Specifically designed for active users who require immediate access to emergency response personnel, the MobileHelp Smart ($349.95) is a rugged smartwatch that offers two ways of connecting to a 24/7 response center and uses Samsung Health apps to help you track your heart rate, fitness activities, calories burned, and more.
Because it's actually a modified Samsung Gear, it looks nothing like a typical medical alert button and can be worn comfortably and inconspicuously.
The watch turned in solid response times (the time it takes to be connected to a live agent once the help button is pressed) in testing and the fitness apps worked well, but it doesn't come cheap and it lacks fall detection and messaging capabilities.
Honest, Objective Reviews
Daxdi.com is a leading authority on technology, delivering Labs-based, independent reviews of the latest products and services.
Our expert industry analysis and practical solutions help you make better buying decisions and get more from technology.
Price, Design, and Features
The MobileHelp Smart doesn't come cheap.
You'll pay $349.95 upfront for the watch and $24.95 per month for the 24/7 monitoring service.
That's significantly more expensive (for the first couple of years, at least) than the Freedom Guardian watch, which goes for $99 and offers two service plans at $44.95 and $49.95 per month.
And, while the MobileHelp Smart is loaded with fitness features, it lacks the senior-friendly extras that you get with the Freedom Guardian, such as a portal that lets caregivers and trusted friends track the user's alerts and current location, a mobile companion app, text-to-voice messaging, and calendar alerts and reminders.
Unlike most other mobile alert systems, the MobileHelp Smart doesn't offer fall detection, but it does have cellular and GPS radios and uses AT&T for its cellular service.
The GPS radio not only locates your position in the event of an emergency, but is also used to track distance for your outdoor walking, cycling, running, and hiking activities.
As far the hardware itself, the MobileHelp Smart is a Samsung Gear S3 Frontier watch designed specifically for medical alert users.
It runs on Samsung's Tizen mobile operating system, which is easy to navigate using the touch screen and offers a variety of Samsung Health apps.
The watch is durable: It has a black stainless steel body that has an IP68 rating, which makes it resistant to water and dust, but swimming with the watch or wearing it in the shower is not recommended.
It has a black rubber strap and a rugged Corning Gorilla Glass face.
A rotating outer bezel is used for scrolling through menu choices.
The MobileHelp Smart's 1.3-inch circular face is an AMOLED touch display with a 360-by-360 resolution.
The watch has a built-in microphone and speaker that allows for hands-free communication with emergency response agents.
There are two buttons on the right.
The top button is a Help button and the bottom button is a Home button that toggles between the Watch screen and the Widgets screen.
A heart rate sensor is built into the back.
The Watch screen displays the time, date, and battery life, and it has buttons for Steps, Heart Rate, and Calories Burned.
When you tap the Steps button you can set step targets, enable notifications, and view your daily and weekly step counts.
With the Heart Rate button you can measure your current heart rate and view a brief description that tells you if it is in normal resting range or too high.
You can have it monitor your heart rate continuously, every ten minutes, or only when you tap the Measure button, and you can view a history of monitor results with graphs.
The Calories Burned button opens a dashboard with data including daily and weekly calories burned charts.
The dashboard also contains daily and weekly step data, how many floors you've climbed, and lets you set thresholds for water and coffee intake with notifications when you've met your threshold.
Here you can also select a workout regimen and track duration and distance for numerous activities including cycling, walking, running, hiking, elliptical, exercise bike, step machine, treadmill, lunges, crunches, and squats, similar to what you get with a fitness tracker.
In the Widgets screen there is a Help button that initiates a call to the emergency response center.
Press the button for two to three seconds to make the call, at which point the watch will vibrate and beep.
You can press the Cancel button if the Help button was pressed accidentally.
There's also a Test button widget that you can use to make sure the watch is communicating properly.
It will place a call to the response center, but you'll get a recording rather than a live agent.
The Weather widget gives you the current temperature with the daily high and low temperatures and current conditions.
And the Fitness widget offers everything in the Calories Burned dashboard as well as a Settings screen where you can enter profile data such as height, weight, date of birth, and gender.
Here you can also set inactive time alerts, healthy pace alerts, and sleep notifications.
The watch comes with a desktop charger and a USB charging cable.
