Customer Ratings & Reviews

Love the watch. Regular watch look with smart watch technology. Not sure if it’s just me but it does loose connectivity with my iPhone constantly.

The Citizen CZ Smartwatch is a stylish and well polished smartwatch in the tradition of the analog watches by Citizen. Good quality build that feels solid. The AMOLED screen is bright with rich colors. My model is black unisex 41mm stainless steel with a stainless steel bracelet. The bracelet can be changed and for my taste, I got the silicone band from Citizen that is also a stylish one. The watch is powered by Wear OS, however the setup is done through the Citizen Connected app built on top of it. The app has good options and is easy but with lots of information that can make it a bit confusing for some people. I wish the User Interface was simpler. The CZ Smartwatch has many features, among them the typical smartwatch features such as fitness tracking, heart rate monitor, watch face customizations, tiles configurations and notifications. It syncs well with my phone for notifications and the ‘do not disturb’ mimics the phone settings perfectly. It’s water resistant even though it’s not recommended for water sports. In addition, it has its own GPS which is a plus when you want to leave your phone behind. I’ve used it on many occasions and it works well. For the Alexa fans, it is built-in and setting it up is quick and easy. In my case, I have customized one of the buttons to call on Alexa. It also has an oximeter that is fairly accurate when compared to a medical oximeter that I own. The battery life is typical for a modern smartwatch. It lasts all day and I charge it at the end of the day. My settings are conservative with the ‘always on display’ feature turned off with adaptive brightness, however I have the heart monitor turned on. My experience with the Citizen CZ has been mostly good. It responds quickly to the touch and makes managing my phone easier. I just wish it had Google Assistant which I mainly use at my house. An issue that I have experienced is the ‘always on display’ feature keeps randomly reactivating itself even though it’s been turned off. The wellness section within the Citizen Connected app has been unreliable at times in reporting some activities. I’m also confused about the CZ Smart YouQ app that I thought would analyze my activities and habits and provide unique advice and ideas; I have yet to see any and, somehow, I thought the app would be available to download on my phone but it seems it’s only available on the watch itself. From exploring on the watch, it looks very limited to me as far as initial setup. Except for a few issues, I think the Citizen CZ Smartwatch is a modern looking and well built watch that offers many good and unique features. It’s not perfect, but it works well and the software is reliable. A bit pricey, but most Wear OS users will find many things to like and enjoy.

The watch comes in a nicely branded box with an image of the product on the front and “CZ Smart” printed on the bottom. When you open the box, you find the watch, its charging cable, and the documentation for it directly under a protective piece of foam. The user manual is multilingual and it directs the user to charge the watch before using it and to download the appropriate app for setup. A power adapter is not included with the cable and watch. This particular watch can be worn by men or women. It’s 41mm in size and looks a little large on smaller wrists, but its fits comfortable. The band is a standard flexible metal band that consumers would find on wrist watches with a similar style. The links can be removed if the band is too loose, but no tool is included with the watch for these adjustments. This was a little bit of a disappointment to me because other bands i’ve gotten like this usually come with a simple adjustment tool. I really do like the look of this watch. It has a classic style and can be worn with casual or formal attire. It’s not super flashy, but definitely makes someone take notice of it. The setup is fairly straightforward - especially if you have setup a watch before. After you download the app specific to your phone brand (iOS or Google) you follow the on-screen instructions. The user has to scan a QR code that appears on the screen of the watch with your phone. This action pairs the two devices together. Then you will be asked to add a pin number. If it’s required, a software update will occur. I had to restart the watch a couple of times after it was completed before the watch was working smoothly. In addition to these set up steps, you will also be asked to create a Citizen account, which is free but does ask for some personal information. The app could have a better experience and the on-watch interface is a little confusing to navigate through. There are lots of bugs in the app and one of the pieces of data that I want to track the most - sleep - takes a long time to update. As far as general functionality goes, I ran into some common issues that others have reports. The watch would freeze and sometimes the settings were saved between the watch and my phone’s app. The battery life is not as good as I was hoping for and there is a lack of customization. I could overlook those two issues, but the connectivity between the watch and the app is really inconsistent. The watch also provides limited data in comparison to other smartwatches and it doesn’t seem to record data accurately. I compared walking and bike riding distances that were recorded by the watch and the phone and they didn’t match. One other big con I have with this watch is that it is not water resistant. In this day and age, I expect any daily-wear watch to have some water resistance, but this one clearly states that it doesn’t have any within the specs. Overall, the watch looks great but could function better. In a world where there are some amazing smartwatches that work flawlessly with their respective devices, this one falls a little flat in terms of being ‘smart.’

