A WIRED review portrays the Amazfit T-Rex 3 Pro as an ambitious but flawed attempt to rival the Garmin Fenix 8 at a lower price. Priced at $400, the watch offers impressive hardware like a bright AMOLED display and long battery life, but suffers from a frustrating user interface and unreliable features. Despite some positives, the reviewer recommends Garmin alternatives instead.
The Amazfit T-Rex 3 Pro aims to deliver Garmin Fenix 8-level features for $400, compared to the Fenix 8's $1,100 price tag. The watch features a 49-mm rounded octagon design that's 14 mm thick, with a titanium bezel and sapphire screen over an AMOLED display reaching 3,000 nits of brightness—brighter than the Fenix 8's but dimmer than the Fenix 8 Pro's 4,500 nits. Battery life extends up to 25 days on the 49-mm model and 17 days on the 44-mm version, surpassing the Fenix 8's 16 days. It includes standard health sensors, a depth sensor for diving, a microphone, speaker, and LED flashlight, plus over 180 sport modes.
However, the user experience draws sharp criticism. "Virtually every screen, every quest to change settings, every attempt to do even more the most rudimentary thing left me wanting to tear my hair out," the reviewer writes. Menus require excessive button clicks and are often misplaced; activities must be fully ended to access settings, and the AI assistant Zepp Flow lags up to eight seconds or fails to respond. Offline routing, a touted feature, frequently fails with messages like "Route Creation Failed. Try Again," and once suggested running on Interstate 405, a busy highway.
Maps must be downloaded via the Amazfit app, which took five minutes for one-third of Los Angeles. The Zepp Coach running program setup was adequate but produced illogical suggestions, and one test run prematurely declared "Training Completed" after a mile, freezing the display. Music storage is 26 GB, but no apps support offline streaming, limiting playback to phone control.
Positives include an accurate GPS, decent heart rate monitoring, useful notifications (with quick replies on Android), and a capable Zepp Flow AI that outperforms Garmin's in some queries. The LED flashlight proves handy. Yet, features like Zepp Pay are unavailable in the US, and privacy concerns linger due to Amazfit's past practices. The reviewer notes a "general sense of unfinishedness," with issues like missed surfing waves and unfulfilled strength training recognition. Ultimately, for multisport users, Garmin's Instinct 3 or older Fenix 7 models at $400–$500 offer more reliable performance.