S Health like the name insinuates is a health and fitness application Samsung has been bundling on its Android devices starting with the Galaxy S4 back in 2013. It has a built-in pedometer, a thermo-hygrometer, exercise tracker, a calorie-watcher and other minute features to help users monitor their fitness. The application has been updated over time with each big change Samsung makes to TouchWiz. The downside so far has been that users have to either get a firmware update or buy a new device to get a newer version of S Health every time it is updated (no cosmetic changes have ever been made via Galaxy Apps) or dig through the forums and force their hand. That ends today as Samsung takes a bold step and brings the application to the Play Store.
Samsung joins the likes of HTC that has done a pretty job unbundling all its Sense applications and availing them on the Play Store so that users of its devices can get timely updates without having to wait for the same to be bundled with their next firmware upgrade which may never be forthcoming (it’s Android after all 🙁 ). S Health joins the likes of WatchON as some of the few Samsung applications on the Play Store. We hope this signals a change and that soon we may see the likes of Group Play, Action Memo, S Note and others make an appearance as well. Not that there are legions of fans of these applications (bloat is bloat) but it doesn’t hurt to have them on the Play Store.
The S Health on the Play Store is the updated one we’ve seen on the Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge and can be installed by anyone using a capable Samsung device running Android 5.0.