I really like this Smartwatch. It is a solid and beautiful looking watch, with Citizen quality that I expected. In fact, when I turned 10 years old I got my first watch, which was a Citizen dive watch, and I still have it today. After passing 60 years of age, I felt it was time to monitor my health better. I noticed that my medical Doctor had a Smartwatch and he mentioned how he uses his to track his daily activity and sleep patterns. So, my primary reason for getting this watch was to help me set activity goals, remind me to work towards them, and show my how I did over time. I received this watch 5 days ago and at first had a difficult time setting it up. For some reason, it failed to pair with my Samsung (Android 13) phone. I retried it several times and twice the watch said it was wiping and restarting. But, for some reason, after the 6th or 7th try, it worked and successfully paired to my phone and continued with the setup. As soon as that completed through, it started downloading a firmware update and restarted again. Strangely, when it restarted, it detected another firmware update, downloaded it, and restarted again. So, when it finally finished and was up to date, the battery was low and I had to recharge it again. I even made sure it was fully charged before I even tried to power it on in the beginning. Since then I haven't experienced anything unusual about it pairing with my phone or connecting to my WiFi. Except, when you turn your watch off, the watch turns off it's Bluetooth, so when you turn it back on, it doesn't automatically reconnect to your phone's Bluetooth. (It may also do the same if you turn your phone off, but I didn't check that.) Other than that, overall I think the watch looks beautiful and has all the features and more, that I was looking for in a Smartwatch. It has the typical functions like; heart rate, steps, calories burned, etc. This is available in the watch and in the App Citizen Connected. But, the unique features of this watch is in the App CZ Smart YouQ. This App has the biggest benefits of this watch, if you want to use this as a health and fitness monitor. However, the CZ Smart YouQ App requires you to install and login to the Google Fit App too. The CZ Smart YouQ App tracks considerably more information. The Citizen information states it "helps wearers maximize their daily potential by learning the wearer’s unique Chronotype and daily rhythms and computes HR, SP02, fitness activity and sleep". This is the help that I am looking for, but I've only used this watch for 4 days. I still have a lot to learn about the CZ Smart YouQ App and what these terms mean before it will give me some meaningful figures. But, for now, I really love this watch. It looks great and is very comfortable to wear. I can easily get the basic health scores that I am looking for. As far as that is concerned, I can highly recommend this. I gave it a 4-star rating solely because of the quarks setting it up and the vagueness in the instructions about setting up the CZ Smart YouQ App.

I love Citizen watches and I have several high end versions but I really struggle to recommend this watch. The watch itself is typical Citizen high quality but the software, configuration options and connectivity are sub-par when compared to other smart watches. I found the setup of the watch to be problematic and the operation of the features and apps to be non-intuitive and frustrating at times. The Citizen YouQ app has potential and definitely is intriguing but it relies on the watch providing reliable data. If Citizen can work out the software and connectivity issues and add some better watch faces and configuration enhancements this watch could be a classy looking smart watch. I would only recommend this current watch to someone who believes that Citizen will make these improvements in time. Pros: - Typical Citizen high quality finish on the watch and band. - The Citizen YouQ app provides interesting information - Once connected the email and text notifications were reliable - Alexa was easy to install and use - I was able to pair my ear buds and stream Amazon music - The watch display has potential if new watch faces and better customization is added - Basic Wellness functions (step count, sleep, heart rate, oxygen level) are preinstalled. - The phone feature works and I can answer calls via the watch. Cons: - No IPX rating for sweat and water. - Inconsistent connectivity. The watch drops the Bluetooth and wireless connection even when in close contact with the router and phone. The app and phone will show that the watch is Bluetooth connected but the watch app says its not. - Sub-par battery life. I cannot get the watch to last a full day like my other smart watches. If I turn down the brightness and turn off the tilt to wake feature and limit the notifications I can extend the battery life but that’s not acceptable. - Lacking Customization. You can only choose from 10 watch faces with limited customization. None of the watch faces match the quality look of an analog Citizen watch. - You have to touch the watch face or turn on “tilt to wake” to get to the main watch face that shows the daily data that you have configured to be displayed. - The watch resets options when placed on the charger – this may be a bug. I put my watch on the charger and it turned off the tilt to wake feature and my step count for the day went to zero – see photo. - The Citizen App is very limited in capabilities and has very limited watch configuration tools. - Difficulty adding Apps. I have apps on my iphone but no way to select them and add them to the watch via the Citizen app. Instead I have to use the watch and download the app via the Google store which is problematic on such a small watch screen. Other smart watches let you set up and select the apps using their app on the phone and then the phone sets up the watch. - Limited workout data. The watch comes with two workouts to select from – Indoor or Outdoor! Most other smartwatches have very specific workouts to select from and some actually select and start the activity automatically once you begin exercising. - Not the most accurate. Using the Outdoor Activity the watch came up about 0.15 miles short on a 1.65 mile walk. The sleep measurement did not capture the nightly trip to the bathroom. The heart rate monitor measured higher than normal at times as well. Some of these inaccuracies might be caused by the band not being tight enough – its hard to get a medal band to wrap a wrist as consistently as a flexible band. Setup: The first thing I did was fully charge the watch using the included magnetic charging pad and a standard USB-A charger. While the watch was charging I downloaded the Citizen Connected App onto my iphone. Once it was fully charged I followed the step by step directions on the app and watch to initialize it. This became very frustrating because the watch wanted to be updated to the latest firmware but it kept dropping the wireless connection and the updates failed. To get it to work I reset the watch to factory default and started all over and the second time it finally updated. Citizen has a nice tutorial during the initialization on how to use Gestures and the Buttons on the watch. With the latest update I then went through the set up to get my notifications and emails sent to my watch. This works well and so far I have had no issues with it. Because this is a metal watch band you have to have links removed for a good fit. Even with the best fitting I don’t think the band is nearly secure as a flex band and I believe that can effect the overall accuracy of the watch and its data. I have used mine for about a week now and the data it records for distance, steps and heart rate varies – note that all my smart watches vary some but this one varies slightly more than the others. Bottom line is that could be a really classy smart watch if the software and connectivity issues are resolved and more watch faces and configuration options were added.

