The heart rate sensor of the Galaxy S5 It was one of the great novelties in terms of hardware last year (along with the fingerprint reader) as far as the South Korean firm is concerned, although this quality only comes as standard in its high-end smartphones. Since then, most of Samsung's flagships have integrated their own technology capable of measure pulsations and sync them with the app S Health.
However, any Android terminal that has a camera with flash is able to measure heart rate with a precision similar to the one shown by a Galaxy S5, S6, Note 4, etc. without requiring any type of extra accessory.
Instant Heart Rate and some other alternatives
There are numerous applications capable of performing the same function, however, we are going to focus on Instant Heart Rate because we are interested in its integration with Google Fit; and it is that the tool of the Mountain View company can be taken as the standard in Android to monitor and analyze everything that has to do with the physical activity and biometric indicators.
Either way, you can also take a look at the other two that we link above, because each one has its own peculiarities. For example, that of Runtastic works with the well-known app adored by r from all over the world and therefore it will be especially useful for its followers.
How it is able to carry out the measurement
Although when installing the application and opening it for the first time we will be detailed how it works, its mechanics are really simple. To start we must put your finger on the flash terminal after making sure its light is on. The light impulse on the finger itself returns a reflection registered by another sensor that every phone and tablet integrates, and that data generated is taken as the heart rate at a precise moment.
A kind of diagram, right in the central part of the button bar in the lower area of the interface, is the one that will allow us to re-measure our pulse every time we want to do it and save it in the historial or share it through other apps (Twitter, WhatsApp, Gmail, etc.).
We can say that comparing them with those of the Galaxy S5, after a real test, the results that this application gives are practically traced and therefore reliable.
Taking advantage of Google Fit
As we said a few lines above, this tool can synchronize the data with Google Fit, with which we will add more information to our file within the specific app service for fitness of the Mountain View.
There are bracelets and other capable wearable devices register all this automatically, however, there are also somewhat cheaper options, such as the bracelet We Band de Xiaomi (20 euros) that only offers measurement on some limited aspects, within the many to consider: steps, distance, calories, heart rate, etc. With data from Instant Heart Rate we will make our information More complete.
In order to integrate the operation of the tool in Google Fit we need to click on the right wheel of Settings, which appears in the bottom bar of the interface, and if we have both services installed on our tablet or mobile, we will be given the direct option of link them.