Can A Smartwatch Play Music Without Phone?

Yes, smartwatches these days can play music without a phone. The way it goes, you connect your Bluetooth earbuds or headphones with a smartwatch and as far as they are in the range, you can enjoy your favorite music, audiobooks, and podcasts. 

Some watches can even make calls and send texts thanks to LTE connectivity available in premium watches. Anyways, we will explore the music experience on the watch. 

Music storage was first offered by Apple, Samsung, and Fossil long before it become a baseline feature for premium smartwatches. 

Garmin and Fitbit were slow to adapt as their niche-focused smartwatches had little room for bells and whistles. But the convenience smartwatches offer by allowing you to listen to music from the wrist, made them change their course. 

Music storage and contactless payment are the most sought-after features these days as users don’t want to tow their giant phones around when they are out for a run or hitting the gym.

Apart from music storage, some smartwatches allow you to download playlists from a popular music streaming platforms like Spotify, Amazon Music, Deezer, Pandora, and iHeartradio. Of course, you must have premium accounts to download music for offline listening. 

To name a few, we share with you an ultimate list of smartwatches that can store music. 

1. Apple Watch Series 3, Series 4, Series 5, Series 6, Series SE, Series 7
2. Samsung Galaxy Watch Active, Active 2, Galaxy Watch, Galaxy Watch 3, Galaxy Watch 4, Galaxy Watch 4 Classic
3. Fossil Gen 5, Skagen Falster 3, Fossil Sports
4. Ticwatch Pro 3 GPS, Ticwawtch E3, 
5. Garmin Venu 2, Venu, Venu SQ, Fenix 6, Vivoactive 4/4S
6. Fitbit Versa 3, Sense, Versa 2
7. Suunto 7

I am going to share with you the best watches that can play music without a phone, once I am done covering frequently asked questions on the topic. 

Disclaimer: If you buy through affiliate links on this article, we may earn a commission without any additional cost to you.

How Can A Smartwatch Play Music Without A Phone?

Earlier smartwatches had the ability to control music on the smartphone, and it was quite a popular feature at that time. Even today, budget smartwatches like Amazfit Bip U Pro cut corners by offering nothing but music remote control. 

Though useful, this feature wasn’t a great help as fitness buffs and athletes had to carry their smartphones or mp3 players around. The music storage on the smartwatches changed the whole equation and made the wearable market more attractive. 

If the smartwatch has storage capacity, it usually ranges between 4 to 8GB, It can be used as an mp3 player. You just have to sync music via your smartphone or PC (Garmin Watches) over Bluetooth or Wi-Fi connection and that’s it. 

Alternatively, if the smartwatch support Wi-Fi and LTE connectivity, it is highly likely that there is dedicated music streaming app for it. As these are standalone watches, you can directly stream music on them, or even store the entire playlist for offline playback.

My Smartwatch has Speaker, Can it play music?

Obviously, you can, but do you really want to listen to your favorite tracks on the feeble speaker of your smartwatch. I won’t.

These tiny speakers are for Voice assistants or to attend calls on the go. They are not designed to give you the best music experience, or even half, which you have become used to with the recent advancements in audible devices. 

Do smartwatches come with earbuds inside?

There are smartwatches mostly manufactured by shady companies that offer smartwatch-earbuds combo. No reputable smartwatch manufacturer has tried this venture. 

The smartwatches with earbuds inside have a considerable heft to them, and both the watch and the earbuds are of inferior quality. 

I highly discourage you to buy these 2-in-1 smartwatches mainly for the reason that they aren’t worth the money. Instead, you should invest in a branded smartwatch with music storage inside, even if you get your hands on renewed units on popular eCommerce stores.

7 Best Smartwatches With Can  Play Music Without A Phone

Apple Watch Series 6:

• 8 to 32 GB storage
• Apple Music, Spotify, Audible
• About 3 hours of music Playback

Apple offers the best music storage capacity on its smartwatches. From series 3 to Series 7, you get 8 to 32 GB storage at different price points. As I mentioned earlier, Apple Watch Series 6 is one of the best smartwatches that can play music without a phone.

The smartwatch has a built-in speaker and microphone though you won’t be using it for music playback anytime soon. You can connect the Airpods via Bluetooth for a rich music experience.

As we can expect, it offers deep integration with Apple Services: Apple One and Apple Music Plan. You can import music and can even stream music over Wi-Fi. And if you opt for the cellular unit, you don’t have to be around your iPhone or a Wi-Fi connection.

Not just music, you can listen to your favorite podcasts and audiobooks. And if you are not a great fan of Apple Services, you can opt for third-party music streaming services like Spotify.

To upload MP3 music on the Apple Watch, you would have to pass through the iPhone. For this, you first have to sync your favorite playlist to iPhone via iTunes software, and as you charge your Apple Watch, it would automatically sync music using Wi-Fi connectivity.