I was really exited to first wear this Citizen CZ smart watch because it is such a nice watch. The bracelet feels right, the case it's built well and the screen it's actually pretty bright and has a good color reproduction. The 41mm diameter makes it a good fit for men as well as for women. So for looks this watch gets a 10 out of 10 for me. But one think i can't get over it is the software development of this watch. I feel like it's sitting behind few years where it should be specially if you think it's not a cheap smartwatch. I tried it for few days and i was hopping to get something good out of it but unfortunately. The battery in a real world test situation wasn't able to get me thru more then half a day and that's with a medium usage. Very disappointed to see the same old magnetic strip in the back of the watch that's it's been used for so long by this Google Os devices which is not the true wireless but hei if would be just that i could've lived with it, i guess my real concern is the battery life. Then sluggishness of the OS man it's so annoying! Once you open some apps it really slows down this thing and many many times it would crash making the watch to restart, just not a pleasant experience. I didn't find it to be a really good health tracking device either just because of the fact that you can not wear this thing for a full day with all the sensors activated and have it connected to your phone to proper monitor your vitals at all time. Too bad! The watch looks and feels good on my wrist but doesn't really serves the purpose!

The Citizen CZSmart watch is a sleek and stylish looking smart watch. I love the look and fit of this watch. I will say, I had to remove five links to get it to fit my wrist, but that was actually fairly easy to do after watching a video on how to do it. It feels nice on my wrist, and looks awesome. Upon initial pairing with my iPhone 13 it immediately needed an update. After a few hours it seemed ready to go but it kept disconnecting. I did a full reset and started over, once I did that it worked perfectly! I tested out the sleep monitoring, & found it pretty nice as well as accurate. That’s a nice feature. Absolutely love the blood oxygen tracking. That’s a great feature! You can time your exercising and it tracks your distance, calories burned, all the basics. Does a great job at this. The battery is just ok. After a full charge, & wearing it all night to monitor my sleep when I got up it was down to 19%. It also does not last a full day. That said, it does have different modes, I kept it on ‘daily’ use. It does charge quickly, in under an hour. The only thing missing, which I do not think is a deal breaker, is that I can’t text from it. I can do that on my other smart watch that goes with my iPhone. Overall, I love the feel & design if this watch & would recommend it.

I am 66 years old and have never worn a wristwatch but was intrigues about the opportunity to monitor my activity. I was very apprehensive about how I would adjust to wearing this, but I found the watch to be very comfortable from day 1 – even after wearing it all day. Overall, I found the watch to be easy to live with, providing good health monitoring with prompt alerts as well as good battery life (around 48 hrs. set to normal with saver starting at 10%) and would recommend it. But if choosing again I would probably go with a larger face – these old eyes had trouble reading some of the screens. Unpacking it was easy and charged it using its propriety interface which attaches to back of the watch. This was kind of disappointing but understandable that a more universal USB interface could not be incorporated given watches size. Adjusting the band was initially confusing until I searched for an answer. You can take to a jeweler, or you can remove the links by using a small, pointed tool and pushing out the “pins” – but one end is larger (the one with the split) so you want to push the other end – there are also arrows in the links indicating which way to push. There is also an adjustment in the clasp – again using a small, pointed tool – but be careful as this pin is under pressure and can fly out. Instructions had a QR code which led to downloading Citizen app. This walked you through synching watch and phone. Initially the setup worked fine but after 2 days the app could no longer synch with the phone. I tried multiple times to resynch (removing from Bluetooth, restarting phone and watch, etc. Each time indicating it was synched, but app still could not find the phone. I had to reset the phone then add it as new to the app – it has worked fine since then). The watch is thoughtfully designed and seems sturdily built. Using app- you have several face and screen options to allow for personalization. Swiping up or down from the main face allows you to access other functions. Down presents a set of options not unlike a phone would. Settings, plane mode, etc. Swiping up presents you with a screen you can customize for different functions. The app keeps track of your steps, calories, heart rate, etc. on a daily, weekly and monthly basis. It also has options to inform you about the watch, sign up for offers, app news, Instagram, my preferences, have a question, Alexa (don’t use), configure tiles (face), new arrival, set up notifications. Can make phone calls (again a function I won’t use) – but it is nice to receive an alert if you have a phone call. There is a lot to absorb and learn about this watch, especially in just a few days. I look forward to learning more about its operation and uses. Good so far and recommend.

