Picking a smartwatch isn’t as simple as buying the best-looking or most feature- packed one you can find. To make things easier for you, I tested nearly every flagship smartwatch available over the course of four months to make sure I wasn’t leaving any stone unturned. Here are some of my best picks.

The Series 9 came out in September. I’ve been using it for several months, and the experience is nearly identical to last year's Series 8, but it has some minor improvements that’ll help it stand the test of time a bit longer. It has double brightness of Series 8, new gesture- based controls that don’ t require you to touch the screen, and Siri commands are now processed right on the device rather than sent to the cloud.

If you’re not sure whether you can commit to Android or iOS for more than a year or two, or you like to lean heavily into the fitness aspect of wearables, get Garmin’s Venu 2 Plus. Its fitness tracking is hard to beat, with options for cardio, HIIT, yoga, Pilates, golfing, cycling, and swimming, plus all the basics for health tracking.

Compared with the Series 9, the Ultra 2 has bigger screen, longer battery life, more durable design, and additional Action Button for quickly triggering workouts. However, I don’t think the price point merits a best-in-class designation. The Ultra 2 has an Action Button on the left side of the display. You can program it to quickly start a workout, timer, the watch’s flashlight mode, or run a custom Shortcut automation.

The Series 9 is still an excellent option for most smartwatch users, but the Ultra 2’s additional adjustments make it worthwhile for anyone who truly swears by getting things done on their wrist.

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