Turn Off Heart Rate Monitor on Apple Watch, Galaxy Watch and Mi Band.
Apple Watch and Galaxy Watch blink their LEDs (green) hundreds of times per second to calculate how many times your heart beats per minute.
The heart rate monitor on your smartwatch is helpful, but it also drains the battery a lot. If you are active, a heart rate monitor and other health tools will provide you with detailed information. But if, like me, you don’t use a heart rate monitor often, turning it off is the best way to save battery power. Here’s how to turn off the automatic heart rate monitor on Xiaomi Mi Band, Samsung Galaxy Watch, and Apple Watch. Let’s be.
1. Turn off the heart rate monitor on Mi Band 2/3
Like most fitness bracelets, the Mi Band comes with a decent heart rate monitor. While not as accurate as other high quality wearables, it gets the job done. Given the small form factor and tiny 110mAh battery (70mAh for the Mi Band 2), the heart rate sensor drains the battery a lot. Turning off your heart rate monitor is easy and you can use the Mi Fit app to turn it off.
Make sure your strap is connected to your phone and open the Mi Fit app. Click on the “Profile” button in the lower right corner and click on Mi Band to open the Band settings page.
See also: How to unlock a computer using Mi Band 2/3
On the options page, you will see a list of settings. Find Heart Rate Detection and click on it. It opens up a new screen that has the same option for some reason.
Press Heart Rate Detection again and select Off. Now your Mi Band will not automatically record your heart rate.
Must Read: Use Mi Band to Control Music on Your Phone
2. Turn off the Heart Rate Monitor on the Galaxy Watch
Unlike fitness bands, you can use the Galaxy Watch as a standalone device. It has an internet connection, a touchscreen and a decent processor for doing tasks on its own. If you want to spend more time playing games on your Galaxy Watch, turning off the automatic heart rate monitor can give you a few extra hours of power. While simple, the disable button is hidden in a maze of settings, but you can follow these steps to quickly disable the automatic heart rate monitor.
On your Galaxy watch, press the Home button (the one at the bottom) to open the Apps drawer, highlight the Samsung Health app, and press to open the app.
Scroll to highlight a heart rate section and tap to select it. Press the options button (three vertical dots) on the right to open the heart rate settings.
Here you will see the Auto HR settings. Click to open settings. Now turn the dial and select Never. Your Galaxy Watch will never record your heart rate unless you manually take a reading.
Read: Best Galaxy Watch Apps
3. Turn off the Heart Rate Monitor on the Apple Watch
The Apple Watch is arguably the best smartwatch with features like 3D Touch, sleek design, and accurate status monitors. Just like the Mi Band and Galaxy Watch, the Apple Watch also automatically tracks your heart rate at constant intervals. There is no way to disable this feature on the watch and you will have to use the Watch app on your iPhone.
Go to the Clock app and click the My Watch icon in the lower left corner. This will open a list of options and you need to scroll to find “Privacy”.
Click on the “Privacy” tab and select “Movement and Fitness”. Set the heart rate switch to OFF. Apple Watch will only record your heart rate when you manually take a reading from your watch or app.
Also Read: 6 Heart Rate Monitoring Apps for Apple Watch
Disable automatic heart rate monitoring on smart wearable devices
Turning off an automatic heart rate monitor is often easy, but it’s hidden behind a maze of settings. While this feature is a great technological addition to wearable devices, it drains the battery a lot. If you don’t use this feature often, disabling it will extend battery life and reduce the number of notifications. If you run into any issue while disabling the automatic heart rate monitor, please leave a comment or tweet.