. ..The Citizen - CZ Smart 41mm Unisex Stainless Steel Casual Smart Watch in black is very stylish and aesthetically pleasing, a more upscale version of the well-known fitness and smartwatches that have been in circulation for many years. So, AI am a 64+ year woman who has a 6 inch wrist and this watch was listed as "unisex" which in my opinion is not really true. I see this as a better fit for a male, someone that can better accommodate a larger wrist and a thicker watch casing. In fact, when you download the Citizen app for your smartphone that is instrumental in the set up process of this watch, there is a video option on how to best fit a Citizen watch based on wrist size-requiring the measurement of your wrist and the thickness of the watch casing that will determine the sleekness of it on your wrist. The watch comes with way too many links if you are a woman with even a bigger wrist. The links are attached with pins so even though Citizen has a guide that might allow you to figure out how to remove links to make it fit your size wrist, they do recommend that you go to a jeweler and have it professionally sized. A standard-sized watch was sent to me and I had no say in its sizing, but when I went on Citizen's website, I found out that if you are ordering it from them directly, you can use their "complimentary" sizing so that it will come the appropriate size for you and therefore, save you the time and money from going to a jeweler. . The first thing that must be done is to set up the watch with its charger, a round-disk like one that attaches to the back of the watch casing. There is also a QR code that can be scanned with your phone or in my case with an android phone, you can go into the Google Playstore and get it that way. This watch, per instructions, does work with both android and Apple operating systems, but when I was looking to see which phones that it would Bluetooth and pair with, it does state that you would want to have the latest android system. By the way, you can link this watch to more than one phone through the app. I will be trying to do that, but as of this review, have not done so. I am amazed at all the functions and features that this smartwatch will do, almost too many. The learning curve is massive and daunting for me and even though I am in my 60's, I am still working as a sole proprietor in a field that has many tech challenges that I must keep up with-so while I may not be the most tech savvy, I am not uninformed. Since there is such a learning curve, I do think that this watch does warrant an easily understandable instruction manual that is packaged with the watch and its special charger I was able, through the app,to go on the Citizen website and print off a bunch of questions that then have explanations on how to do this or that. Like I said previously, this watch is very smart involving NASA technology and already has many apps downloaded. I also found this very attractive because of its numerous health monitoring features. The initial set up and syncing to my phone was easy. However, all the fancy stuff will take time to figure out. I allowed myself to pick a pattern for the security opening up of the watch and I need to figure out how to lengthen that interval because I am going crazy having to constantly do that-pick a pin instead. The best advice that I can give you is to take your time and learn how to fully operate this brain trust. By the way, this watch has a 2 year warranty, so keep your proof of purchase, but I read that if you go on their website and register the watch that you get an additional year of warranty-3 years.

