Update 1 (09/01/2020 @ 1:24 PM ET): We have updated this article with clarification from Huami that the Amazfit brand is not being retired. Rather, Zepp and Amazfit will coexist as separate brands with their own wearable product lines. Scroll to the bottom for more information. The article as published on August 28, 2020, is preserved below.

Huami-owned Amazfit is a well-known brand for smart wearable accessories, but now Huami is launching another wearable brand called Zepp. The Amazfit Android app has been renamed to Zepp, though besides a new name and logo for the app, nothing is changing for existing owners of Amazfit wearables. Moving forward, though, Huami will launch new products under both the Zepp and Amazfit brands. The first wearables under the new Zepp brand are the Zepp E Square and Zepp E Circle. These new smartwatches are billed as complete wellness devices, offering sleep tracking, heart rate monitoring, and bloody-oxygen saturation monitoring (with an SpO2 sensor).

Zepp E comes in two different designs: Zepp E Circle and Zepp E Square. They’re essentially the same devices but they feature slightly different screen sizes and shapes. The Circle features a 1.28" AMOLED display at 416x416 resolution while the Square features a larger 1.65" AMOLED display at 348x442 resolution. Both designs are made on stainless steel but come with different band colors and materials. While both the Circle and Square offer a leather band in "Polar Night Black" or "Moon Grey" and a fluoroelastomer band in "Onyx Black", the Square gets a unique "Deep Sea Blue" leather band, "Pebble Grey" fluoroelastomer band, and "Metallic Black Special Edition" while the Circle gets its own unique "Ice Blue" fluoroelastomer band and "Champagne Gold Special Edition."

One of Zepp E’s headlining features is the ability to track a wearer’s sleep stages, including light sleep, deep sleep, Rapid Eye Movement (REM), and awake time. The devices can even monitor your naps. Zepp then provides users with a sleep score, which users can use to take actionable steps to improve their sleep quality.

Both smartwatches also come equipped with a heart-rate sensor, which is common among today’s biggest wearables. However, Zepp is trying to differentiate its devices by using the heart-rate sensor to provide wearers with information about stress. The company said this stress-monitoring feature will come in a future OTA upgrade.

The Zepp E series also features 11 sports modes, including walking, indoor and outdoor running, cycling, swimming, climbing, and more. The smartwatches are graded for up to 5 ATM of water resistance but don't have GPS for location tracking.

Even with all the different sports modes and tracking abilities, Zepp promises up to 7 days of typical battery life with the Zepp E thanks to a 188mAh battery. They can last a bit longer (up to 15 days) with the basic watch mode, though. The smartwatches take about 2 hours to fully charge and are charged by connecting to the 2 Pin Pogo Pin connector on the magnetic charging base.  This kind of battery life isn't typical of Wear OS smartwatches, so you shouldn't be surprised to hear that the Zepp E smartwatches run Zepp's proprietary smartwatch OS. The OS offers five watch faces built-in, though more can be downloaded from the Zepp app.

There are a lot of wearables on the market, but the Zepp E series seem like solid options from a reputable company. It’s also nice that it comes in both square and circle designs, letting consumers choose their preferred style. Consumers can purchase the Zepp E series for $249 right now in the U.S. If you’re in the UK, the wearables will retail for £209 starting September 1.

Pre-order the Zepp E: U.S. ||| U.K.

What's Happening to Amazfit?

The renaming of the Amazfit app to "Zepp" has understandably confused many users, including us. A spokesperson from Zepp's PR team reached out to us to clarify a few things. For starters, the Huami says that Zepp is a totally new product line created by a newly established team. Zepp is targeted towards mainstream consumers who wish to take charge of their health and wellbeing while Amazfit targets younger demographics by "presenting a brand image that combines trendiness with proactiveness toward personal health."

What you actually need to know about these organizational changes is as follows:

• The Amazfit app has been renamed as the Zepp app.
• The Amazfit brand will continue to exist and release new products, such as the newly launched Amazfit Band 5.
• Amazfit will focus on releasing wearables that connect to the Zepp app, while Zepp will release its own self-branded wearables and also a digital health management platform.