The music experience on the Apple Watch Series 6 is great, but the short battery life is a big caveat. Apple has yet to fix the battery performance of its wearables, and I hate to tell you this, Playing Music on your Apple Watch without iPhone, would put a huge dent in the battery performance.

Pros:

• Spotify Support
• Speakers and Microphone on board
• Bluetooth, Wifi, Cellular connectivity
• Download, Stream songs on Apple Music
• Huge Storage Capacity.

Cons:

• Compatible only with iPhone
• No offline playback with Spotify

Fitbit Versa 3:

• 300 songs
• MP3 drag-and-drop also Pandora (US) and Deezer (Europe)
• 12 hours GPS no music (expect approx 4 hours with music)

Fitbit Versa 3 isn’t the only Fitbit that can play music without a phone. Its immediate predecessor, Versa 2, and successor Fitbit Sense have the same capabilities. Like Garmin watches, it supports a range of music streaming platforms that include

• Spotify
• Deezer
• Pandora

But there are some caveats. The Spotify support is limited, the same as the Apple Watch. The Fitbit Spotify App can only control music on your smartphone. You can download a playlist for offline listening on Pandora and Deezer though (without a premium subscription). Also, Amazon Music has currently not made it to Fitbit watches.

I ditched Versa 2 for it its outdated design and tech, and Fitbit Sense for the reason that it doesn’t offer anything extraordinary over Versa 3 except for FDA-approved ECG tracking.

Mainly targeting fitness and sports enthusiasts, adding standalone music capabilities to its watches was indispensable for the company.

To put music on the watch, you will have to install Fitbit Connect App on a desktop/laptop and has to pair the Versa 3 with it. Or you can download the Fitbit Music app on Versa 3. Thanks to Wi-Fi connectivity, Syncing music, and other data is pretty fast.

Once your favorite music or podcasts are downloaded on the watch, all you have to do is to pair earbuds via Bluetooth. Remember, Fitbit Versa 3 is compatible with both iPhone and Android. 

Another plus with the Fitbit Versa 3 is its long battery life. At least it is better than Apple Watch. You can get almost 2-3 days of battery performance between charges if you run often and play music on the Fitbit. 

Pros:

• Compatible with both iOS and Android
• Supports Deezer, Spotify, and Pandora
• Solid Fitness tracking
• Long battery life
• Bluetooth/Wi-Fi connectivity

Cons:

• Spotify experience is limited
• Pandora and Deezer are only for US and Europe respectively

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Garmin Venu 2

• 2,000 songs
• Spotify, Amazon Music, Deezer, iHeartRadio
• 8 hours of music with GPS
• Offline playback supported

Music Storage on Garmin GPS Sports watches is often celebrated with a new variant (Pun intended). There a so many Garmin watches out there that have an expensive Music variant and I hate it when a company charges so much for a single feature.

Anyways, Garmin Venu 2 is a recent release and thankfully there is no Music variant to it. The watch can store 2000 songs depending on the quality as it has roughly 7GB storage capacity. Obviously, it can play music without a phone.

Though the display has little to do with the music experience, the crisp AMOLED display on this watch does need a mention. The OLED display on Garmin Watches is a rare exception even to this day. As far as music experience is concerned, the watch offers more than just onboard storage. It has syncing support for Spotify, Deezer, Amazon Music, and iHeartRadio. (one of the best smartwatches with Spotify support)

Surprisingly, this watch offers approx. 12 days of battery performance on basic mode. However, listening to music on it can significantly reduce that to 1 day. For average runners who want to run both GPS and Music playback simultaneously, this watch can last for 8 hours.

Don’t want to pay a hefty price tag (around $400) for Venu 2? You can always opt for the original Venu with 650+ songs capacity and almost similar features.

Pros:

• Spotify, Amazon Music, Deezer, iHeartradio
• Huge storage capacity
• Long battery life
• Solid Fitness and Sports Tracking
• Robust GPS monitoring

Cons:

• Expensive

Galaxy Watch 4/ Galaxy Watch 3/ Active 2

Samsung under the Galaxy banner has released many powerful watches so far. The latest Galaxy Watch 4 and Galaxy Watch 4 classic differs greatly from their predecessors. Wear OS has replaced the Tizen as the operating system and the storage has been upped to 16 GB.

The watch can store music and play and stream videos on YouTube over Wi-Fi/LTE connection. The battery performance hasn’t been improved and in fact, the predecessor Galaxy Watch 3 offers better performance.

With the introduction of Wear OS, you would soon have access to premium streaming services like Spotify, Amazon Music, Deezer, Pandora, and iHeartradio on a Samsung Watch. The compatible apps would be released later this year.

