Google’s Fitbit Air is a $99 screen wearable that I can take seriously

Is 2026 the year we enter the screen? That seems to be the case with Google’s release of the Fitbit Airour competitor Whoop, is available now. Whoop may have started the screenless wristband craze, but Google is proving that an affordable health tracker can be a commercial success, especially if it’s comfortable, useful, and durable — at its $100 price point.

Also: Fitbit Air vs. Whoop: I compared Google’s screenless fitness tracker to the industry best

The Fitbit Air announcement came with several software updates, including a change in the app’s name from Fitbit to Google Health and the global launch of Google Health Coach, an AI companion that powers the premium app experience.

I’ve been testing the device over the past week as I’ve been running, lifting weights, doing yoga, and logged hours on the elliptical. I asked the AI ​​trainer for help in planning my workout routine, understanding my recovery, and nutritional advice. After stress testing the Fitbit Air, I’m well positioned to tell you if it’s a worthy purchase. Spoiler alert: it is.

Your experience with Fitbit Air will vary depending on whether you subscribe to Google Health Premium. Most of the Fitbit Air’s functions are the same across tiers, but some in-app features, such as meal logging by messaging an AI trainer, are a little less seamless in the membership tier.

Out of the box, the $100 Fitbit Air comes in four colors: lavender, berry, obsidian, and mist (blue gray). It’s a thin band that takes up less space on my wrist than my Whoop or Apple Watch. It’s also easy.

Also: I compared the best smartwatches from Google and Samsung – here’s how the Pixel wins

It has an optical heart rate monitor, three-axis accelerometer and gyroscope, SpO2 monitoring sensors, a temperature sensor, and a vibration motor (used for the Fitbit Air wake-up alarm). It doesn’t have GPS for location tracking, but since it’s a screenless device, the Fitbit Air uses your phone’s location monitoring. If you want to sign up for a free phone plan everywhere, you’ll have to use one of Google’s other devices (like its Pixel Watch).

The Fitbit Air’s screenless design allows it to promote healthy relationships through activity tracking. I love my Apple Watch, but it made me a little anxious about logging my steps, because of the constant reminders of my work goals on the screen. A screenless tracker, on the other hand, is less vulnerable; with all the data stored in the app, i can check if i want.

Of all the wearables I’ve tested, this one is tied for the best. On the other hand, when I was working out, I would find myself looking at the band out of habit, looking at my heart rate or calories burned, only to realize that I would have to dig into my app to find them.

The battery lasts about a week. I started wearing the device on Saturday morning, and by the following Saturday morning, its battery was almost at 20%. Not too bad, right?

Also: This minimalist fitness tracker is a refreshing alternative (without a subscription)

You can log a variety of activities with the Google Health app, whether you’re running a trail, practicing Bikram yoga, or doing ballet. It shows your total cardio volume, calories burned, and heart rate as you log the activity. On the Google Health home screen, you’ll see your weekly cardio load (adjusted each week based on your activity goals and habits), sleep, steps, and recovery score.

I like to have a target for the week front and center — it works as a good workout pace. I know when to increase my cardio during a slow weekday, or take it easy on the weekends when I’ve already packed the front of my week with high-intensity running and workouts.

Because you can’t view any exercise data on the device, it would be nice to have some metrics, like calories burned, steps, or heart rate zones, available on your phone’s home screen display. This isn’t currently in Google Health, but I’d like to see it in a future update for easy viewing.

I would also like to use Google Health Coach while logging a workout to, say, ask it to convert 16kg to pounds or change one arm exercise to another during my upper body strength training.

Also: I’ve been wearing the Whoop 5.0 for a month – it combines the best of the Oura Ring with the Apple Watch

The device is still designed for the general fitness audience — not so much the premium, longevity- and biohacking-obsessed audience as Whoop. It is also reasonably priced. Aside from the $100 annual Google Health subscription, the Fitbit Air costs $100. In contrast, annual Whoop subscriptions start at $200, with the top “medical grade” tier at $360.

Google’s AI at its core

The Google Health app (formerly known as Fitbit) brings a bunch of basic health trackers, and if you want to style it freely by importing your weight training data from another app, that’s available to you in the Google Health Coach chat with an additional Google Health subscription.

The membership and access to Google Health Coach elevated the Fitbit Air to me. Instead of digging through tabs to log my meals or add notes to my strength training session, I can simply chat with a Fitness Coach to do these things instead. I log and track all my weight training data through an app called Fitbod. When I was testing the Fitbit Air, I wanted to add the exercises from that app to the Fitbit Air, so I captured the sets and reps, uploaded them to Health Coach, and the AI ​​handled the rest.

Also: Is the AI ​​health coach subscription a scam? My verdict after testing Fitbit’s for a month

The first time I tried this, it didn’t work because when I looked back at that session, I didn’t see any exercises that I shared with the trainer. The second time I tried, however, my tests were indeed included.

AI is also good at tracking nutrition. You don’t need to search through complex product information to find the right type of yogurt to eat; you can just give it details, like “one serving of 5% Fage Greek yogurt”, and it records everything for me.

Just note that I have seen the AI ​​cheat, as AI is wont to do. For example, one night it mentioned a 52-minute elliptical session I had done that morning. But I didn’t exercise that day (unless it confused my ten-minute coffee walk with a 52-minute session on the elliptical).

When I asked a Google spokesperson about this issue, they explained that Coach is designed to recognize patterns but can sometimes connect the dots. “We put our trainer through rigorous testing – every time a bug like this is flagged, we turn it into a new rigorous testing question that the AI ​​must pass before we release new app updates.

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This is a continuous process, so that our system becomes smarter, safer, and more accurate every day,” a Google spokesperson told ZDNET. If any datapoint is presented or the truth is not clear, the Google spokesperson recommended asking the Trainer, “Are you sure?” or where the Trainer gets the data. This makes the Trainer redo its work.

This handy, seamless touch found in the Health Coach provides the perfect functionality and fitness tracking experience for the Fitbit Air. Health Coach helps me better understand the data that Fitbit Air is collecting, and in doing so, encourages me to ask more questions or use it in new ways.

ZDNET shopping advice

The free subscription category and the Google Health Premium category are a good example of a company that knows exactly how to sell its products to different groups. I Fitbit Air fits the bill as an affordable fitness tracker, with the option to customize and upgrade your subscription.

It’s light, thin, unobtrusive, and stylish as a fitness tracker can get (something I can’t say about almost every smartwatch I wear). Plus, it takes a week to charge, and costs only $100 — not cheap compared to the competition.

Also: I tracked 3,000 steps on my Apple Watch, Google Pixel, and Oura Ring – this one was very accurate.

The device is best suited for people who depend on fitness and health tracking who don’t really need a shiny screen on their wrist. Once they fully adopt the device, wear it for a few months, and dig deeper into activity tracking, I can see these users getting more out of Health Coach and adding to that annual subscription.

Why the Fitbit Air gets an Editor’s Choice award

It’s affordable and perfect for first-time users or anyone flirting with step counting and sleep tracking. That said, it will also do well in the hand of someone who has tracked their health for years and is looking for a lightweight, smart smartwatch alternative (with a seven-day battery life).

Its AI Health Coach improves the device by connecting patterns, completing tasks, and answering health questions, and I like that people can pay more for it without being automatically tied to a monthly subscription.