Better than Apple? The Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra is one of our favorite smartwatches (and it’s $200 off)

Matthew Miller/ZDNET

What’s the deal?

Samsung’s 47mm Galaxy Watch Ultra has kept its huge $200 on Amazon. The wearable is still on sale for $450. If you want to save even more money, you can purchase the device in Titanium Gray for about $434<!–>. We recommend taking advantage of these deals soon because they could both end soon.

ZDNET’s key takeaways

The 47mm Samsung Galaxy Watch Ultra–> normally retails for $650 on Amazon, although it does go on sale.
It’s a stylish-looking smartwatch with a slew of safety features and a long-lasting battery.
However, it’s only available in a single size (47mm, to be exact), meaning it may not be a good fit for folks with smaller wrists.

Samsung’s Galaxy Watch Ultra is the company’s top-of-the-line wearable, sporting a tough exterior, an eye-catching design, and a metric ton of features.

Also: The best Cyber Monday deals still live

A few years ago, I purchased the Samsung Galaxy Watch 5 Pro for its longer-than-average battery life and rugged design features. While I passed on the Watch 6 series due to the lack of similar capabilities, this year Samsung finally made a watch fit for my needs, active lifestyle, and next upgrade.

After testing the Galaxy Watch Ultra<!–> for the past three months, it has become my favorite Android smartwatch this year. Here’s why.

To start, I paired my orange Galaxy Watch Ultra with my Galaxy S24 Ultra, a duo that Samsung probably wants everyone to be sporting. Since it had been a while since I used a Galaxy Watch, I didn’t particularly miss having to install and sync several apps, such as Samsung Health, Health Monitor, and Galaxy Wearables, for things to function adequately.

Also: Garmin’s latest flagship is getting smarter, giving me less reason to buy an Apple Watch

To be clear, Apple requires a similar multi-app sync for its phone-watch combo to work best, so both ecosystems can be a bit burdensome compared to traditional sports watches that only require one dedicated app to function.

Still, the Galaxy Wearables app was especially useful to have. On it, you can adjust watch face complications, app screen organization, tile ordering, and even Quick Panel settings. It is great to be able to effortlessly customize the watch face from a larger phone display and have things synced almost immediately.