Haylou Solar
Our editorial rating based on product testing.
- Metal body
- Battery life up to 30 days on a single charge
- Haylou’s simple software
- Low price
- Cheap TFT display
- GPS sensor missing
Affordable smartwatches are also a popular item on the sales market. Today, we’ll introduce the model labeled Haylou Solar, which offers even a metal body, a sensor for monitoring heart rate or sleep, as well as simple in-house software. We’ll share more in our just-starting review.
You’ve probably already heard about the Haylou, brand, especially in connection with producing popular and affordable true-wireless headphones. It’s a partner brand of the Chinese manufacturer Xiaomi, which also belongs to the shared Xiaomi ecosystem.
Even so, they bring something of their own into their products, and these products stand out with a good price/performance ratio.
Haylou Solar: Where to buy?
We purchased the Haylou Solar watches through the Cafago e-shop, which ships the goods from a Chinese warehouse. Delivery took approximately 3 weeks. Shipping is completely free and you don’t have to worry about any customs duty charges.
Buy Haylou Solar at a great price
Standard package
The product packaging of the Haylou Solar watches is traditionally, following the pattern of other products from the Haylou partner brand, very simple. The outer top envelope features an image of the product itself with its name and basic technical specifications. Inside it, you’ll then find a paper box of compact size.
After you open it, on the very top you’ll find the watch sealed with a protective film, placed in a soft padding. Under it, there’s a specific magnetic charging cable that connects to the pins on the underside of the watch. The package also includes a brief paper instruction sheet for connecting to the app and for using the watch itself.
Metal construction
Haylou Solar are watches that are very affordable, but the price definitely hasn’t been reflected in the build quality. The watches even offer a metal body, or a frame around the display. The front panel is made of glass, while the bottom one is plastic. The package includes a standard silicone strap, which can be swapped for another universal one with a 22 mm width.
The dimensions of the watch without the strap attached are 45,3 x 11,4 mm, which are reasonable dimensions and the watch doesn’t look too bulky on a woman’s hand or too fragile on a man’s hand. The total length of the strap including the watch is then 264 mm. The watch weighs 54 grams, which is a reasonable weight that won’t overload your wrist.
The front side features a large touch display with the aforementioned metal frame. The upper and lower edges include protrusions for attaching the standard strap. On the right side there’s a control button used to wake up or turn off the watch. The left side is completely empty.
The rear side, however, is quite interesting. It’s made of plastic and mainly contains magnetic charging pins for a specific USB charger that’s included in the box. There’s also a heart-rate sensor that can be set using a certain algorithm, or continuous recording for up to 24 hours.
We wore the watches and they felt very comfortable, and their design gives a decidedly more expensive impression. Another positive is the increased resistance to water and dust. The manufacturer equipped this model with an IP 66 certification, so you don’t have to worry even about light rain or a dusty outdoor environment.
Big HD display
The watches include a round display with a total diagonal of 1.28” and TFT. technology. In this case, it’s clear that a bit of saving was done—the watches would deserve an IPS or OLED panel.
Resolution of this display is capped at 240 x 240 pixels. It shows true colors and is touch (capacitive). The displays don’t have automatic brightness adjustment—you need to adjust brightness manually.
There was no problem with controlling the display; it responded quickly and was responsive. We also didn’t notice any readability issues indoors. Sure, it’s not the finest display on the market, but it would benefit from a slightly higher brightness. Outdoors, readability was worse, and in direct sunlight we really had to focus on the display.
Mobile app: Haylou Fit
As for pairing with the mobile app, the watch will greet you with a QR code right at first startup, which takes you to the Play Store. There, you’ll find a pair of apps labeled Haylou Sport and Haylou Fit. The second one mentioned is the one you need to connect your watch Haylou Solar.
Signing in to the app is very easy—just for example, you can connect with a Facebook account. The Bluetooth 5.0 www links the watch to your smartphone very quickly and efficiently, and right away you’ll see the home splash screen.
On the home screen, you can see the basic stats from the watch. Your location connected with the weather forecast won’t be missing, along with step count, distance, or calories burned, but also sleep monitoring and heart rate data.
