review : Xiaomi Mi Band Pulse review

The Xiaomi Mi Band Pulse, the Chinese manufacturer's new heart rate monitoring fitness band, is ludicrously cheap. It can be picked up in China for next to the price of the original Mi Band at 99 Yuan and is on sale in Xiaomi's global store for the slightly higher sum of $27.

That said, an incredibly cheap tracker that doesn't work is probably worse than no tracker at all. So will the Pulse shift another 10 million wearable s for Xiaomi – and does it deserve to? Probably to that first question and not quite to the second.


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Xiaomi Mi Band Pulse: Design

We've very much in Wearable Tech 1.0 territory with the Mi Band Pulse's design. It's almost identical to the original Mi Band with a small, oval shaped module with a clean, matte finish and a selection of black or colored rubber bands (the colors cost slightly more).

If Misfit hadn't slashed its prices so ferociously we would have stuck with our verdict on the Mi Band's design and build. It does still work because it's so simple – no fiddling about with annoying clasps, plus a handy IP67 dust and waterproof rating.

And it's only half a gram heavier than the first Mi Band at 13.5g which, for the record, is so light you'll forget you're wearing it, and you'll also be able to comfortably sleep with it still on your wrist.

But with the Misfit Flash and Flash Link also now selling for rock bottom (from $16.99) prices, in most cases we'd recommend checking those two trackers out instead. They are more stylish, more versatile and, most importantly, more accurate than the Mi Band family.

The Mi Band Pulse is slightly chunkier than its predecessor, due to the optical heart rate monitor, but it's hard to spot the difference. Still annoying is the small bit of metal which will scrape on laptops.

As with the Mi Band, I didn't pay too much attention to the three LED's on top of the tracker but they can be customized to show your daily progress. Overall, it's a durable build but the bands do get scuffed up quite quickly so be prepared to buy a replacement at some point.


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Xiaomi Mi Band Pulse: Tracking

The Mi Band Pulse tracks steps, distance and estimates calories/grams of fat burned, just like the first Mi Band. It also breaks your walking and running into blocks of active time and presents hourly, daily, weekly and monthly graphs.

In general the Mi Band Pulse, like the first one, tends to overestimate steps – and so, everything else – and I did still tend to find entries in the Mi Fit app timeline that had me covering 1.7 km when I know I walked about half that distance then sat at my desk for half an hour.

That doesn't mean it's off entirely – the Mi Band Pulse successfully recognised runs and workouts – it just means that Mi Fit You ends up looking slightly more active than Real You.

There have been some accusations that the Mi Band Pulse is more prone to counting steps when you are simply moving your arm. If you're hell bent on this budget tracker then I guess my only suggestion is to take it off when typing, for instance. And again, I'd recommend a Misfit tracker over a Mi Band.

The sleep tracking, which employs optical HRM readings at 10 minute intervals to help in monitoring, was actually pretty usable. It was hit and miss, of course, so you'll need to keep an eye on your light sleep stats to check you weren't just frozen in concentration while watching the latest Making A Murderer on the couch.

But what's good here is that even though the Mi Band Pulse has auto sleep detection, on the sleep tabs in the app, you can edit the "fell asleep at" and "woke up at" times the next day. A bunch of wearable with auto sleep detection that are also not 100% accurate don't let you correct it which is hella annoying.

And, to be fair, one night I was lying awake in bed at 2.30 am, suffering from post-CES jet lag, listening to the Call Your Girlfriend podcast. The next day, the Mi Band Pulse correctly logged that I didn't actually get to sleep till 3 am even though I was lying there, cursing long distance flights, for hours.

Xiaomi Mi Band Pulse: The Mi Fit app

Xiaomi's companion fitness app is fairly basic with daily totals, graphs to swipe through, the option to share your day's progress on social media and a bunch of settings. There's not much to motivate you here compared to more sophisticated ecosystems, though you will get a nudge when you've hit your step goal for the day and a total distance on your profile page. 

Quick note: If you're finding it impossible to sign up or log in to Mi Fit, it's best to do so on desktop then sign in on the iPhone or Android app. Don't ask us why, just another Xiaomi quirk.

The good news is that Mi Fit is compatible with both Google Fit and Apple Health, though with the latter you can only share steps and sleep data with Apple. With Google Fit, the Mi Fit app successfully shared steps, calories burned, distance and sleep data, though annoyingly it transfers over Xiaomi's blocks of activity which don't always make for the most useful scrolling.

The Mi Fit app is also where you can set up extra features like the Mi Band's alarm and app notifications for up to three apps, chosen by you. That's a bit of a shame but at least you can choose to receive Whats-app notifications, which is more than you can say for recent Fit-bit trackers. The vibrations are on the loud side but they're strong enough that you won't miss them.

Mi Fit can also send you an activity summary every day at 9.30 pm and a sleep summary after you wake up, both of which are fairly reliable. In the app you can also see the current charge status of your Mi Band Pulse showing when you last charged it (which, to be honest, tends to be wrong). If you have a Xiaomi phone, the Mi Fit can even be used to unlock it.

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