I walked another 8,000 steps with the Apple Watch 12 and Fitbit Edge: Here’s which came out on top
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Jane McGuire is Tom's Guide's Fitness Managing Editor, which means she looks after everything fitness-related — from running gear and fitness trackers to yoga mats and sports bras. An avid runner, Jane has tested and reviewed fitness products for the past five years, so she knows what to look for when finding a good running watch or a pair of shorts with pockets big enough for your smartphone, running gels, and house keys. Jane has run six marathons — the London Marathon five times, and the Berlin Marathon once -and is still on a quest to tick off all of the marathon majors. Her marathon PR is 3:30, which she ran in the New Balance Supercomp Elite V5's, but she also spends a lot of time talking about her ‘joy plan’, where she runs for happiness, not for PR’s. Previous to Tom’s Guide, Jane worked for Runner’s World, where she co-hosted the Runner’s World podcast. She also presents on a YouTube channel called the Run Testers, alongside other running-mad journalists, where they review the latest shoes, kit, and tech. Her work has also appeared in Coach, Get Sweat Go, and Women’s Health. When she's not pounding the pavements, you'll find Jane striding round the Surrey Hills, taking far too many photos of her spaniel, Toby.
Earlier this week, my colleague Dan walked 6,000 steps with the new Fitbit Edge and the Apple Watch Series 12 to test which was more accurate when it comes to one of the most basic smartwatch requirements: step counting. Dan found that the $179 Fitbit Edge came out on top of the $399 Apple Watch Series 12. Keen to find out more, I strapped both to my wrist and repeated the test.
Sure, both of these trackers will do a lot more than just count your steps. The Apple Watch Series 12 is like having an extension of your iPhone on your wrist, and is the best smartwatch on the market for most people. The Fitbit Edge seems to toe the line between the $99 screenless Fitbit Air and the Google Pixel Watch 5 — a bright screen, built-in GPS, and a continuous heart rate monitor.
Like all these walk tests, I strapped one watch to each wrist and used a $5 clicker tool from Amazon to count my steps as I walked manually. Both trackers count steps using an internal accelerometer, which measures the swing of your arms. Each swing counts for two steps, and it doesn’t matter whether you wear your watch on your dominant or non-dominant hand. It doesn’t matter if you walk with your hands in your pockets or holding a cup of coffee; the accelerometer should still measure your body’s movement.
Read on to find out which came out on top. You can also read our Apple Watch Series 12 review and our Fitbit Edge review here on Tom’s Guide.
As with all of the best Apple Watche s, the Apple Watch Series 12 still doesn’t tell you the number of steps you’ve taken during a specific workout; instead, you see an overall number of steps throughout the day, which you can now pin to your home screen. This is probably because steps aren’t actually that useful a metric beyond a certain point, but annoying for me when writing these articles. For this comparison, I downloaded a third-party Pedometer+ app onto my Apple Watch.
I split this walk up into three different walks, manually clicking each time I took a step. When I got home, I downloaded my data.
Manual:
2,900 steps
Apple Watch 12:
2,905 steps
Fitbit Edge:
2,864 steps
Manual:
2,990 steps
Apple Watch 12:
3,000 steps
Fitbit Edge:
2,964 steps
Manual:
2,380 steps
Apple Watch 12:
2,388 steps
Fitbit Edge:
2,371 steps
Manual:
8,270 steps
Apple Watch 12:
8,293 steps
Fitbit Edge:
8,199 steps
As you can see from the results, this one is incredibly close. The Apple Watch Series 12 overcounted by 23 steps; the Fitbit Edge missed 71 steps. With only 50 steps between them, it’s a tough one to call, but unlike Dan, I can say the Apple Watch Series 12 was slightly ahead here.
It’s worth noting that 50-70 steps is pretty much spot on. The average person takes 2,000 steps a mile, so an extra 23 steps is nothing.
To really compare these two watches head-to-head, you’d need to look at more than just how well they count steps. Both are designed to be worn 24/7 and help you track more than just walking workouts.
However, there are some big differences: as mentioned above, the Apple Watch Series 12 is designed to be an extension of your iPhone on your wrist, with plenty of apps at your disposal. The Fitbit Edge, on the other hand, is definitely more of a basic fitness tracker than a smartwatch.
We’ll continue to test and compare the two watches, but which would you buy?