conditions, and the latest Apple Watch even claims to help identify sleep apnoea.

You can get a great fitness tracker for under £50, whereas good smartwatches range from £100 to over £1,000. So if you're just looking for a tracker to give you insight into your day-to-day activity on a basic level, consider a fitness tracker first.

Find out the Best Smartwatches 2025: the Best Buys from our independent expert tests 

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Three cheap wearables to consider

There's plenty to choose from whether you're shopping for a fitness tracker or smartwatch, and while you can get good models for less, quality varies and it's worth doing your research before you buy. Here are three cheap wearables to consider.

Xiaomi Mi Smart Band 9

The Xiaomi Mi Smart Band 9 has heart-rate tracking, an SpO2 monitor, and claims to track more 150 sports. The screen is oval-shaped, in colour, and measures 1.62 inches with 192 x 490 resolution.

Fitness features include a heart-rate monitor, a step counter, and it will also estimate your VO2 Max – a measurement of your aerobic endurance. The pulse oximeter approximates your blood-oxygen levels.

Find out how it performs in our comprehensive Xiaomi Mi Smart Band 9 review, buy it from Xiaomi, or compare prices at other retailers below.

Huawei Band 9

The Huawei Band 9 is a reasonably priced fitness tracker that has lots of features such as sleep tracking, blood oxygen monitoring and it’s also swim proof in shallow water. It has a 1.47-inch rectangular, colour AMOLED touchscreen. 

It also offers heart-rate monitoring,  blood oxygen tracking (sometimes known as a pulse oximeter or SpO2 sensor), and will estimate your VO2 max (or aerobic fitness level). It has menstrual tracking and can give you an impression of your stress levels.

Find out the full scoop in our Huawei Band 9 review or pick it up from the retailers below.

Amazfit Active

This smartwatch has impressive specs for its price. It's sleek build and 1.75-inch square screen makes it look a lot like a pricier Apple Watch.

It has a number of health sensors, including a heart-rate monitor, SpO2 readings and step tracking. For distance tracking, there’s a built-in GPS. It can track more than 120 activities in detail, including swimming, and when running, you can add a “virtual pacer” to keep up with a customised pace.

Find out more in our full Amazfit Active review, or buy it at the retailers below.

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