CES2014 was awash with the smell of gym socks this year. OK that’s not quite true, but the whole event was dominated by the wearables market with a heavy overtone of “things to help you be more fit.”

I got to play with a large amount of them  and I wanted to share some of my favourites with you. I will start with this little gem from Misfits called the Shine.

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The Shine can be found at the Misfit website as well as at Millets in the UK for £99

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1x Shine Disc
1x Wrist Band
1x Battery
1x Shine Loop
1x Opening Tool

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The Misfit Shine is a fitness band much like the many others around out the moment but with a few key differences. It is small and good looking while still giving the same metric as other bands but unlike other products the Shine is fully waterproof and can be placed at different points on the body.
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Everything that comes in the box is of extremely high quality if a touch Spartan. The wrist strap and loop are simple and light which makes, I think, for a nice clean look when attached to the brushed, coloured metal of the Shine itself.

The Shine Disc is probably one of my favourite fitness “things” to date. It looks like a flying saucer a little bigger than a Mento with a choice of colours (mine is Topaz) with tiny led’s that are only visible when you tap the top. The whole thing just oozes quality and style.

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The Shine has the ability to track your movement as you would expect, and being fully waterproof you can use it when you are swimming as well as all the other activities you might do to keep fit. By tapping the Shine three times you enter it into sleep mode which will track your sleep time as well as your deep sleep time. This can be very helpful if, like me you sleep but never feel rested. I found that by changing some things in my room I have increased my deep sleep time, and so feel better rested. The way it tells the time is also I feature I think. It shows you an led where the second and minute hand would go which, once you get used to it, looks great.

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The mobile is pretty basic if I’m honest. It looks fine, don’t get me wrong, using the Holo theme as it does, but it lacks much of the information you would expect to see on a fitness tracker. It shows your distance travelled, steps and your calories burned, as well as an arbitrary point system, much like Nike do. I don’t actually mind the Points system as I find it gives me a better goal to work towards. The app also shows you the sleep stats if you remember to turn it on, which I don’t very often. What is lacking is what you see in the FitBit app, for example.

The FitBit app as you can see shows information I think are important in what I call a lifestyle device. By helping you track your calorie intake as well as your liquid intake you can help people manage their lifestyles better whether they use their fitness band for serious fitness or just making themselves a bit healthier. I am hoping that Misfit will work on this in the future to bring a more fully featured app to our phones.

Oh and the app doesn’t auto sync when you open it which make my eye twitch every single time. Please Misfit I need that sorted ASAP!

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As a device, the shine is great. The quality of the product is evident from the first moment you touch it and although the App still has a way to go before I think it is fully featured, it is worth the price.

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