I test smart watches for a living – it’s been a while since I’ve been this impressed with one

Matthew Miller/ZDNET Coros Pace 4 Pro 4.5 / 5 Very good Pros & Cons Has the largest display on any Coros watch. Long battery life, even with AOD enabled. Connects to ChatGPT and Claude for advanced data evaluation.

Sleek and slim form factor with a titanium bezel. No third party apps. No support for subscription music services.

Coros has long been one of my favorite sports watch brands, so it came as little surprise that my new favorite watch is the new Pace 4 Pro , thanks to its design and smart set of features. I started with Coros using the Pace in 2018, then jumped to the larger and more rugged Vertix that I used for years. Now, I’m thrilled the Pace 4 Pro offers all I need in a sports watch at a reasonable price.

Also: I tested the best sports watches in 2026: Here are the latest and greatest watches, no matter your budget I’ve tested Coros Pace models in the past, but always found them too small to serve as my long-term daily driver. For example, the Apex 4 is an outstanding option, but has a MIP display. The Nomad is a perfect fishing companion, but is a bit bulky for daily use.

The Pace Pro has a smaller AMOLED display, much lower battery life, and has too much plastic for me to use as a daily driver. The Coros Pace 4 Pro, however, is designed for athletes like me that enjoy running, biking, and other fitness activities such as indoor rowing, walking, and more. The Apex 4 is optimized for more rugged, longer outdoor adventures with the Nomad and Vertix serving a more focused customer base.

Matthew Miller/ZDNET That big display The new Coros Pace 4 Pro brings the largest watch face ever to any Coros device at 1.47 inches with a high resolution 466 x 466 pixels AMOLED touchscreen. While it’s large enough for my wrists with a 47.6 mm size, it is also sleek and light at just 13.8mm (including the heart rate sensor) and 43 grams with a nylon band. The default silicone band that came with the evaluation unit bumps the total weight to 51 grams.

The body weighs just 38 grams. Matthew Miller/ZDNET The display goes up to 3,500 nits of brightness, so it’s viewable in all lighting conditions. Unlike other competing watches in this price range, the display is sapphire glass so it is scratch resistant.

In addition Coros upgraded the bezel material around the display to titanium so it improves the quality feel and durability of the watch face. Long battery life Coros watches have long been considered battery champions, and the magic continues on the Pace 4 Pro with up to 60 hours of GPS tracking and 21 days of typical use with its 447 mAh capacity battery. These battery ratings drop to 46 hours and seven days with always-on display mode, but even these are still compelling for a sleek slim smartwatch priced at $449.

Matthew Miller/ZDNET Charging is also convenient with the included USB-C charging adapter providing up to 10 hours of GPS tracking with a 30 minute charge. Sensors and more The Pace 4 Pro is the first Coros watch with the fourth generation optical heart rate sensor, while accuracy compared to other watches and arm bands has been excellent. The watch also sports a thermometer, pulse oximetry sensor, ECG, and a new multi-thermal temperature sensor.

This new multi-thermal sensor hardware is present, but there is no software yet in place to use it. However, in typical Coros fashion you can expect new features and functions with regular software updates. Matthew Miller/ZDNET The watch also includes a speaker and microphone so you can capture voice notes or voice pins and control key functions of the watch with your voice.

RAM has also been doubled to 64MB compared to the Pace 4, so you can enjoy a more responsive mapping and navigation experience. The large 32GB of onboard storage is also perfect for storing the data from your Adventure Journal and onboard music files. Training tools and AI integration I’ve long been a fan of the Coros Training Hub that provides you online access to all of your data with the ability to work with coaches too.

The Coros Pace 4 Pro collects a vast amount of health and fitness data that you can view in detail on your connected smartphone or via the website. A fairly new function available to Coros watch owners is the Coros MCP that supports connecting your Coros data to ChatGPT and Claude. Due to this capability, I upgraded my ChatGPT account and find this AI connection to easily be worth the monthly ChatGPT fee.

Matthew Miller/ZDNET With this AI connection, you can query your Coros data and create all kinds of custom reports to view trends in your metrics. As of September 18th, you can now ask these AI platforms to create workouts and training plans that sync directly to your Coros account and then to your watch. Also: Finally, a smartwatch that competes with my Garmin in battery life (but it’s cheaper) The ability to create custom training plans that match how you train is outstanding.

I primarily stay fit by running and indoor rowing, but very few watches and training plans allow me to use these activities together. ChatGPT replied that I could not integrate rowing into Coros, but it provided rowing sessions that I could add manually into the fitness plan, and that’s still better than most systems. I just started exploring this new training plan functionality and am excited about the possibilities to use AI for improving my health and wellness.

ZDNET’s buying advice The Coros Pace 4 Pro is just about perfect. It has a reasonable size, good price, large, brilliant display, good battery life, and a capable ecosystem. I would love to see support for golf courses and ski maps to make it the only one I need, but the Coros Pace 4 Pro may be the perfect sports watch for most people who enjoy typical activities and want an affordable option with insights into all of the data collected by the watch.

You can also trust Coros to support your watch for years and improve it regularly. Why the Coros Pace 4 Pro gets an Editors’ Choice award The Coros Pace 4 is nearly perfect for the price point and when you compare it to competitors. I would love to see a LED flashlight and support for golf courses, but that is just my personal needs.

Other than that, I can confidently say it’s the best Coros watch I’ve ever used. Matthew Miller Contributing Writer Matthew Miller started using mobile devices in 1997 and has been writing news, reviews, and opinion pieces ever since. Matthew started using mobile devices with a US Robotics Pilot 1000 and has owned hundreds of devices running Palm, Linux, Symbian, Newton, BlackBerry, iOS, Android, webOS, Windows Mobile, and Windows Phone operating systems.

His current collection includes the latest and greatest foldables, wearables, and more, along with classic devices like the Apple Newton MessagePad 2100 and Sony CLIE UX50. Matthew can be found on various social networks under the user name of "palmsolo." See full bio The Latest from Matthew I test smart watches for a living – it’s been a while since I’ve been this impressed with one I tested the world’s first solar AMOLED sports watch – how charging works This accessory lets you add a keyboard to most any device – and I found the perfect use for it

Source: ZDNET