Zenith Wellness 
The Amazfit Helio and Garmin Cirqa are after the same person: someone who wants WHOOP-style recovery and sleep tracking without the WHOOP subscription. Both are screen-free bands with no required fee. The difference is price and, more importantly, where the data lives.
Quick answer: The Amazfit Helio ($99.99) is the cheaper, value-focused band, tied to Amazfit’s Zepp app. The Garmin Cirqa ($199.99) costs more but adds the deeper Garmin Connect ecosystem and an open path to free insight through Zenith. Both last about 10 days on a charge, so battery is a wash. Pick the Helio to spend less, or the Cirqa for depth and an ecosystem you can build on.
The core difference: price and ecosystem
Both bands skip the screen, both track recovery and sleep, and neither charges a mandatory subscription. So the decision is about how much you want to spend and which app your data ends up in.
The Amazfit Helio keeps things cheap inside the Zepp ecosystem. The Cirqa costs more but brings more activity types and the open Garmin Connect ecosystem that other tools can read.
How they compare
| Amazfit Helio | Garmin Cirqa | |
|---|---|---|
| Type | Screen-free band | Screen-free band |
| Price | $99.99 one-time | $199.99 one-time |
| Subscription | None required (Zepp) | None required (optional $6.99/mo) |
| Battery | Up to 10 days | Up to 10 days |
| Ecosystem | Zepp app | Garmin Connect |
| Recovery + sleep | Yes | Yes |
| Works with Zenith | No | Yes |
Where the Amazfit Helio wins
Price is the headline: at $99.99 it is half the Cirqa. And it is no lightweight. It tracks HRV, sleep, and readiness, plus VO2 max, training load, and 27 sports modes, on the same up-to-10-day battery, with no required subscription. If budget is the deciding factor and you are happy inside the Zepp app, it is a strong value.
Where the Cirqa pulls ahead
Battery is a wash at about 10 days each, so the Cirqa’s edge is the ecosystem. It tracks 80-plus activity types and plugs into the full Garmin Connect stack: Body Battery, training readiness, Pulse Ox, and skin temperature, a deeper toolset than the Zepp app.
Its bigger edge is openness. Because the Cirqa reports to Garmin Connect, its data is not trapped in one app the way the Helio’s is inside Zepp. That is what lets you build on it.
The free-insight path, on the Cirqa side
This is where the ecosystem choice pays off. The Amazfit Helio keeps your data inside the Zepp app. The Cirqa syncs to Garmin Connect, which is open, so a free app can read it.
Zenith does exactly that. It reads your Cirqa data and turns it into a unified recovery score and strain picture with trends, free, no subscription. So a Cirqa plus Zenith gives you a deeper recovery read than the Helio offers, at no monthly cost, and it works with the Cirqa from day one. Try Zenith. It’s free to start.
How to choose
- Cheapest entry, happy in the Zepp app: the Amazfit Helio.
- Deeper ecosystem, open data, and free recovery insight via Zenith: the Garmin Cirqa.
For the matchup that started the screen-free race, see Garmin Cirqa vs WHOOP, and for another budget option, Garmin Cirqa vs Fitbit Air.