Huawei Watch Kids 4 Pro Review

In the modern world, a high-quality and functional device for communicating with a child is not a luxury, but a necessity, primarily related to safety. I recently encountered the question of choosing such a device, when it became necessary to equip a 6-year-old son with something that would allow him to instantly contact me or his wife (or us) and notify him of his current location. At the same time, so that the device would not distract the child with all sorts of additional entertainment. That is why not a smartphone, but a smartwatch, was selected to solve such problems.

I settled on one of the most advanced devices in this class – Huawei Watch Kids 4 Pro. I tell you in order what attracted me to them, what opportunities the device provides, and whether there are any disadvantages in it.

LTE

Huawei Watch Kids 4 Pro does not require a constant connection to a smartphone, like traditional smartwatches, as it is equipped with a full-fledged LTE module. In fact, this is a smartphone, packed in a children's watch case, constantly online and supporting voice calls up to VoLTE. Wi-Fi and Bluetooth are also on board.

The Nano SIM card slot is located on the left side: to open it, you need to use the supplied tool, on one end of which there is a screwdriver, and on the other end there is a tab to pry the tray.

As a child's device, watches have an undeniable advantage over a regular smartphone – limited functionality. Even such an advanced watch guarantees that in kindergarten or elementary school, as well as on a walk, the child will not be distracted by games, entertainment applications or watching YouTube videos.

The maximum that a child can entertain himself with thanks to the watch are to take a selfie alone or with friends, applying one of the built-in funny masks, but more on that later.

Accurate positioning using various sources One of the key functions of such a device is the transfer of location, and here Huawei Watch Kids 4 Pro rely on multiple sources of information and artificial intelligence technologies simultaneously.

The clock locates with:

• Satellite propositioning systems — GPS, Beidou and GLONASS;
• Wireless base stations – A-GPS;
• Accelerometer and camera (when the SOS panic button is enabled).

At the same time, a self-learning algorithm combines data from different systems to improve accuracy, and when they are determined again at the same location, the accuracy increases. The manufacturer states that the current location is recorded every 120 seconds in automatic mode, however, through the application for parents (Huawei FamCare), you can forcefully request the coordinates at any time. It is a pity that there is no real-time broadcast of geolocation, probably such a limitation is due to power consumption.

In FamCare, you can customize the boundaries of the safe zone, it is proposed to mark the addresses of home and school as such zones by default. If the child leaves such a zone (or returns to it), then a notification will be sent to the parents' smartphones. By the way, FamCare is available on both iOS and Android. In the latter case, you will need to install the App Gallery first, since, alas, there is no application on Google Play.

Connect with parents and other loved ones

Huawei Watch Kids 4 Pro allows a child to contact parents in three ways:

• Call. Classic mobile call;
• Video challenge. Video call via the MeeTime proprietary service – the call will come to parents in FamCare, no other programs are required;
• Chat. Send an emoticon, voice message, photo, or video to chat – both a family chat and individual dialogues with each parent are available.
• FamCare. Through FamCare, you can set up a list of contacts that will be available in the “phone” section on the watch. For “administrators” with FamCare installed, both voice and video calls will be available, for ordinary contacts – only voice calls.
• Block strangers. It will not be superfluous to “block strangers” in the settings, that is, disable the ability to receive calls from numbers that are not included in the contacts on the watch. This will protect the child from communicating with spammers and other strangers.
• Administrators. Chat is available exclusively with “administrators” who have FamCare installed, since it is carried out through the messenger built into it.

SOS function

For emergency communication, it is important for a child to learn how to start the SOS mode, for which it is necessary to hold the Fun key waiting for 5 seconds.

During the activation of the SOS function, three actions will occur at once:

• The watch will call the parent via mobile phone;
• Two photos from the built-in camera will be sent to the family chat;
• FamCare will update the location of the watch.

