Casio Adds Heart Rate Monitor to G-LIDE with the GBX-H5600
Casio has announced the GBX-H5600, a new addition to the G-LIDE line within its G-SHOCK family — and the first G-LIDE watch to include a heart rate monitor. The watch is positioned for surfers and outdoor athletes but is built broadly enough for everyday fitness use.
G-LIDE has long carried the features that coastal and water sports enthusiasts expect: tide graphs showing water level changes and moon data tracking lunar phases. The GBX-H5600 keeps all of that and layers in an optical heart rate sensor and accelerometer, enabling real-time biometric tracking during activity. Supported training modes cover running, walking, gym workouts, and interval training, with the watch also recording distance and calories burned.
The sensor data is processed using algorithms developed by Polar Electro, the Finnish company with a long track record in wearable sports science. Results sync to the CASIO WATCHES smartphone app for deeper review and trend tracking.
Display is a high-definition memory-in-pixel LCD — the same technology that remains readable in direct sunlight without the battery drain of backlit screens. The bezel uses translucent resin that exposes the internal construction, a design choice that reads as deliberate rather than economical. Casio has also incorporated bio-based resin into the bezel, case, and band, a materials shift that aligns the watch with current sustainability expectations without foregrounding it as a selling point.
G-SHOCK launched in 1983 on a single premise — survive a drop — and has spent four decades expanding what that premise can support. The GBX-H5600 extends the line into health monitoring territory that watches like the Apple Watch and Garmin Fenix have owned for years. The difference is the G-LIDE context: a watch already trusted in saltwater and heavy impact conditions, now able to track the physical cost of the session that tested it.