Huawei Watch Ultimate 2 gets serious about skiing with new Snow White edition

Huawei has added a much more winter-focused version of the Watch Ultimate 2, and this is more than a new paint job. The new Snow White model arrives with ski mountaineering, deeper skiing metrics and expanded health-risk features, while a Descente co-branded edition joins it.

This is still the Huawei Watch Ultimate 2 rather than a new generation. We covered the original timepiece and its unusual 150-metre diving and sonar messaging features when it launched last year. The new release builds on that hardware with a much bigger focus on skiing, along with some health and AI additions.

Ski mountaineering is the big new feature

So now you get a dedicated ski mountaineering mode. That is a slightly different proposition from the fairly basic skiing profiles you still find on many sports watches, because Huawei is trying to cover both the climb and the descent.

Routes can be loaded onto the watch before heading out, with support for GPX, KML and TCX files. During the activity, the watch can show the route along with information such as remaining distance and elevation. Huawei also showed a track-back option, which makes rather more sense on a ski mountaineering watch than another collection of pretty watch faces.

The watch records speed, gradient, altitude, heart rate and blood oxygen as you move through the mountains. Afterwards, the session can be broken down further with pace, altitude ranges, heart-rate zones and other performance data.

Skiing in general has received a sizeable upgrade as well. Huawei now talks about six different snow-sport modes covering indoor and outdoor skiing, snowboarding, cross-country skiing and ski mountaineering.

There are also maps for more than 3,000 ski resorts around the world. These can show trail names, difficulty levels and lift locations directly on the wrist, which could be genuinely useful at an unfamiliar resort.

Outdoor skiing gets more granular data too. The Watch Ultimate 2 can record turn counts and recognise different types of turns, while Huawei has added G-Force measurements to estimate the forces generated while carving. The company also showed support for connected smart sensor accessories capable of recording more than 20 skiing posture metrics, including balance, edge angle, pressure and rotation.

That is a fairly serious set of additions. The original Ultimate 2 was already unusually capable underwater. Huawei now seems to be trying to give the watch a similarly distinctive role on snow.

Health tracking gets more ambitious too

The other interesting part of the update is health tracking. Huawei is expanding the X-TAP system, the side-mounted fingertip sensor technology that first appeared on the Watch 5 and which we looked at when Huawei introduced X-TAP on the Watch 5.

Pressing a finger against the X-TAP area can provide real-time blood oxygen readings, while Huawei’s quick health check can now pull together as many as 20 health indicators.

More unusually, Huawei is adding research-based risk assessments for coronary heart disease and hyperglycemia. The wording matters here. The watch is not suddenly measuring blood glucose, and Huawei is not presenting the coronary heart disease feature as a diagnosis. These are risk-assessment tools that use data collected by the watch to identify patterns that may warrant closer attention.

Snow White is not the only new version

The new Snow White edition gets a light-colored case with a purple-white nanocrystalline ceramic bezel and a pale nylon woven loop strap. Huawei has also created several matching snow-themed watch faces, so the whole thing looks noticeably different from the existing darker Watch Ultimate 2 variants.

There is also a new Descente x Huawei Watch Ultimate 2 version. That model goes in the opposite direction visually, using a darker finish with orange detailing and a matching woven strap. The collaboration makes more sense now that Huawei is pushing the watch much harder towards skiing and winter sports.

HarmonyOS 7 brings another part of the update. Huawei’s Xiaoyi assistant can analyse health and exercise information, answer questions about recorded metrics and provide post-workout interpretations. Satellite messaging, eSIM connectivity, golf features, 150-metre diving and the existing underwater sonar communication system remain part of the broader Ultimate 2 package.

For now, Huawei has announced the new variants as part of its China launch event. There is no confirmation yet in the material released today on whether the Snow White or Descente versions will make their way to international markets.