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Which smartwatch should you buy? Michael Kors Runway The Michael Kors Access Runway is a stylish smartwatch that builds and improves upon the success of its predecessor-The Access Sofie. Its battery life could still be better, and it's not the most practical fitness watch, however, we can deny the fact that it is a classy watch. Michael Kors Bradshaw This watch is all for its quality and style, delivers a lot of features - from built-in GPS and water-resistant to a built-in speaker and customisable watch faces - and offers great overall performance. For all the Michael Kors fans, it is all that you could request in a smartwatch, consummately mixing conventional Kors style with advanced smarts. Introduction There are numerous ways where a person can choose a smartwatch. The best place to start narrowing it down is to consider your purpose and what you want to buy. If you want to buy a smartwatch that has fitness tracking abilities but you don't want to compromise on style then In that event you need a smartwatch which gives you both and Michael Kors has a ton of wearables to bring to the table. I think the Michael Kors Runway and the Michael Kors Bradshaw are two well-known choices that you ought to consider. Michael Kors Bradshaw Source: Amazon It is available in 8 colours including black, silver, gold, navy, sable and the modern-day staple of all high-end personal electronics manufactures that is rose gold, the model we reviewed was the navy-tone stainless steel variant. One of the first things that strike you about the Bradshaw is its weight. The whole thing weighs 145 grams of which the actual case accounts for only 51 grams. To put it into perspective, the heaviest Apple Watch weighs 125 grams. Upon slipping it onto my wrist, however, it's a different story. The Bradshaw is perfectly balanced, sits very well on your wrist and has the feel of a premium timepiece. The generous strap, because it's likely to be loose on most wrists. It is comfortable and suits the aforementioned chunkiness of the actual watch perfectly. The crown is located at the traditional 3 o’clock position and serves little purpose apart from being a power button and a long press gets you to the app menu. And while it looks like it should turn, perhaps allowing you to sort through notifications or apps, it doesn’t. What it does do, on the other hand, is looking very stylish, featuring the only visible branding on the body of the watch. In terms of colours and tonnes, customisation options are available, which will include a jewelled gold strap, the basic black and navy versions of the Bradshaw look the most visually appealing. A 35.5 millimetres screen on a 46 millimetres case would generally translate into wide bezels. Not this one though. With sloping bezels and a deceptively broad body, the screen appears to be just the right size. Unfortunately, it's when you turn on the Bradshaw that things begin to go slightly downhill. Onboard the Bradshaw are also a speaker, microphone, accelerometer and gyroscope, but somewhat surprisingly — when you consider the pricing, there’s no heart rate detector. One way of looking at it is that the Bradshaw is definitely not a watch you’re likely to wear on a run or to the gym, and so you’re unlikely to be checking your heart rate on this smartwatch. Perhaps, but that seems to be a very flimsy reason not to include a feature that is de rigueur on most smartwatches today. The Bradshaw’s 360 mAh battery is charged wirelessly with a magnetic disc (which you have to plug into a power socket) that for the large part, sticks efficiently to the watch. Unfortunately, charging takes a very long time — nearly five hours to go from 0 to 100 per cent. Bradshaw will be receiving the Android Wear 2.0 OS update, which is splendid news because the first generation of this smartwatch operating system is on its last legs. It’s not so much because of glitches and problems — of which it has a fair few, but rather because the OS looks and feels outdated. Start using the Bradshaw and one thing quickly becomes clear: The screen isn’t very responsive. Over the two weeks during which the smartwatch was used, constant swipes across the screen went unnoticed by the Bradshaw. It took exaggerated slow swipes to get to what you want. Whether this is due to the type of glass used or the device’s inability to follow instructions is not known. As for the gestures, it wasn’t unusual to spend 30 or so seconds flicking the wrist back and forth to dismiss a notification. Further, loading times for apps and emails are astonishingly long given the processor. Going back to notifications, performance is inconsistent. It’s possible to go from promptly receiving WhatsApp messages on Bradshaw to dealing with a vibrating wrist long after you’ve accepted a phone call. And why? Because the watch hasn’t worked out that you’ve already answered the call. ‘Phantom calls’ — i.e. the vibration and onscreen options to reject or accept a call, after the actual call has ended — were a regularly noted feature. This brings us neatly to a very important question: How long does the battery last? Answer: Not very long. At all. 360 mAh should be more than enough to see you through a full 24 hours in theory. According to the Michael Kors website, users should be able to get ‘one-two days’ of battery life from a single charge. And technically, this is accurate… if you’re not wearing the watch and you keep it aside disconnected from the mobile phone. When kept like that, you can easily extract over 30 hours of battery life from it. From the point-of-view of aesthetics, this is one of the most attractive smartwatches you can buy. The poor battery life, performance issues and absence of something as commonly-found as a heart rate detector render this first-class watch a decidedly second-class smartwatch. And despite all that, should you still be enamoured by the look of the device, you’d be better off getting hold of the analogue Bradshaw watch, which is available at around $100 less than its smart counterpart. Michael Kors Access Runway source: Amazon If you're looking for a fashion-first Wear OS smartwatch this could be the right one for you. Get all your notifications sent straight to your wrist, when you seamlessly pair your smartphone with this smartwatch from Michael Kors. With the rapid charging, you get a full battery in around two hours. You’ll barely have to be without your