To charge the watch, simply place it on the magnetic dock and wait for the red LED to turn green, indicating a full charge.
At any time you can press the Home button to see the percentage of charge and how many minutes remain until a full charge.
Its battery can last up to two days between charges.
Setup and Performance
Before using the MobileHelp Smart for the first time make sure it has a full charge, then press the Home button to power up the watch before strapping it to your wrist.
I tested the watch's response time using both the physical Help button and the button in the app.
The first press yielded a response time of 51 seconds, but subsequent calls yielded an average of 30 seconds before a live agent responded.
That's around six seconds faster than what we saw with the Alert1 Kelsi On-the-Go and the MobileHelp Solo systems, but not quite as fast as our leader, the GreatCall Lively Mobile (13 seconds).
The watch's fitness monitors are accurate.
The heart rate monitor readings were nearly identical to the readings I took while using the monitors on the elliptical and treadmill machines at my local gym.
Similarly, the step counter mileage logged me at 1.01 miles on a one-mile treadmill walk.
Conclusions
The MobileHelp Smart is more than just a mobile medical alert system.
It also lets track your fitness activities and calories burned, monitor your heart rate, check the time and weather, and monitor your water and caffeine intake.
Its intuitive user interface makes it easy to set up workout routines and track your progress, and most importantly, it offers two fast and easy ways to call for help in the event of an emergency, with speedy response times in our tests.
That said, it doesn't offer the caregiver features such as a companion app, a customer care portal, and direct messaging capabilities that you get with the Medical Guardian Freedom Guardian watch.
It's important to note that neither watch offers fall detection, so if that's a requirement, you may be better off with a traditional mobile emergency alert system such as the GreatCall Lively Mobile or the Philips Lifeline GoSafe 2.
If you do a lot of driving, the Bay Alarm Medical Splitsecnd In-Car Medical Alert is also an excellent choice.
Cons
Expensive.
No fall detection.
No messaging.
Lacks companion app.
View More
The Bottom Line
The MobileHelp Smart is a sleek-looking smartwatch with a built-in medical alert help button, GPS tracking, and several health-monitoring apps.
Specifically designed for active users who require immediate access to emergency response personnel, the MobileHelp Smart ($349.95) is a rugged smartwatch that offers two ways of connecting to a 24/7 response center and uses Samsung Health apps to help you track your heart rate, fitness activities, calories burned, and more.
Because it's actually a modified Samsung Gear, it looks nothing like a typical medical alert button and can be worn comfortably and inconspicuously.
The watch turned in solid response times (the time it takes to be connected to a live agent once the help button is pressed) in testing and the fitness apps worked well, but it doesn't come cheap and it lacks fall detection and messaging capabilities.
Honest, Objective Reviews
Daxdi.com is a leading authority on technology, delivering Labs-based, independent reviews of the latest products and services.
Our expert industry analysis and practical solutions help you make better buying decisions and get more from technology.
Price, Design, and Features
The MobileHelp Smart doesn't come cheap.
You'll pay $349.95 upfront for the watch and $24.95 per month for the 24/7 monitoring service.
That's significantly more expensive (for the first couple of years, at least) than the Freedom Guardian watch, which goes for $99 and offers two service plans at $44.95 and $49.95 per month.
And, while the MobileHelp Smart is loaded with fitness features, it lacks the senior-friendly extras that you get with the Freedom Guardian, such as a portal that lets caregivers and trusted friends track the user's alerts and current location, a mobile companion app, text-to-voice messaging, and calendar alerts and reminders.
Unlike most other mobile alert systems, the MobileHelp Smart doesn't offer fall detection, but it does have cellular and GPS radios and uses AT&T for its cellular service.
The GPS radio not only locates your position in the event of an emergency, but is also used to track distance for your outdoor walking, cycling, running, and hiking activities.
As far the hardware itself, the MobileHelp Smart is a Samsung Gear S3 Frontier watch designed specifically for medical alert users.
It runs on Samsung's Tizen mobile operating system, which is easy to navigate using the touch screen and offers a variety of Samsung Health apps.
The watch is durable: It has a black stainless steel body that has an IP68 rating, which makes it resistant to water and dust, but swimming with the watch or wearing it in the shower is not recommended.
