Galaxy Watch 5 44mm here with all the features enabled but raise to wake (AOD on), 2 days and a few hours of battery

Is it the OS? Or is it something else? I've got a Garmin and I don't have all the sensors on all the time, but I do have most of them on. The biggest thing is that GPS isn't always on. I get 1+ week of battery life.

With the Google watch, is GPS always on?

It will hopefully get better with the new chip. From another article:

First, Qualcomm shares an example of a “sleek fashionable” smartwatch that has a 300 mAh battery. If that device managed 28 hours with the Snapdragon Wear 4100+, it would hit 43 hours on the Snapdragon W5+ Gen 1.

That 300 mAh total is key to the story here, as it’s roughly the average we see on most smartwatches. The Fossil Gen 6, for example, is rated for 24 hours of battery life with its 300 mAh battery. By Qualcomm’s stats, that device would see at least 40 hours of battery life on the Snapdragon W5+ Gen 1.

Not a direct comparison with the Exynos 9110 but it's pretty likely it could hold a charge for at least a whole day for the uses cases you described if Qualcomm's numbers are true.

The original Pixel Watch was also criticized for its massive black bezels. Sadly, this situation is not changing this year

yeah guess not