In the secondary menus, you can start one of the pre-set sports activities. There’s also watch settings, watch faces, notifications, and the option to check for updates. The last menu is your profile, with the option to change your goal for the number of steps covered.
The app is suitable for Android operating systems from version 4.4 and above, and for iOS from version 8.0 and above. It’s quite easy to navigate, it’s smooth and fast to use, but you can’t shake the feeling that it’s a kind of clone of the popular Mi Fit app with slightly cut functionality.
No wonder—the Haylou brand belongs to Xiaomi’s ecosystem, so connecting and controlling the watch is very similar to Mi Band bracelets or Amazfit watches.
Software and control
When it comes to the software, it’s from Haylou, and similarly to the mobile app, it resembles the corresponding operating system used in Amazfit watches. The main screen shows a watch face with the date, time, and weather info, along with the number of steps taken.
Swipe from top to bottom to open the shortcut center. On this screen, you can see the battery percentage, there’s no shortage of brightness control, a battery saver mode, access to settings, and more.
Swiping left or right gives you a graph of steps taken, heart rate monitoring, sleep tracking, weather forecast, and access to breathing exercises.
More features are available by swiping from bottom to top. You won’t miss the option to track notifications or control music, and you can access settings—but most importantly, you can start and control sports activity monitoring.
These very functions are the foundation of these watches, which therefore present themselves more like a fitness tracker in the shape of standard smartwatches—however with optimized, and extremely simple, software.
Fitness and monitoring features: No GPS module
The software and the watch itself support 12 sports activities. Specifically, it includes running, fast walking, cycling, hiking, a stationary bike, yoga, indoor running, strength training, gymnastics, basketball, football, and also rowing. So everyone can find something they like.
The downside of the watch’s low price is the lack of a GPS sensor. Your location is recorded only via the connected smartphone. That can be a disadvantage for certain sports activities, especially outdoors. Still, the GPS connection and the start speed of sports activity monitoring are fairly fast.
From this perspective, we didn’t notice any problems even with the affordable watches. Also, the deviation was standard, and the measured data didn’t differ significantly from reality. The manufacturer doesn’t lag behind the competition and offers 24 hours of heart-rate monitoring, which complements basic sleep monitoring.
Battery: Up to 30 days on a single charge
The manufacturer equipped the watch with a battery with a total capacity of 340 mAh. For a watch, that’s a very decent value, and it shows in the battery life.
According to the manufacturer’s data, in standard use the watch should last up to 30 days on a single charge. When using 24 hours of heart-rate monitoring, the battery life will then drop to 15 days.
Our testing showed that with heart-rate monitoring enabled, the watch lost approximately 5-6% per day. We had all notifications turned on (and sometimes even annoyingly), including the ones about successfully connecting the watch.
So, with our usage, the total battery life is around 18-20 days per single charge. Charging is handled via a specific USB charger and the watch should be charged to 100% in 120 minutes.
Price and availability
Haylou Solar are cheap and truly available watches that are currently not sold through official distribution in the Slovak or Czech market.
Haylou Solar European version
CZ warehouse
TIPExpress delivery from the Czech warehouse without customs duty and VAT.
This product will be delivered to you express from the local Czech warehouse. Delivery from the Czech Republic usually takes 7-10 days and is handled by a courier. When it arrives, you don’t pay any extra fees—no customs duty and no VAT.
Even so, several private e-shops offer them on our market for around 50 € / 58 USD. But if you choose to import from China and use our discount coupon, the price drops significantly.
When delivered from a Czech, i.e. European warehouse, the price is around 35 € / 41 USD, and for imports from a Chinese warehouse you’ll even pay just a little over 27 € / 31 USD.
Final verdict: Haylou Solar
The available Haylou Solar watches are best suited for less demanding users who don’t need a GPS sensor and whose priorities are mainly notifications or basic monitoring such as step count, calories burned, sleep, or heart rate.
So, practically speaking, it’s a simple fitness tracker, but it’s built in a metal body and in the shape of a watch. If you don’t like a fitness band, this is a very good alternative—and we recommend the purchase.
However, if you need more, you often wear the watch outdoors, and you’ll appreciate an OLED display or a GPS sensor, then look more toward pricier models, for example from Amazfit.
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