Review: Withings ScanWatch 2 and Light – Hybrid Watches for Those Seeking a Break from Technology

These days, there’s been an uptick in people asking me about simple yet stylish smartwatches. Emphasis on simple. Begone fancy health and training features! Stuff the third-party apps! All they want is a device that looks nice, has bare-bones tracking, and doesn’t need frequent charging. Everything else — the Apple Watches, the Samsung Galaxy Watches, the Pixel Watches — comes with too many bells and whistles. Inevitably, the daily charging gets old, and these expensive watches end up collecting dust in a drawer.

If that’s you, the $349.95 Withings ScanWatch 2 or the $249.95 ScanWatch Light is worth a gander.

Withings ScanWatch 2

$346.95

The Good

• Long battery life
• You’re gonna get compliments
• Comfortable to wear
• Adds temperature and period tracking

The Bad

• The little OLED display is made for ants
• A bit pricey considering how simple it is

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Withings ScanWatch Light

$249.95

The Good

• Long battery life
• Also gets you lots of compliments
• Comfortable to wear
• Great price
• Adds period tracking

The Bad

• Has fewer sensors than the ScanWatch 2
• Again, the OLED display is tiny

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Get ready for compliments

When I wore these outside, I got stopped a lot by friends, family, co-workers, and the occasional stranger. “That looks really nice,” they all said. “Where did you get it?” That rarely happens.

Hybrid smartwatches like these are essentially dressier, incognito versions of yesteryear’s fitness bands stuffed inside an analog watch. Recently, on Threads, I saw a spirited discourse about whether you should wear an Apple Watch to a fancy dinner. Well, if you wore one to a wedding, only the eagle-eyed would notice that it’s a smartwatch.

Similar styles but slightly different vibes. The ScanWatch 2 (white) has an extra dial to track step goal progress.

The ScanWatch 2 is elegant, while the Light is sporty. A lot of it boils down to color and materials. The ScanWatch 2 has sapphire crystal and an extra dial for tracking step goal progress. It also opts for neutral colors like Withings’ classic white or black faces. (There’s also a fetching navy option.) The Light opts for Gorilla glass and comes in a fun minty green or a pale blue in addition to the black and white versions. Both have stainless steel cases in either silver or rose gold, with plenty of strap options. Outside of design, the ScanWatch 2 has more sensors and health tracking features, while the Light is a pared-down version that’s $100 cheaper.

I’d describe my style as “aggressively casual,” but neither watch stuck out like a sore thumb with plaids, band T-shirts, and jeans. Both were also easy to dress up for occasions when I had to look like a put-together adult.

I have small wrists, but the 37mm Light was just the right size — and comically tiny whenever I’d compare it to the 49mm Apple Watch Ultra 2 on my other arm. The 38mm ScanWatch 2 was similar in feel, though that also comes in a larger 42mm model. These are on the smaller side for smartwatches, so if you want something bigger, they might not fit the bill.

Bare-bones basics for the tech-fatigued

These are for the folks who say a watch is for telling the frickin’ time… and maybe one or two other things.

That’s because neither watch conveys information, aside from the time, particularly well. All you get is a tiny grayscale OLED display. If you want to read a notification, you have to wait for it to slowly scroll through. Since there’s no touchscreen, you have to use the digital crown to scroll through menus and press it to select something. I’ll put up with it to start a workout, but I’m less inclined to do it for timers or EKG readings. It’s much less tedious than the Fossil Gen 6 Hybrid’s interface, but most days, it was easier to think of this as a regular watch.

That tiny OLED window isn’t great for conveying information. It’s better for notification triaging.

As with older fitness bands, this is most useful for triaging notifications and passively tracking basic metrics. “Oh, what’s this buzz? Brad emailed. Brad can wait.” (You can also choose which apps ping you.) Besides, you’ll need to pull out your phone to take calls or view your data anyway.

If you want to be more present, going low-tech can be a useful tool

Because its only screen is tiny and grayscale, the battery lasts weeks at a time. If you’re mostly using this as an analog watch, those gains multiply. Seriously, I wore each for weeks. Withings estimates you get about 30 days on a single charge, though I got around 21 to 25 due to heavier usage for testing. I took the ScanWatch 2 on a weeklong business trip, left the charger at home, and it was all good.

The only problem is you might lose the charger because you rarely need it. When I moved, the ScanWatch 2’s charger disappeared into the same interdimensional portal that gobbles up all my left socks. You can buy replacements, but unlike other gadgets, all smartwatch makers have their own proprietary chargers. That means replacements can get pricey ($24.95, in this case). And the two watches don’t even use the same proprietary charger. I tried seeing if the Light’s charger would work, but it doesn’t. So if you and a family member both use Withings but have different watches, you won’t be able to share.