For people starting out with fitness, the Fitbit Blaze is a decent all-rounder and the best tracker the company has produced to date. The Blaze offers a spectrum of stats for most pursuits, even if they're often imperfect in nature. Having to take a phone to benefit from GPS accuracy, wayward HR stats at peak exercise and undercooked FitStar workouts ensure the Blaze pales in comparison to specialist fitness wearables – and buyers would do well to peek at the forthcoming Garmin Vivoactive HR first – but its size, diversity, user friendly stats and strong app make it easy to recommend for beginners.

The Fitbit Blaze is one step above its fitness trackers rivals, but it's still half step behind the smartwatch crowd.

If you think of the Fitbit Blaze not as a smartwatch, but just the latest in a long line of fitness trackers, the device is fairly successful. It's $50 cheaper than the Surge but has nearly the same feature set. It also adds some important features like a color display, changeable bands and the most stylish design we've seen on a Fitbit product. It's definitely not as attractive as competing smartwatches, but it at least doesn't scream "fitness tracker" like the rest of Fitbit's lineup.

The Fitbit Blaze is competent fitness tracker for casual users, with a few smartwatch functions bolted on.

Fitbit's first real smartwatch gets a lot of things right, including comfort, features and price, but it's not a slam-dunk design for everyone.