A smart watch with fall detection with fall detection is a device that can sense when you have taken a hard fall and send an alert to emergency contacts or call 911 for you. These devices typically look like regular digital watches and can also be worn around the neck or torso as part of a medical alert system using a pendant or bracelet.

The most common way to add this feature to a normal digital watch is with a software update that uses motion sensors and on-device machine learning to detect the hard fall and then automatically calls emergency services. It’s important that this feature works reliably and that it doesn’t over-call or inundate emergency dispatchers with false alarms.

Innovative Protection: The Ultimate Guide to Watches with Fall Detection Technology

To achieve this, the engineers who created the Pixel Watch had to make sure the software could distinguish between a hard fall where you might need help and movements that mimic falling but aren’t serious. They had to go to extremes to make it work, including having people wear the Pixel Watch while doing jumping jacks and swimming in a pool to see how well it performed.

The Apple Watch Series 5 and the Garmin Fenix 5S Plus both have this feature, but they only call your emergency contact if you move or press the help button. For this reason, they didn’t make our list of the best smartwatches with fall detection. The Lively Wearable2, on the other hand, alerts Bay Alarm Medical’s monitoring center when you fall or can’t move and they then take action to get in touch with your emergency contacts, call 911 or dispatch an agent to your location to assist you.