Google is ditching the display screen on its newest wearable and betting laborious on its AI well being coach. The brand new Fitbit Air is a slim, screenless band with a detachable sensor with the only real job of gathering well being knowledge within the background, eradicating the distractions of notifications, apps and stats.
Learn extra: Fitbit Air, Redesigned App and an AI Coach: Google Is Overhauling Its Well being Ecosystem
This back-to-basics transfer echoes the earliest Fitbit gadgets, however with a really totally different finish sport. The place these first bands solely counted steps, the Fitbit Air feeds a much wider stream of biometric knowledge into Google’s evolving well being ecosystem that appears to be more and more centered on AI.
At $99, the band is simply the ticket to get you within the door. The principle occasion is Google’s lately launched Well being Coach, a part of the Google Well being Premium (previously Fitbit Premium) service. The premium service will run $10 a month or $100 a yr while you buy an annual subscription.
Well being Coach is an AI-powered chatbot constructed on Gemini that interprets uncooked knowledge into customized steerage, adaptive exercise plans and restoration suggestions.
The technique additionally extends past Android. As a result of the Fitbit Air and its companion app help each iOS and Android, Google is utilizing the system as a Malicious program of types to convey its AI well being coach to iPhone.
Information of the launch comes alongside a broader rebrand, as Google phases out the Fitbit title in its app in favor of Google Well being — a part of a push to unify its wearables, companies and AI. The Fitbit branding sticks round on {hardware} for now, however the end line for the Fitbit title is in sight.
It is also a strategic wager on the place the market is headed. Screenless gadgets just like the Whoop band and Oura Ring have carved out a rising class of wearables centered on steady put on, sleep monitoring and long-term well being traits relatively than the in-the-moment performance of a smartwatch. The truth that the Fitbit Air may be paired with a tool just like the Pixel Watch additional suggests Google sees the 2 as complementary, not aggressive.
The Fitbit Air has a detachable sensor under the band.
What does it observe?
The Fitbit Air covers the core well being metrics you’d count on, together with 24/7 coronary heart fee monitoring, coronary heart fee variability, SpO2 (blood oxygen stage), temperature variation, sleep monitoring and evaluation, cardio load, coaching readiness, steps, distance and irregular coronary heart rhythm notifications for atrial fibrillation detection. It additionally contains computerized exercise monitoring you can verify later within the app. The system is waterproof as much as 50 meters.
One caveat: The Fitbit Air makes use of an older sensor setup than the present Pixel Watch 4, which features a multipath optical coronary heart fee sensor and a far-field temperature sensor. The Air sticks with extra conventional sensors, which might restrict accuracy, particularly in peak coronary heart fee zones and for extra superior insights, like menstrual cycle monitoring.
Google’s teaching superpowers
Google Well being Coach, and the long-term well being insights, are the principle motive you’d purchase this band. The coach pulls collectively health, sleep, coronary heart fee and menstrual cycle knowledge to construct coaching plans that adapt to real-time efficiency and schedule. It units weekly targets and might counsel exercises (which embrace video examples), modify suggestions based mostly on restoration and might use your personal knowledge to sign when to push and when to relaxation. This contains haptic Sensible Wake alarms that use your sleep knowledge dynamically to wake you at an optimum level in your sleep cycle.
Well being Coach has been in beta since October of 2025 and is rolling out in a staggered launch alongside the Fitbit Air.
Three cellphone screens displaying Google Well being Coach vitamin and health logging.
Battery life
One of many clearest benefits of going screenless is battery life. Google says the Fitbit Air lasts as much as per week on a single cost. (We’ll have to check to see how this holds as much as our real-world testing.) And it may well additionally cost from zero to 100% in 90 minutes.
That does not fairly match the Whoop band’s two-week battery life, nevertheless it’s a critical step up from the roughly 36-hour battery cap you’d get from its display-totting siblings, just like the 41mm mannequin of the Pixel Watch 4.
The Pixel Watch 4 (pictured) can be utilized alongside the Fitbit Air.
iOS and Android
In contrast to the Android-only Pixel Watch, the Fitbit Air works with each Android and iOS, which is extra in keeping with different Fitbit gadgets. Meaning you will get the Google Well being Coach even you probably have an iPhone, although it is unclear if there are any benefits to utilizing the Air on Android versus iOS.
Design and match
I have never seen the Fitbit Air in individual but, however based mostly on the specs, it follows a well-known screenless design. Just like the Whoop band, the sensor module may be eliminated and swapped between totally different bands. In contrast to Whoop, which provides alternate mounts corresponding to a sports activities bra and even a Whoop thong, Fitbit is sticking to wrist-based equipment. That will change later based mostly on suggestions.
The Air helps a variety of interchangeable bands in numerous supplies. Choices embrace the Efficiency Loop for on a regular basis put on, the Energetic Band for exercises and the Elevated Trendy Band for a extra polished look. Bands begin at $35 and are available in 4 colours: Obsidian, Fog, Berry and Lavender. An orange and grey Stephen Curry Particular Version can even be accessible in restricted portions.
Fitbit Air Efficiency band in: Lavender, Obsidian, Berry and Fog.
The privateness dilemma
The shift towards Google Well being branding is now prompting renewed scrutiny, significantly as the corporate explores letting customers import medical data to the app. As a part of its 2020 acquisition of Fitbit, Google agreed to maintain Fitbit well being knowledge separate from its promoting enterprise for 10 years.
Google says knowledge collected by the Fitbit Air and different Fitbit gadgets won’t be used for promoting, however consultants have famous that even anonymized well being knowledge can usually be traced again to people, and that after knowledge is collected, the way it’s used years down the road relies upon fully on insurance policies that may change. For anybody contemplating handing over their well being knowledge, it is value studying the high quality print and maintaining a tally of how these insurance policies evolve over time.
The Fitbit Air detects exercises mechanically and shops them within the Google Well being App.
Fitbit Air pricing and availability
The Fitbit Air launches Could 7 for $100 at Google.com and within the Google Retailer app, with in-store availability at bodily retail areas starting Could 26. Accent bands begin at $35.
Three months of Google Well being Premium are included with buy, after which the subscription mechanically renews at $10 a month.
CNET will likely be testing the Google Fitbit Air over the approaching weeks, so examine again for our full evaluate.