Note that using a watch to eavesdrop and spy on a child will not work, since unconditional access to the camera and microphones through FamCare is not provided. You can only call the clock and be sure to wait for an answer. In case of unforeseen circumstances or childish tricks, FamCare can disable the power button on the watch so that it cannot be turned off so easily. In this case, the clock can be turned off only through the parent application or in the advanced settings of the clock.

Durable

If we are talking about a children's gadget, then it must be “bulletproof”, and the case of Huawei Watch Kids 4 Pro feels exactly like that. Naturally, I did not conduct crash tests, so we will focus on the declared indicators. Huawei says that the watch passed during the tests:

• Pressure test. Pressure test – 70 kg front and back;
• High temperature and humidity test. High temperature and humidity test — 168 hours at +55 °C and 95% humidity;
• Test by drop. Drop test – 20 times from a height of 0.8 meters;
• Durable. 200,000 clicks per button and 800,000 touch screen touches.
• 5ATM. The declared water resistance is 5 ATM, which means you can also swim in them, but still preferably not in salt water.

But this also has the other side of the coin – dimensions. Even on the hand of an adult, the watch looks big, but on the hand of a child, it looks huge. But that's the price of reliability functionality (to say that this is a smartphone in a watch case) and a capacious battery. By the way, this problem affects almost all children's watches, Huawei is not unique here, so you have to take it for granted.

At the same time, the 800 mAh battery shows its best side – it lasts for 2–4 days of use without recharging, depending on the intensity of use – mainly on the number of calls and interaction with the display. In my opinion, the result is excellent, given the constant online via LTE or Wi-Fi. By the way, in the FamCare settings, you can set the watch to turn off and on automatically at night – this will be useful both for the child and for the autonomy of the watch.

Bright display and built-in camera

Huawei Watch Kids 4 Pro has a fairly high-quality and bright (up to 600 nits) AMOLED display with a high resolution of 320×360 pixels (341 PPI). The picture is juicy, individual pixels cannot be seen. There is only one complaint about the screen: the display is tiny, especially against the backdrop of the dimensions of the watch itself, only 1.41”. At the same time, I was pleased with the support for auto-brightness – it works well and correctly adjusts to the surrounding conditions. But there is no Always On mode – most likely for autonomy.

Above the display is a wide-angle camera eye with a stated shooting angle of 85° and a resolution of 5 megapixels. It can be used not only for video communication, but also for shooting selfies and videos. The quality, of course, is not so hot, but it is quite suitable as entertainment for a child. Kids will especially love the AR Fun mode, which puts Snapchat and Instagram-style masks on the faces of the watch.

Other features you like in a short line

Uv sensor. Unlike “adult” smartwatches, The Huawei Watch Kids 4 Pro is not packed with sensors, such as heart rate or blood oxygen levels. But there is an ultraviolet sensor, thanks to which the watch records how much time the child spent outdoors.

Features:

• Activity rings. This is one of the three peculiar activity rings (the norm is 2 hours). The other two rings are the number of steps and the time of medium-high physical activity, for example, brisk walking, running, jumping rope, swimming and more.
• Initiation to exercise and sports. Also in the watch menu you can find the training menu, which includes: skipping rope, swimming and rocking the press. The choice is small, but for the general physical development of the child is quite logical. Hours, by the way, quite accurately read the number of jumps and bends. Unfortunately, we have not yet been able to test swimming.
• Tournaments. If there is someone else in the children's company with a similar watch, you can arrange one-minute tournaments – the readings between the watches will be synchronized via Bluetooth. If there are no such friends, then online competitions with a random opponent are available.
• Auto power off at night and during lessons. In the FamСare settings, you can specify at what time the clock will automatically turn on and off for night. You can also specify the study time when the hours will be functionally limited − they can only show the time and, if necessary, call their parents. At the same time, parents themselves will not be able to call the clock at this time.
• Rewards. Another interesting thing is the ability to create tasks for the child, completing which he will receive likes from his parents. Received 10 likes – received an award, like ordering a pizza. You can request a like from a parent right from the watch. A notification will be sent there if a like has been placed.

Verdict