When it comes to watches, I've always been traditional. I have several watches, all traditionally built, either automatic, wind-up, Battery Power. But I was needing a unit that will be able to measure my blood oxygen, heart rate, sleep monitor and GPS. My daughter has an Apple watch, that has some of those features, but I was looking something that can work with my Samsung Phone, in other words, Android OS, with a more complete health tracking functions, and can keep traditional style as well. When I received the Citizen Smart Watch, with all those features and many other, it didn’t let me down. This is my first Smart Watch, so I have a lot to learn, but fortunately the operation is very intuitive. However, I have to admit that at the beginning the first day setting up the watch, I struggled a little with some “issues”, like stop responding, frozen, or settings that were not saved from the app. However I figured out that probably it was related to the SW setting up or the firmware update that was done during the setup, so I restarted the Watch OS every time I finish a setting, and also found out that is better to do the changes on the watch instead of the app on the phone. But after all that, the watch is working as is supposed to be, with all the features I was looking for and the monitoring and report I was needing. The setup is simple, after unbox it I charge the watch with the proprietary USB charging cable, and a USB 2amp Power adapter (not included). It took about 30min to fully charge, but after, several charges, from 5% to 100%, it only took at the most 35 minutes to complete which is really fast. Once you turn on the watch, a QR code will appear on the screen, and that will lead you to the Citizen Connected App install. From there you will continue with the app. The next steps are intuitive to follow. You will be asked to add a pin number and the google account that my phone is using, which will allow the app to get all the information of the apps in your phone and will be accessible from your watch. Then it will perform a Software update, and this point I think it is very tricky, because I think somehow even if it will tell you when it is complete, I think it will continue doing some setting changes or some kind of activity related to this update in the background, because at some moments the watch was unresponsive, or slow. But once I started to restart it like 3 or 4 times, started to work fine. Then it will ask you to follow a quick guide operation and I recommend doing the following which will be very useful. After you create a user on the citizen app, it will ask you for your information like DOB, Name, weight, height, gender. I started focusing on what I was looking for, the Oximeter, the heart rate, and sleep stage report. All of them work as I expected, you can set up the frequency to get the info and you also want to get the measures. With those enabled to keep monitoring even during my sleep, the Battery last a full day. But this watch has a lot more features that I love as well. I will list some of them that I used the most: I can answer my phone calls, talk and make phone calls through the watch I can get, I would dare to say, all the notifications, emails, Txt messages, whatsapp messages, my devices notifications, like my doorbell, security cameras, home sensors, etc, in other words everything you have setup in you phone will be available in your watch. I can reply my txt msg, emails, which is very useful because I don’t need to go on my phone when I receive the audible alert. I can have a report of the steps I have made through the day as well as the calories burnt. I love the option to turn on the watch tilting the wrist or tap the screen. Super fast charging When you put the watch to charge or the watch is not in your wrist it will ask you for the pin you setup initially. And once you put it back it will ask you again, this is a security procedure that I haven’t seen in other brand/models. To make more Battery efficient, I disable from the watch, the vibration setting, the Always on Screen or Display, so it will be turn on when you tap the screen, or you tilt it, that is a setting you will have to enable. And finally set up the extended mode. With all those settings my battery last 24 hours. Through the app, you can change the “face” of the watch, which is a fun activity trying to find the best face look you want. The finish is great, very elegant, my bracelet is stainless steel black. To adjust to my wrist, was very easy, with a small watchmaker screwdriver, I pushed the pin to remove the links I needed to adjust to my wrist. On the watch, if you press the dial or crown, it will turn on the screen, and if you press and hold it will take you to the power off or restart function. If you swipe from up to down, it will show you the preselected options or settings you can do, with symbols, like flashlight, that will light up the screen with a bright white, or you can choose the option to locate your phone, you can do the opposite as well from the app in the phone to locate the watch. You can select the Extended mode for long lasting battery usage, or go to the settings on the gear icon. Many of these options can be accessed as well if you press the upper button and you can see all the apps available. If you swipe from left to right you will see the notifications, the oxygen level, the sleep report, and the phone calls I received. The only cons I can mention, is that the charging cable is proprietary, I think, with the standards available nowadays, it could designed to be wireless like any other wireless charge device available in the market. And the fact that it was kind of messy at the beginning to set up. I think future firmware updates will improve this, but once you pass the set up operation it is flawless. Finally, aesthetically speaking, the watch fits perfectly on my wrist, it's just big enough to see everything on the screen. It's not heavy either and doesn't weigh down my wrist because it's not bulky like other watches. I really like how Citizen is designing their smart watches now. I am very satisfied with the watch, being my first smartwatch it has everything I was looking for, and has many other options to discover.

TLDR… a great looking and feeling smart watch with lacking software and mediocre battery life. Pros: > Build quality feels awesome. The band it comes with is adjustable, simple as using a SIM ejection pin to remove unneeded length. The buttons and dial seem very durable and provides good feedback to convey presses. > Look and feel are definitely premium. This bit is definitely subjective, but I personally love the design language here that Citizen went with (there's only so much you can do though right?) > Activity tracker gives good metrics on health! There is moderately more info compared to my other smart watches. Cons: > Battery life was sub par. Could hardly go a day with light use before the battery saver mode had to kick in. > The watch face options via the Citizen's is very limited… Leaves only a handful of faces to choose from. >> The watch can't connect via the Wear OS app though it's a Google/Android watch. This is unfortunate since I was hoping to customize the watch face with the Wear OS app… > The watch feels laggy compared to my other smart watches. When bringing it to my face (via lifting my hand) there is a noticeable delay/lag with the watch waking up. Once I enter my pin, interactions with the watch continue with this behavior of sluggishness (especially if I have apps opened). > Though this watch can track health/fitness related activities, it doesn't provide any IPX rating… making me feel like that was a big miss… makes me hesitant to sweat it was my hand with the watch on… Overall, this is a great looking watch but I feel like there were a lot of missed opportunities to make it also a great functioning watch.

