The Maxima Max Pro X6: A Budget Smartwatch With Calling Capabilities, But Is It Worth It?
Smartwatches and fitness wearables have taken the world by storm, especially among today’s youth. They’re used for everything from fitness tracking to fashion statements. The Indian market is flooded with options in every price range, but recently, the sub-Rs. 5,000 segment has seen a surge in activity. Typically, wearables at this price point are basic fitness trackers or notification devices, not full-fledged smartwatches. The Maxima Max Pro X6, from Indian watchmaker Maxima, aims to be more than just a notification device. Packed with features like SpO2 tracking, IP rating, and crucially, the ability to answer phone calls, a feature missing in many budget watches, the Max Pro X6 begs the question: does it stand out against established players like the Redmi Watch or the Realme Watch 2 Pro? Let’s find out.
Maxima Max Pro X6 Price in India
The Maxima Max Pro X6 can be purchased online from the company’s website or major online retailers for Rs. 3,999. It’s available in a single 43mm case size and comes in four distinct color options: Black, Black and Gold, Peach and Gold, and Silver.
You can also track sleeping habits using the Maxima Max Pro X6
Maxima Max Pro X6 Design
The Max Pro X6’s design draws heavy inspiration from the Apple Watch, featuring a rectangular casing and a crown on the right side. The watch boasts a metallic casing with a glossy finish, lending it a premium look and feel. A 1.7-inch display with a claimed 400nits of brightness completes the package. You can press the crown to access the home screen and even rotate it, although the rotation is purely aesthetic and doesn’t serve a functional purpose.
You cannot reply to notifications on the Maxima Max Pro X6
Pressing the crown allows you to wake or turn off the screen, exit to the home page, stop activities, and a long press shuts down the device. The back of the watch houses a heart-rate sensor and a SpO2 sensor, as well as two magnetic contact pins for charging. It’s here that we find the speaker and microphone, an oddly placed duo, as your wrist tends to cover them when wearing the watch.
The Max Pro X6 comes with high-quality rubber straps that are easy to detach and replace. If you’re not a fan of the black straps, you can swap them for any other 20mm watch straps. Weighing in at just 44g, the watch is remarkably lightweight. Its IP67 rating ensures resistance against splashes of water, making it suitable for swimming or showering. Compatibility-wise, it pairs with Android devices running Android 5.0 and above and iOS devices running iOS 9.0 and above. Inside the box, you’ll find manuals, a warranty card, and a charger with a USB-A connector on one end and a proprietary magnetic charging pin on the other.
Maxima Max Pro X6 Software, Interface & App
The Maxima Max Pro X6 runs on a custom user interface (UI) reminiscent of the Fire-Boltt Talk. Its Apple Watch inspiration is once again evident, even in the software. The UI looks decent, but the low color saturation results in a less-than-vivid display. Icons and text lack sharpness, and noticeable jagged edges mar the UI elements. You can choose between a list-style app drawer or a honeycomb style, reminiscent of the Apple Watch’s app drawer.
The Maxima Max Pro X6 allows you to switch between honeycomb view and list view for the app drawer
Swiping down from the home screen displays the weather, allows you to adjust brightness, enable/disable battery saver mode, and turn on the flashlight (which essentially maxes out screen brightness). Swiping right brings you to the step counter, displaying details like total steps taken, calories burned, and daily step highs and lows. It also includes a weekly bar graph, offering a clear view of your activity at a glance.
Swiping further right reveals the sleep tracking data, encompassing total sleep time, deep sleep, and light sleep. Scrolling down displays a weekly bar graph similar to the step counter. Another swipe to the right accesses all the health tracking features: the heart-rate monitor, SpO2 tracker, and the Bluetooth phone calling feature. The latter displays call records, a dial pad, and your contacts. The watch can store up to eight contacts, which must be manually added using the app. Interestingly, you cannot customize or rearrange the menu pages.
The Maxima Max Pro X6 relies on the Da Fit app for pairing with your smartphone. The app is available for both Android and iOS devices. Pairing with my Realme 6 Pro and even my iPhone 12 was seamless and hassle-free. Holding down the home screen allows you to switch between the preloaded watch faces. You can store up to five watch faces on the watch at a time. You can also select your favorite watch faces from the Da Fit app, which offers a wide array of options. Swiping up reveals all the notifications you’ve received. The app lets you choose which messaging or social media apps are allowed to send notifications to your watch.
