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Text: Oscar Hentmark / Photo: Emelie Voltaire

For some people, a fitness tracker or smartwatch plays an essential role in their day-to-day life, from recording their sleep to telling them they need to drink more water. For others, the entire trend has passed them by. Hooked accompanied two Addnature colleagues on a hiking weekend in the Swedish countryside to see these watches in their natural habitat, learn what data they track and what they do with it.

To the untrained eye, they look like any other watch, and countless watch brands worldwide offer timepieces that cost many thousands of euros. But few have as many functions as a good smartwatch. Many of these devices are effectively mini smartphones that can do everything from making calls, sending messages and playing music to monitoring heart rate, counting your steps, updating you on the weather and helping you navigate. But are these gadgets only for elite athletes, or are they useful in everyday life? After asking different people, from couch potatoes to recreational runners, professional athletes and outdoor enthusiasts, we were able to draw a clear conclusion. With so many apps and metrics, smartwatches truly have something for everyone. But this isn't a buyer's guide, so to get the lowdown on these smartwatches, we accompanied a couple of Addnature employees on a recent hiking trip to the Florarna Nature Reserve in northern Uppland, Sweden. Oskar Eriksson is a dyed-in-the-wool outdoor enthusiast who's into everything from gravel biking, skiing and climbing to running and hiking. He takes his passion to work too, as 'Team Leader Category Manager Outdoor' (read: head of our purchasing department in the Nordics). His colleague, Jenny Wikman, who works more on the creative content side, also keeps herself up to date on outdoor products. Jenny loves any activity where she gets sufficiently mucky, like cycling and mountain biking in the woods, as well as 'everyday' adventures like picking mushrooms and hiking in the mountains, preferably in the company of her best friend Maja, a one-year-old Shetland sheepdog. Oskar has a Garmin Forerunner 945 and is a bit of a sports watch enthusiast. Jenny, however, invested in a "bewildering and packed-with-features Fenix Pro 6S", also from Garmin, just a few months before the hike. "I bought my watch because it's helpful to keep track of distance covered and activity duration – for example, when I train the dog who can't express how tired or alert she feels compared to our last session. With the help of the watch, plus the dog's breathing, I get a better idea," says Jenny. "Otherwise, it was mostly because it's convenient not to use my phone to follow a route, especially when mountain biking or picking mushrooms. I can also mark where the car is (and where the mushrooms are – but don't ask me to reveal my spots because then I'll have to kill you...)." "My watch is – after my partner Malin – my number one companion," says Oskar. "I use it all the time. I love to keep track of statistics and figures, but mainly I want to know how quickly I get down the ski slope, the elevation, how far I've gone and my top speed." One weekend last autumn, Jenny and Oskar, together with Oskar's partner Malin, went to Florarna Nature Reserve to hike and spend the night in a cabin. It soon became apparent that these watches could be used in entirely different ways. Malin was mentally prepared for a weekend together with two insufferable gadget nerds, says Jenny, and dropped back to enjoy some peace and quiet, away from all the gadget chat. This particular discussion started with 'what R-value his UL base layer has' and 'why she's looking at getting a similar one in the same weight class' and continued with lightweight backpacks, Dyneema, water filtration and so on. A true World Cup of nerdery. In the cabin that evening, Oskar reviews the day's activity on his watch, compares it to similar hikes and gets lost in graphs and numbers until it's time to go to bed. Jenny and Malin relax without any technology in sight. "I can see the benefits of these watches, but I'm not particularly interested in getting one myself," says Malin. "Since I almost always have Oskar and his watch with me, keeping a close eye on our performance, it's nice not to care. I get (sometimes without wanting it!) the information anyway." Daybreak – time to eat breakfast and get moving. Malin laces up her boots and is ready to go. But the watch crew are still messing about setting up their little friends. And it's at this point that beginner Jenny makes a fatal mistake by pressing start before the watch has finished ascertaining its GPS position. The three hike, eat lunch, hike some more, and drink some hot coffee. As they get near to the end of their trek, Malin tosses out an innocent question: "How long do we have left?" Oskar and Jenny both say how far they went yesterday (the same route but in the other direction) and how far they've gone today. It differs by two kilometres. Jenny and Malin shrug their shoulders. Some watches aren't 100% accurate, but so what? At least they're finally near the car! But Oskar's having none of it. He can't work it out – complex streams of numbers and equations run through his head, like Matt Damon in Good Will Hunting. Both of their fancy Garmin watches showed exactly the same distance yesterday. WHOSE. WATCH. IS. WRONG?! HOW?! WHY?! In addition, it's Jenny's watch that shows the two extra kilometres, so she takes the opportunity to rub salt in Oskar's wounds. They press on. Only now, Jenny and Malin walk together fifty metres behind Oskar, who's quiet and calm. In a world of his own, Oscar secures first place in the Swedish Championship of Nerdery, mumbling: "It must be my watch that's right because it shows the same distance as yesterday. We've been together the whole time. My pulse has been smooth, as it should be, so it's Jenny's that's wrong!"

The benefits of a smartwatch are obvious: they keep track of heart rate and health data, which is always good, whether you're a professional athlete or spontaneous exerciser. On top of that, well, let's just say they become what you want them to be.