Product Review: Up24 by Jawbone

Have you noticed people wearing these sleek, rubberized bands lately? They look so stylish that you’d think they’re merely wrist candy. Truth is, those bands provide useful information that can actually improve one’s lifestyle.

It’s called the Up24 by Jawbone. The Up24 is a fitness band that tracks your activity, diet, and sleep. If you wish, you can also monitor your food and water intake, your weight, your moods, and goals. As they say on their website, it’s an “intelligent computer wrapped around your wrist.”

I received a sample from Up24 over 2 months ago. To be quite honest with you, I never felt the need to get a fitness tracker since, as a runner, the only thing I obsess over is my pace, distance, and time during a run. But, I thought I’d give it a try and see for myself what the fuss was all about.

Sample Homescreen

[ LIKES ]

+ Easy tracking. Up24 won’t demand much of you to monitor your activities. As long as it’s synced with your iphone or android phone (which you only need to do once when you take it out of the box), then it will automatically track the number of steps you take during the day like a trusty pedometer. For sleep, you just have to press the silver button at the end of the band before you doze off. All other information, such as diet, weight, and goals, will require you to input details, but it’s user-friendly.

+ Sleep Tracker. I would say that the single most useful information for me was the sleep tracker. Up24 can monitor the total number of hours you slept, how much of that is sound sleep and light sleep, how long it took you to fall asleep, how long you were in bed, and even how many times you woke up during the night. If you set sleep goals, let’s say 8 hours nightly, it will monitor your sleep for a week or so and notify you when you’re not getting enough sleep…as it often did with me! Sleep is a big part of our training as athletes and this feature helped bring home the point for me.

Felt like a teenager again when Up24 told me one time to go to bed at 8:14 PM! LOL

+ Number of steps. Up24 monitors how many steps you take throughout the day. It was astounding and interesting to learn that I took 34,795 steps during a long run! I’ll put this under the Like category because it’s definitely useful info for fitness enthusiasts who wish to see how much movement they had on any given day. However, for me, this was more of a nice to know since I have a Garmin to track my distance during runs.

+ Healthy Food Score and Water Log. You can track your meals and water intake just by clicking on the utensil at your homescreen. Up24 will give you a food score, number of calories eaten, estimated number of calories burned, and track the glasses of water you’ve had throughout the day.

+ Comfortable and sleek design. The bracelet is simple yet stylish so it doesn’t draw attention nor compete with regular attire for the day. It also sits comfortably on your wrist so much so that you often forget it’s there. The two ends do not lock up so the fit is secure, but never tight.

+ Easy to read data. All the information gathered appears on your Up24 app either on your iphone or android. You can quickly see on your homescreen the week’s information on your sleep, steps, and other information you inputted. If you click on Trends, you’ll see a chart of all the information since you started using Up24. From the menu, you can quickly access your Goals, Weight, and Apps. You even receive smart tips on your home screen!

+ Join a community. You can connect with other friends who have Up24 too. You can interact with each other and see what they’ve been up to as well. Conversely, you can also set some info to private if you don’t want them to find out you’re on secret training. (Hah!)

+ Connects with Apps. Up24 can connect with other apps like My Fitness Pal, Run Keeper, Strava, Map My Fitness, UP Coffee and more.

[ DISLIKES ]

+ One-week battery life. When I was using it, the battery life of Up24 lasts for only a week. For someone who leads a busy life, taking the time out to plug this in weekly was an inconvenience. I believe the latest download, however, addresses this problem and increases its battery life to two weeks. (I’ve been so busy I haven’t downloaded it yet!)

+ Healthy Food Score could be improved. This would work if your basis for eating well are calories. Personally, I don’t count calories but I believe more in ensuring I eat real, clean food with good proteins and limited gluten, so this isn’t so useful for me. To add, the restaurants included in the food are obviously American restaurants so you won’t be able to add a Jollibee Champ or Shakey’s Pizza in there unless you customize it.  (Maybe you just shouldn’t eat those at all! tsk tsk)

+ No screen. Compared to its competitors, the Nike Fuelband, Fitbit, or Garmin VivoFit and VivoSmart, the Up24 is the only one with no screen for you to see info immediately. I actually like the fact that it has no screen so it looks like a simple bracelet, but for those who may wish to see their info without having to access their smartphone, this may be a problem.

+ Not water proof. Up24 is water resistant, meaning you can shower with it and it can get wet under the rain, but you cannot swim with it.

[ TBR VERDICT ]

I found the Up24 a nifty gadget to own providing me with useful information on my sleep patterns. I must say that it’s almost a habit for me now to check if I got enough sleep throughout the night and I secretly aim to make my Up24 proud with getting 8 full hours of sleep!

The rest of the features, such as number of steps taken, food and water intake, weight goals, etc. were nice to know, but were not essential for me because I only really focus on my pace, time, and distance during a run. To add, I don’t really track my food intake as I only make sure I eat clean, healthy food without calorie counting.

Having said that, this may still be a product that people may benefit from on their road to fitness and health. I would recommend this product for athletes who are obsessive with tracking their sleep, activities, and meals. It’s also perfect for the fitness enthusiast, gym fanatic, or any individual who simply wants to be more aware of their health and needs a tracker to motivate them to stick to their program. Up24 can act as a pedometer, calorie counter, food and water tracker, and more. Best of all, it looks sleek and stylish enough to look just like a bracelet!

[ WHERE TO BUY ]

Up24 is available at R.O.X., Deuter, Chris Sports, Toby’s and Runnr. SRP Php 8,590