The Citizen CZ Smart Touchscreen watch is perfect for the professional that wants a smartwatch without the look of a typical smartwatch. It's stylish and elegant, but the more traditional watch look brings with it both positives and negatives. Firstly, as with traditional watches, you cannot easily adjust this to fit your wrist. There are no loops to hook into like on silicone or leather wristbands you might see on more "modern" style smartwatches, so if you are a woman or have a smaller wrist, you will need to either risk damaging the watch and remove links on your own or send the watch in to a Citizen technician to be adjusted at your own expense. Both options are clunky and feel a tad outdated, but for those who prefer classic watches or are comfortable with removing traditional watch links on their own, this won't be an issue. For someone for whom this was their first "real" watch, this was a massive hurdle as the watch is unusable until the size can be adjusted (for instance, I could remove the watch without undoing the clasp as it was so oversized on my wrist). This isn't really Citizen's fault, but it is a potential downside that I hadn't ever encountered before in a smartwatch as most watches come with silicone or leather straps. Luckily, Citizen does sell silicone and leather bands that fit this specific model, and swapping out bands is easy. Another aspect of this watch that I found difficult to adjust to is the weight. It is significantly heavier than other fitness trackers or smartwatches I've tried, such as the Apple Watch, Amazon Halo, or Fitbit. I attribute this to the excellent build quality; this watch is built much more like a traditional watch than the others I listed, and the weight reflects that. This did make it harder to get used to wearing, however, and as someone who prefers watches that are lighter and feel like a natural extension of my arm, this watch felt much clunkier and heavier than I prefer. Of course, YMMV. Initial impressions while unboxing were a little underwhelming; I would have hoped for accessories or at least an alternate (even cheap) band in the box but sadly it only comes with one unbraided charging cable, a quick setup guide, and a manual. Pairing and setup were sometimes as clunky as the device, and I found that the pairing instructions did not always match what I had to do. As an example, at one point during the pairing process, the watch screen said something about connecting to wifi using my phone, but the Citizen app on my phone was blank with a loading screen. I let it sit for about ten minutes hoping something was happening in the background, but eventually gave up and just went back to the watch and had to manually connect to wifi using the watch's touchscreen. This isn't the end of the world and pairing, especially through Bluetooth, is always going to be a little funky, but I was a little let down by how unsophisticated the process was compared to how fancy the watch itself looked. Moving on, I also found the Citizen app itself disappointing. The watch and my phone never seemed to stay connected for an entire day, and it felt like every other time I opened the app, the watch was disconnected. Moreover, having only ten total watch faces to customize the watch with (and there is very minimal customization; the background color can only be changed from a limited color palette of four colors at most, and most faces cannot be customized at all) feels oddly limited in 2023. Most of the faces feel added for the sake of padding out the gallery, and I found myself sticking to the default anyways. The app itself doesn't offer much else, and I wasn't a fan of having to download another app (YouQ) to access the IBM-backed AI-researched Activity Lab software side of things, which includes the more interesting aspects of the watch's fitness tracking like chronotype and "power score" for the day. Still, it is admittedly a neat feature and unique in my experience with other trackers. Onto the fitness tracking aspect, I found that the Citizen CZ was generally at least consistent, if not accurate. There were still times when I was certain it wasn't reading things like heart rate accurately; for instance, I had a friend try on the watch, and I knew his tracker consistently read his HR at around 80-90bpm. Despite that, the Citizen CZ had his HR at 70ish and did not change or update at all after having him wear it for about 5 minutes. At this point, we were both a bit confused, as my HR is usually at around 60bpm so we weren't even sure if the Citizen had updated to start reading his HR instead of mine. To see if we could get the numbers to budge, we had him do a quick lap, after which the HR reading shot up to a whopping 115bpm (for reference, it's unheard of for him to jump to from a resting HR; keep in mind up until then we'd just been sitting around chatting!). Moral of the story: take fitness tracker readings with a grain of salt and assess trends, not raw numbers. To that end, I found that the Citizen CZ generally was consistent and output similar trends as I'd seen in other trackers, although I couldn't bring myself to wear it for sleep tracking (I was genuinely worried I'd scratch myself with it, and it was too heavy to comfortably wear to bed besides). The blood oxygen measurements were consistent with the fingertip pulse oximeter I have at home as well. Steps were one aspect that I felt the Citizen CZ was below average in accuracy with measuring, but the numbers were usually not too far off from other trackers I was using at the time. Thus, I do believe this watch would work well for the "casual athlete" - someone who has fitness goals and wants to track their activity and health but doesn't need a more sporty or accurate smartwatch to that end. As for the "smart" part of this smartwatch, the touchscreen could be frustrating to use at times, and navigating through the OS was sometimes like trudging through molasses. There were many times when I would be navigating through a menu or pressing a button and wondering whether the watch had frozen or a screen was loading. Otherwise, notifications came through as expected and I could make calls or reply to texts and emails easily from my wrist, and I felt that WearOS really did offer a lot for people wanting "smart" functionality without needing their phones out at all times. The display itself is bright and sharp, though you rarely get a chance to appreciate it in my opinion as you can't set a custom background on the watch face and don't ever really get to see images on it. Battery life was middling, lasting me just under a day. Charge time was also average, taking about an hour to get to full charge. I feel that the charging cable being a proprietary contact charger is a notable downside, as the cable given is fairly thin and you cannot just swap in another USB-C cable if this one wears out. Overall, this is a stunning smartwatch visually but in daily use, there are smartwatches that look "worse" but function better. The Citizen CZ doesn't excel in any particular area: it isn't a great fitness tracker, it isn't a great smartwatch, and it isn't even a great "dumb" watch as you can't exactly turn off or ignore the smart aspects. If all you want is a smartwatch that looks great, you only need the absolute bare minimum of smartwatch functionality, and you are comfortable possibly having to adjust the watch links yourself (or pay to have a technician do it for you), then this might be the watch for you. Otherwise, look elsewhere.