watch, with impressive power that has it ready to go in no time. Health and fitness tracking keep tabs on your steps taken, distance travelled, calories burned and the quality of your sleep. So you can monitor your progress effortlessly, from the convenience of your wrist. The water-resistant design has you covered, with protection for up to 20 metres. Ensuring that you can swim and shower without having to worry. A perfect combination of design and technology, this Michael Kors smartwatch gives you convenient smart functionality in a stylish iconic look. The Access Runway takes its design from the company’s standard runway watch. This design is on the chunkier side or oversized as the company itself described it, exactly like Bradshaw, offering a stainless steel casing with 18milemeters wide lugs. And it's an amazing design. I have personally worn this watch every single day for a month. The smartwatch is fashion-focused and very comfortable to wear. The standard Michael Kors Runway watch has a singular crown on the right of the watch face, while the access runway features the Michael kors-etched rotating crown to the right of its touchscreen, along with two action buttons either side. The access casing has a 2 shades effect on its edge made up of brushed and polished steel, showing a more sophisticated finish compared to the Access Sofie, while the underside of the case has a heart rate sensor which is a new feature in the access range. The Michael Kors Access Runway is also Swimproof. There are 9 colours options available which include rose gold, gold and silver casings, also colour matched linked bracelet strap or a silicone strap. My review model is rose gold with a linked bracelet strap- and I love it. All straps can be interchanged, so if you pick one of the models with a traditionally linked bracelet, you can always invest in a silicone alternative for the days you are feeling more active. The design is very Michael kors. It takes one of the company's well known traditional watch models and makes it smart which is exactly what two predecessors which are Bradshaw and Sofie did. Like the Sofie and Bradshaw, the runway won't be to everyone's choice but if you are looking for a smartwatch that combines substance and style, the Michael kors access range is a great place to start, especially if you are already a fan of Kors watches. The smartwatch features a fully round 1.19-inch touch screen display, which is the main difference between the access device and the traditional runway watch. There is an AMOLED display, which means you get rich and vibrant colours coupled with deep blacks. Everything is crisp and sharp thanks to the 390x390 resolution. The smartwatch has a great screen with ample brightness for even the sunniest of days. The access runway also features an Always-on Display, which is darker and more subtle than the standard display, switching to a monochrome output and only displaying the time to preserve battery life. The access runway takes your heart rate every 20 minutes, or on-demand if you tap the HR complication on a compatible watch face or press the bottom action button when in Google fit. The heart rate is fairly accurate, though we would always recommend those ratings to an HR zone wear a chest strap for the most accurate readings. Google fit is accessed with a swipe from left-right on the runway’s screen, or by pressing the bottom action button. It concentrates on 2 metrics- moves minutes and heart points- both of them are shown in circles, like apple watch. Move minutes are gained for any physical activity you do, from walking to yoga, while heart points are scored when you do activities at a higher intensity, the more points you get. At first, these seem like pretty pointless metrics, but if you are anything like us, after about a week of wearing the access runway then you will want to complete those rings before the end of every day. There is built-in GPS, too, meaning you can go for a walk, hike, ride or run without your phone and the Access Runway will record your route and distance. Scroll down past the Move Points and Heart Points rings on the Access Runway's screen and you'll find other information, including steps taken, heart rate data and calories burned. More information can be found by tapping on the respective metric too. Data is recorded and presented in the Google Fit app for Android users, or within the Wear OS app for iOS users. The Michael Kors Access Runway conveys a smooth, slick execution generally. We had a couple of cases of it stammering before the Wear OS programming update landed - yet following that it had the option to switch between assignments without an issue. The built-in battery is charged through a magnetic plate, making top-ups simple. That is something to be thankful for, as you'll have to do so consistently. It's this longevity per charge where the Access Runway is most let down. The battery life is claimed to offer over one day of use - but we only managed to get a full day from 7 am to midnight at best. The access runway runs on Google wear OS platform with voice-activated Google assistant. The crown on the Access Runway allows you to swiftly scroll through the various apps, while a swipe from the top of the screen provides better and quicker access to a larger variety of settings from Google Pay to finding your phone. The Michael Kors Access Runway is a remarkable smartwatch. It's the ideal gadget for those after up-to-date wrist-wear with strong execution and plenty of features, from its strong waterproof form to its heart rate monitoring. However, the battery life could certainly be far better and the Wi-Fi connectivity can be a little glitchy. Its fitness-focused features also seem a little mismatched for something so fashion-focused, so if you're looking to go sporty then we'd turn your attention to a Garmin or even a Fitbit tracker. Conclusion Thinking about the entirety of this, if your primary objective is to put resources into a great smartwatch that is exclusively centred around wellness, there are preferable choices out there over these two Michael Kors wearables. There's no denying that they've made some significant improvements that deserve acknowledgement, especially when it comes to the Runway, but you could easily score a more fitness-focused device elsewhere for this price.] So . Want to buy any of these Check out cureent price of Michael Kors Bradshaw Check out cureent price of Michael Kors Runway