The Maxima Max Pro X6 also permits using the watch as a remote shutter for your phone’s camera. You can control the music playback on your phone as well, but you can’t store music on the watch and it lacks the ability to read song metadata like song name or artist.
The Maxima Max Pro X6 takes up to two hours to fully charge
Maxima Max Pro X6 Performance & Battery Life
Using the Maxima Max Pro X6 for nearly a month, I found wearing it for extended periods every day to be comfortable. The display quality is acceptable and gets remarkably bright, offering good visibility even outdoors. I encountered no issues even when using it under direct sunlight. However, the lack of an auto-brightness function necessitates manually adjusting the brightness level whenever stepping outside.
The Max Pro X6 functions well as a notifier. You can receive notifications from your WhatsApp chats, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, etc., with the watch displaying up to 13 lines of a message. It can also display Hindi messages, although the formatting is somewhat unusual and difficult to understand. Nevertheless, the watch’s lack of reply functionality prevents it from truly being classified as a smartwatch.
The Maxima Max Pro X6 lets you answer calls directly from the watch. Once you enable the call function from the settings, you can pick up calls directly on the watch. The speaker gets remarkably loud, but the microphone quality is only average at best, a common limitation in this price category. You will need to hold the watch close to your mouth for the recipient to hear you clearly. Despite the speaker and microphone’s awkward placement, they performed decently well during testing.
A frustrating quirk, also witnessed with the Fire-Boltt Talk, is that once the calling function is enabled, the watch’s speaker behaves like a Bluetooth speaker, routing all phone audio, from YouTube, Netflix, or any other app, to the watch speaker. The only way to circumvent this is to disable the call function or disable the ‘Media audio’ permission in the Bluetooth settings on Android.
The heart-rate sensor proved accurate in most cases when compared to the Amazfit Verge Lite. The app also allows for continuous heart-rate monitoring throughout the day, although this does drain the battery faster. Performing our standard tests, which involve walking 1,000 steps to assess step tracking accuracy, the Maxima Max Pro X6 registered around 1,004 and 1,007 steps, an acceptable result.
The Maxima Max Pro X6 offers eight different sports activity modes
The SpO2 tracking proved accurate when compared to a medical-grade oximeter. However, it’s still recommended to use dedicated devices for these tests rather than relying solely on your smartwatch. The watch also possesses sleep tracking capabilities, which proved quite precise in testing.
Maxima claims up to 10 days of battery life for the Max Pro X6 with the calling feature off and approximately three days with the calling feature on. In my testing, the watch lasted for four days with Bluetooth calling disabled and around two to three days with Bluetooth calling enabled. Considering the absence of built-in GPS, I anticipated a longer runtime between charges.
During this time, the watch was constantly connected to my phone, with notifications for all social media apps enabled, along with phone calls and SMS. I tested this with the quick view enabled, which activates the display with a flick of the wrist. The watch lacks a battery percentage indicator; it merely displays a battery bar under quick toggles. You will need to access the app periodically to check the battery percentage.
Charging the watch takes approximately two hours to complete. The proprietary charger is somewhat awkward to handle. It requires careful placement at an angle to ensure a secure fit and prevent accidental disconnection.
The DaFit app has a lot of watch faces to choose from
Verdict
Smartwatches with calling features under Rs. 5,000 are a rarity. The Maxima Max Pro X6 is one of the few exceptions that offers this capability in this segment. The ability to make calls on the go from your watch is extremely useful. The watch also boasts a bright display, performs well in recording sleep data and your steps. However, I believe the Max Pro X6 could have excelled in terms of battery life and its software, which could benefit from refinement to enhance the UI experience. Besides the Max Pro X6, you can also check out our review of the Fire Boltt Talk, which also features calling functions and is priced similarly.
Overall, the Maxima Max Pro X6 is a solid offering for its price point, but it’s not without its quirks. Its calling feature is a standout advantage, and its design and performance are respectable for its budget category. However, its battery life and software limitations might be dealbreakers for some users. Ultimately, it’s a compromise between a budget-friendly smartwatch with calling and a more refined experience offered by pricier rivals.