So my husband is really "Tech-curious" at best, he enjoys gadgets but he doesn't necessarily rely on any to get him through his day. I, on the other hand, made the move to a smart watch several years ago and have never looked back. One of the things that always gave him pause was that he didn't care for the look of the leading smartwatch brands. This style has officially converted him! This is a really good looking watch and I appreciate how simple Citizen has kept the display. The user can personalize the three circles and it gives them the ability to only see what is most important to them. My husband always felt like my watch was "giving too much information" and he has made the weather and his steps his main focus and is now really starting to be exciting about keeping up with his movement throughout the day. We were on a vacation last week and he was playing golf most of the time, and the weather notifications were a HUGE help in keeping him and his dad aware of the pop up summer storms and it was all on his wrist rather than having to pull his phone out on the golf course. He was able to set it all up to work really nicely with iOS and again, he's not someone who spends a lot of time tinkering with tech gadgets so the fact that it took him all of 15 minutes to be up and going shows that it's a SUPER friendly piece!

Thin and flimsy compared to my previous gold smartwatch (Fossil). At least I don't have to charge this 4+ times a day like my old watch but the battery could be a little better. Lots of problems with the software that I was going back and forth with their tech support until one day they just stopped responding a few days before the return window closed for this so now I am stuck with it. If want a watch that looks like a high-end fancy piece of jewelry, this is not it. But if you're looking for a smartwarch that isn't rubbery or plastic, it's ok

The CZ Smart 41mm watch is a refined, feature packed smartwatch for today. Out of the box, this watch was stunning. Stainless steel watch band is classy and lightweight to make up for the heft of the case. Watch is comfortable, even when worn all day and fits well in professional settings. Was able to adjust the watch band myself by using a jeweler’s screwdriver to remove pins holding links. 3 micro adjustments able to be made on the clasp to fine-tune the fitment. Setup was simple with the download of the Citizen Connected app. For the first couple of days wearing this watch, it ran sluggishly at times but has smoothed itself out ever since. Now, the familiar WearOS operating system is responsive and insightful. AMOLED screen is sharp and can get quite bright. Framerate is smooth overall but can stutter at times when the processor is overwhelmed. Watch comes preloaded with a wide assortment of features. Phone connectivity and sync works flawlessly with my Android phone. Able to read notifications, answer phone calls, and track my fitness with ease. Amazon Alexa, Google Pay, and wellness are all easily accessible through the crown buttons by default. The functionality does not stop there. The find my phone feature which rings your phone is a nice touch. As well as the flashlight feature, which makes the watch face glow a white or red light. Countless apps and watch faces are also available for download on the Google Play Store. An array of 7 sensors track everything from blood oxygen levels to sleep patterns and can automatically detect workouts. Heart rate and blood oxygen readings are accurate when compared against my fingertip pulse oximeter. Although this watch does track sleep, I do not find it practical to wear this watch to sleep, as it is large, and the battery is usually run down or dead at the end of a full day depending on usage. Numerous stylish watch faces are available on the Citizen app. Color and data are adjustable as well for an even more personalized experience. Wellness info, watch settings, and a find my watch feature are also available on the app. Tiles are customizable within the app as well. One con of the watch is that it is not water resistant. However, this isn’t a dealbreaker as it is intended to be more of a casual watch instead of a sports watch. Overall, the CZ Smart 41mm watch is a stylish, practical watch for the contemporary wearer.

Great and nice-looking watch. Fast and reactive also but trouble syncing to the phone.

It’s a great watch, just wished it had more features.