One particular design aspect of Galaxy Watch 4/4 classic as found on their predecessor is the touch and physical rotating bezel for navigation. This bezel would make navigation through the music player a breeze.

Galaxy Watch 3 and Galaxy Watch 2 are a compelling buy if the budget is limited and you don’t care about the fact that these watches would get updates for only 3 years. Both are decent watches with storage options of 8 GB and 4 GB respectively, and LTE connectivity to stream music when the phone is not nearby.

You can play music on the built-in speaker, but their small size ruins the experience. You would have to connect Bluetooth/Wi-Fi enabled headsets, earbuds, or Bluetooth speakers to get the best out of them.

Amazon Music is not available for Tizen, but you have Spotify. The experience however is limited if you don’t have a premium account. You can’t stream music or download playlists for offline listening.

Keep in mind that the latest Galaxy Watch 4 is compatible with only Android Devices. And the earlier units can pair with both Android & IOS.

Also, all the above-mentioned Galaxy Watches double as a fitness and health tracker. They can monitor heart rate, sleep, stress, and even ECG. GW4 can even monitor body composition. 

Ticwatch E3/ Ticwatch Pro 3 GPS:

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No products found. and Ticwatch Pro 3 GPS have almost the same specs: Wear OS powers them up, 8 GB Storage, and the latest processor by Qualcomm, Snapdragon 4100. These watches would be upgraded to Wear 3.0 later this year.

The music storage is not that huge as that on Galaxy Watch 4 or Apple Watch Series 6, but believe us, it is enough for average users.

Google Play store has apps for Spotify, so you can download playlists or stream music on these watches as both have Wi-Fi Connectivity. Ticwatch Pro 3 has an LTE model also that allows you to stream music without a phone. Ticwatch E3/ Ticwatch Pro 3 GPS:

Mobvoi’s Ticwatch E3 and Ticwatch Pro 3 GPS have almost the same specs: Wear OS powers them up, 8 GB Storage, and the latest processor by Qualcomm, Snapdragon 4100. These watches would be upgraded to Wear 3.0 later this year. 

The music storage is not that huge as that on Galaxy Watch 4 or Apple Watch Series 6, but believe us, it is enough for average users. 

Google Play store has apps for Spotify, so you can download playlists or stream music on these watches as both have Wi-Fi Connectivity. Ticwatch Pro 3 has an LTE model also that allows you to stream music without a phone. 

Music experience on the Ticwatch is particularly great thanks to solid battery performance. These watches have built-in GPS and can perform a range of sports and fitness tracking. Apart from ECG, you can track all health metrics found on the Apple Watch. 

Music experience on the Ticwatch is particularly great thanks to solid battery performance. These watches have built-in GPS and can perform a range of sports and fitness tracking. Apart from ECG, you can track all health metrics found on the Apple Watch. 

Related Post: Ticwatch GPS vs Ticwatch E3

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Huawei Watch GT 2e:

4GB storage

Mp3 player

14-day battery life (essential mode)

Huawei Watch GT 2e as the name suggests is the affordable variant of the original GT2. The watch has a built it mp3 player and around 4 GB of storage.

Like Amazfit, Huawei has its own operating system that works best with Android Phones. You can sync songs in MP3 and AAC format through the Huawei health app. Unsurprisingly, no popular music streaming service has an app for Huawei OS. Last year debacle of the company with the US government made its products a pariah.

Music player is an extra, the GT 2e is the best match of smartwatch and fitness features packed inside an affordable watch. Heart rate and SpO2 tracking feature is there, as well as the stress monitoring. The watch has built-in GPS to track running, and running guides for beginners to put their running training in order.

In addition to this, the watch offers a 14-day battery life on essential mode. However, if you use the music and GPS simultaneously, it will be reduced to a few hours. 

Garmin Forerunner 245 Music

• 500 songs
• Spotify support and offline syncing (Premium required)
• Deezer
• iHeartRadio
• 6 hours GPS with music
• Offline playback supported

Despite the introduction of Garmin Forerunner 945 and Forerunner 645 that are all excellent watches, Garmin Forerunner 245 Music has refused to fall in popularity. Probably the company would have to discontinue the watch.

The watch undercuts many of its successors, but we don’t appreciate the $50 hike in price just for adding a music feature. Overall the best affordable smartwatch for runners with music.

This Garmin watch doesn’t have a speaker, rather you would have to pair your Bluetooth headphones to listen to MP3s stored on the device or the playlists synced from Spotify, Deezer, Amazon Music, or iHeartRadio.

 At max, you can store 500 songs. Only Spotify Premium subscribers can transfer playlists to the device for offline support (Phone-free music experience).

We don’t expect a running watch to miss on GPS tracking and advanced running features. In that sense, Forerunner 245 Music doesn’t offer anything extraordinary. It gives you deep insights into your heart rate during running and cover a wide range of running metrics.