It has a black rubber strap and a rugged Corning Gorilla Glass face.
A rotating outer bezel is used for scrolling through menu choices.
The MobileHelp Smart's 1.3-inch circular face is an AMOLED touch display with a 360-by-360 resolution.
The watch has a built-in microphone and speaker that allows for hands-free communication with emergency response agents.
There are two buttons on the right.
The top button is a Help button and the bottom button is a Home button that toggles between the Watch screen and the Widgets screen.
A heart rate sensor is built into the back.
The Watch screen displays the time, date, and battery life, and it has buttons for Steps, Heart Rate, and Calories Burned.
When you tap the Steps button you can set step targets, enable notifications, and view your daily and weekly step counts.
With the Heart Rate button you can measure your current heart rate and view a brief description that tells you if it is in normal resting range or too high.
You can have it monitor your heart rate continuously, every ten minutes, or only when you tap the Measure button, and you can view a history of monitor results with graphs.
The Calories Burned button opens a dashboard with data including daily and weekly calories burned charts.
The dashboard also contains daily and weekly step data, how many floors you've climbed, and lets you set thresholds for water and coffee intake with notifications when you've met your threshold.
Here you can also select a workout regimen and track duration and distance for numerous activities including cycling, walking, running, hiking, elliptical, exercise bike, step machine, treadmill, lunges, crunches, and squats, similar to what you get with a fitness tracker.
In the Widgets screen there is a Help button that initiates a call to the emergency response center.
Press the button for two to three seconds to make the call, at which point the watch will vibrate and beep.
You can press the Cancel button if the Help button was pressed accidentally.
There's also a Test button widget that you can use to make sure the watch is communicating properly.
It will place a call to the response center, but you'll get a recording rather than a live agent.
The Weather widget gives you the current temperature with the daily high and low temperatures and current conditions.
And the Fitness widget offers everything in the Calories Burned dashboard as well as a Settings screen where you can enter profile data such as height, weight, date of birth, and gender.
Here you can also set inactive time alerts, healthy pace alerts, and sleep notifications.
The watch comes with a desktop charger and a USB charging cable.
To charge the watch, simply place it on the magnetic dock and wait for the red LED to turn green, indicating a full charge.
At any time you can press the Home button to see the percentage of charge and how many minutes remain until a full charge.
Its battery can last up to two days between charges.
Setup and Performance
Before using the MobileHelp Smart for the first time make sure it has a full charge, then press the Home button to power up the watch before strapping it to your wrist.
I tested the watch's response time using both the physical Help button and the button in the app.
The first press yielded a response time of 51 seconds, but subsequent calls yielded an average of 30 seconds before a live agent responded.
That's around six seconds faster than what we saw with the Alert1 Kelsi On-the-Go and the MobileHelp Solo systems, but not quite as fast as our leader, the GreatCall Lively Mobile (13 seconds).
The watch's fitness monitors are accurate.
The heart rate monitor readings were nearly identical to the readings I took while using the monitors on the elliptical and treadmill machines at my local gym.
Similarly, the step counter mileage logged me at 1.01 miles on a one-mile treadmill walk.
Conclusions
The MobileHelp Smart is more than just a mobile medical alert system.
It also lets track your fitness activities and calories burned, monitor your heart rate, check the time and weather, and monitor your water and caffeine intake.
Its intuitive user interface makes it easy to set up workout routines and track your progress, and most importantly, it offers two fast and easy ways to call for help in the event of an emergency, with speedy response times in our tests.
That said, it doesn't offer the caregiver features such as a companion app, a customer care portal, and direct messaging capabilities that you get with the Medical Guardian Freedom Guardian watch.
It's important to note that neither watch offers fall detection, so if that's a requirement, you may be better off with a traditional mobile emergency alert system such as the GreatCall Lively Mobile or the Philips Lifeline GoSafe 2.
If you do a lot of driving, the Bay Alarm Medical Splitsecnd In-Car Medical Alert is also an excellent choice.
Cons
Expensive.
No fall detection.
No messaging.
Lacks companion app.
View More
The Bottom Line
The MobileHelp Smart is a sleek-looking smartwatch with a built-in medical alert help button, GPS tracking, and several health-monitoring apps.