Overall At first glance, this is a beautiful well-crafted watch of amazing quality. Its appearance is sharp while subtle, perhaps a trait I see with the black model, while being functional and inviting to use and play with. The best part, it actually looks like a normal watch on your wrist, and not like you strapped a smartphone to yourself. It's your standard recipe for the smartwatch, with several buttons, a tiny speaker slit, a touch display, and sensors on its underside. It includes several watch faces that range from very traditional watch designs, retro looks, modern styles, and some that scream a distant dystopian future. On paper, it's described to operate between 1-3 days, but I've managed between 12 hours and 2.5-3 days. Setup This part was the most troublesome, more than I believe it should be. The watch is fully compatible with both Android 6.0+ and iOS 10+ according to Citizen and Google Wear OS. Initially, I attempted pairing with Android, devices with both 11 and 12. These however proved to be more trouble than I thought. After multiple factory resets, deleting citizen-connected smart app, and a multitude of reboots, I finally managed to pair these devices 2-3 days later. The devices in question would see the watch within the app but could never pair with it. For transparency, these were a Google Pixel 7a and Motorolla Edge. Why such a hassle, I've yet to understand it. Once paired these work perfectly fine, with a few quirks. After initially being unable to pair those devices I gave a few iOS devices a try. Devices running iOS 14.9 and 16.6 (or the current version). Unfortunately, the device running 14.9 was unable to pair using the citizen smart app, that's the app the watch prompts to install generating a QR code on the screen. This is due to the app requiring iOS 15+ to install. Due to other reasons, I don't update it. The device running iOS 16+ paired within seconds of installing the app. Then a few prompts, pairing a Google account and it was tracking steps and notifications from my phone. Software This being my first excursion with wear OS, it was a quick and snappy OS to figure out. There isn't much difference from your average Android device which makes it a similar experience. It comes with a Play Store for adding other apps to your watch. Being a more Google-oriented device, there isn't a large usability factor with iOS. I mean, yes you can see your notifications and be made aware of what goes on with your phone from your wrist, but seeing a list of every single text in the standard iMessage app isn't an option. But in all fairness, this same can be said in Android. Even though the messages app comes pre-installed, the same messages app that's usually loaded in other Android phones, it could never load my messages. Opening the app redirects to the Play Store to update the app, however, there isn't any update to apply on the phone. While there isn't a Samsung messages app either, this likely follows how the iMessage app works. See notifications, reply to them, and have to use your phone to see anything delivered prior. This can be said of a large number of communication apps, no apps except for Line, which I haven't used in many years. But even without apps, I do see Reddit, Discord, Messenger, and Telegram show up from time to time. No social media has seemed to trigger for me. As a fitness tracker, this works perfectly. In conjunction with apps on your phone, it can track everything from steps, heart rate, sleep, workout routines, and respiratory rates among others. In a contrasting topic, several of the most prevalent issues to speak of stem from it defaulting to a set of functions. Disconnecting from the phone when battery saver kicks in. Reverting to always-on display when you set it to off. Resetting your gestures for inexplicable reasons (this might also be linked to the battery saver mode but it seems to trigger from time to time. The saver function can't be fine-tuned to know what happens exactly). Features The CZ Smartwatch offers superb hardware. The screen is sturdy and can accurately watch for keypresses. Even when typing out something on the tiny 1.5" x 1" keyboard, I've been impressed by the sheer accuracy. The frame seems sturdy and well made as I've bumped it accidentally on things such as cabinet doors and corner moldings of doorways. Using the battery-saver mode, I've easily gotten about 3 days on a single charge. Charging the watch is incredibly fast. According to the manufacturer, 30 minutes will get you 50%+ of charge, however, when looking to confirm this information I could no longer locate where I came across it. Neither the listing description, the included manual and added information, or the manufacturer's website. The only thing I could find is a 60-minute charge time, which is about what I see for 100%. Considerations This had a very odd pairing experience for Android devices. Not only a single device but pairing with 2 different devices was more trouble than it needed to be. Pairing with a new device is more trouble than it's worth. It's not a simple straightforward process like changing clothes. You have to delete and unpair from the app to be able to put it into pairing mode. This may be a plus in the event of theft but if you left it without any type of lock, pin or pattern, this wouldn't really matter. The listing and surrounding information don't mention app requirements to be able to use it. The only place I found any of that information is in the user manual. Android 7+ or iOS 15+. The phone disconnects fairly often and it isn't entirely clear what triggers it other than the battery-saver function. A large portion of the time, the watch reports it being disconnected in the control panel, swipe down function. The green indicator showing a phone would more often than not show red. To add to its odd behavior, the watch sometimes still shows notifications as if it were still connected to the phone. Battery saver always bringing back always-on display will oftentimes leave me hunting down the charger after about 10 hours, as it will eat the charge quickly. This typically occurs when I forget to check the settings after charging. Other than turning off the battery-saver function, there really isn't any fine-tuning. You can set it to auto, 10%, or off. Performing updates, downloading apps, or browsing through the settings will eat its charge, but will also cause it to get very warm. Outside of a mention of "IP" in the listing description, I couldn't really find any type of rating anywhere. Not the listing or the manufacturers' website. The only mention of anything is in the manual stating to keep away from water. I find myself removing the watch for just about any task that has some form of water. cooking, washing hands, washing dishes, going to the bathroom, etc. This area also brings to question how can one use it as a fitness tracker if any type of moisture is bad for it. Sweat may be more than enough to bring about its demise. I can only assume this isn't safe from any dust either. Conclusion I really like the watch. It's beautifully designed, seemingly durable, and above all, looks like a standard watch. Configured properly, lasts up to 3 days on a single charge. It functions well enough as a smartwatch and has good fitness-tracking aspects. But at its price point of $400+ at the time I received this unit, I couldn't wholeheartedly recommend it. There are a lot of quality of life aspects this could be improved on. Frequent disconnects, lack of any ip rating, low battery life under defaults, and heating up under seemingly simple tasks. This is worth 3-stars.

Great Apple Watch alternative. This watch does everything I need it to do and more. Love it.

not wateroroof, touch screen, doesnt really work, was expecting a "smarter" watch