JAWBONE UP2 REVIEW

In terms of wearables Jawbone is the (not so) little company that did. It's Jawbone Up24activity tracker has been a smash hit in weareable terms, managing to find its way on to the wrists of tech- and fitness-savvy beautiful people in London and San Francisco (and therefore the entire world).

Jawbone makes activity trackers that eschew on-device displays, instead making do with a series of LEDs on the bands themselves. You use the LEDs for basic functions, and explore the detail of your quantified self via a connected smartphone app. Defiantly not smartwatches, Jawbone's wristbands work on the basis that people are more concerned with wearing something that looks okay than they are with squinting at a tiny screen to find out what is happening on their smartphone. By and large they have been proved right.

The UP2 replaces the almost ubiquitous UP24, and is the middle child of Jawbone's current fitness family. It sits between the bargain basement Jawbone Up Move pendant and the UP3, Jawbone's new flagship wristband. As such it is intended to compete with the likes of the Fitbit Charge and the Misfit Shine. (See also: the best activity trackers of 2015.)

JAWBONE UP2 REVIEW: UK PRICE AND AVAILABILITY

The Jawbone UP2 is widely available in the UK, and retails for a reasonable 89.99 in both black and silver at retailers such as Expansys , PC World and Currys.

But listen: you can grab a bargain. Head over to Amazon and you can save 4p on your Jawbone UP2. What? Come back. I can change.

JAWBONE UP2 REVIEW: FEATURES AND SPECIFICATIONS

The Jawbone UP2 is splashproof activity tracking wrist band that connects to your iPhone or Android smartphone via Bluetooth. It contains what Jawbone describes as an 'LED display', but which is in fact a series of three coloured LEDs. There is an accelerometer, and a battery, and it charges via a proprietary USB-charging cable.

A one-stop health shop, the UP2 is activity tracker, sleep monitor and food tracker. But really, it is an activity tracker - sensing your steps and extrapolating the data that generates to measure your exercise and calorie burn.

It delivers all of this information via a colourful smartphone app. In principle the all-new Jawbone app is a kind of virtual coach. You tell it how much you eat, it monitors sleep and movement, and gives you semantically designed tips as to how to be a better you. (See also:Microsoft Band review.)

JAWBONE UP2 REVIEW: DESIGN AND BUILD

As I mentioned earlier, Jawbone's big attraction is attraction: its wearables look like something with which you would like to be seen. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, however, and it would appear from at least one reaction that Jawbone has dropped the ball on this one. My colleague Luc - who is a Jawbone superfan and long-term UP24 wearer - took an instant dislike to the silver/grey UP2 we were testing, describing it as feminine and 'blingey' (but not in a good way).

On the other hand another male colleague, Joao, who is not a habitual activity tracker wearer, described the UP2 as looking 'cool'. He said he would definitely wear it. So the issue isn't black and white - in fact it may well be black and grey. Because over the on the female side of the office (we don't *actually* segregate), the response was almost universally popular.

I spoke to three of my colleagues who have to XX chromosones, and they all said similar things. Denise, Fay and Laura all seperately commented on the slim looks and lightweight feel of the Jawbone UP2, as well as the way the grey and silver UP2 would work with silver jewelry. Two of them specifically said that black activity trackers look male. They all said they would wear the Jawbone UP2.

So on what are all of these PC Advisor staffers commenting? Well, as I may have hinted there are two colour schemes for the UP2: grey and black. Both come with a textured metal plate appended to the top, but in the case of the UP2 that metal is black. The device itself comprises a thin rubber strap and that metal midsection. It's a one-size-fits-all gadget, with an all new metallic watch clasp. In our experience the clasp was initially super fiddly, but then a welcome addition in that it allowed us to set the UP2 to be sufficiently tight as to live on the same wrist as my watch without the two clashing. That aside, it seems a shame that Jawbone has cast aside the more elegant claspless solution of the UP24.

Like that activity tracker the UP2 is robust and splashproof. The metal plate does pick up scratches, but it is impossible to tell on the top side because of the textured finish. I wouldn't take it swimming, but it survived the odd shower with no problems. And that is a good thing, because like the UP24 that rubbery strap will get sweaty and grubby when you workout. Remember that you are going to be wearing it day and night: you need to be able to clean it if you want to retain any friends.

The UP2 weighs in at a measly 25g and measures just 220mm x 11.5mm x 3.0-8.5mm, Jawbone does accept that some wrist sizes will be too big or too small, but claims that it will fit all wrists ranging from 140mm to 190mm in diameter. We couldn't find anyone for whom it didn't fit.

Overall then the UP2 is well built and designed to be both discreet and stylish. You will either like it or dislike it: and I am a fan.

In terms of the user experience the lack of physical buttons or a screen is both a boon and a pain. A pain because althoug you can switch between modes by tapping on top of the unit, we found this fiddly and counter intuitive. And because I am used to being able to see how far I have run by glancing at the Microsoft Band or a FitBit or similar. But a boon because it is really simple to refer to the all-new Jawbone UP on your smartphone. When you do that you see more detail on a comfortable display. And it is way easier to control your activity tracker via the app than through a variety of taps.

Don't get me wrong: I am not claiming the absence of a feature as a feature. I think the on-device user interface of the UP2 is poor. It is worse than the more simple single-button, two-LED UI of the UP24. But the price you pay for having a slim and stylish activity tracker is the absence of a screen. And my point is that unless you require up-to-date speed heart rate and calorie info while you work out, that absence is really no problem.