There was a time when it felt like Android smartwatches didn’t have a bright future, but the category got a new lease on life with the refreshedWear OSon theGalaxy Watch 4series. More than two years later, it’s now certain that smartwatches are far from an existential crisis. But considering how many designs and types these wristwatches come in sure indicates an identity crisis of sorts. You can tie a simple fitness band to your wrist that does a couple of things well, or you can spend big on a top-of-the-lineGalaxy Watch 6 Classic. But does that mean one is less of a smartwatch than the other? We will find out.
Multiple faces of a smartwatch
No, not the watch faces, but the actual form factors modern screen-clad wristwatches come with these days. The most recognizable of them all have to bethe top Wear OS smartwatchesand even theApple Watchfor those using an iPhone. What helps them stand apart is their support for an app store from where you may download a wide variety of apps to enhance their capabilities. To support that, the watches come with more capable processors beating under the hood along with software to match, but at the expense of battery life.
Some large-screen watches also have alessersibling — the likes of the Amazfit Bip 5 or theCMF by Nothing Watch Pro. While such watches don’t offer an app store, forcing you to stick with the preloaded apps like the smart feature phones of the pre-smartphone era, they are typically far more affordable (Garmin is an exception) and offer insane battery life lasting up to a couple of weeks. They look like a smartwatch, offer a ton of fitness features, and can relay notifications from your phone connected via Bluetooth.
They basically fall in the middle ofrealsmartwatches and smaller, more discreet fitness trackers, offering a big-screen experience without any unnecessary features that you may never use. Then there are fitness trackers themselves, like theFitbit Inspireor the Mi Band. These tiny capsules are primarily made to be your workout companions, but their software is rich enough to do all that a budget Amazfit watch can do, from showing you notifications to letting you pick up calls.
Not to forget, hybrid smartwatches also exist to offer you the flexibility of a modern smartwatch with several connected features but on a traditional analog timepiece design.
Is it even smart without your phone?
All smartwatches still rely on your phone for at leastsomeof their functionality, and this is especially true for fitness trackers and basic smartwatches. you’re able to leave your phone behind briefly, say when you’re out for a run (if your tracker has GPS built-in), but to see the aggregated data, you will have to connect the watch to your phone once you’re back. Beyond that, they need to stay connected to the phone via Bluetooth to show weather information, caller details, notifications, and more.
The Galaxy Watch, on the other hand (no pun intended), can function on its own without being connected to your phone for a longer time. And that’s mainly because it can connect to your home Wi-Fi and/or LTE (on cellular models) to operate independently of your smartphone to enable its smart features. The installed apps can directly access the internet without needing to first sync the changes with the handset. And LTE connectivity means that you can even receive phone calls and texts on the watch itself.
When all kinds of smartwatches must stay hooked to your phone, are any of them smart enough?
However, not everything can be done that way, and a Galaxy Watch functions better when it stays connected to the phone — Samsung will start sending you incessant notifications as soon as the watch is disconnected from the phone. So, when all kinds of smartwatches must stay hooked to your phone with only varying differences depending on the kind (fitness tracker, hybrid, basic smartwatch, et al.), are any of them smart enough?
How much is smart enough?
I have a very specific relationship with my smartwatch.In a recent personal piece, I detailed how myGalaxy Watch 4 Classickeeps me from getting distracted. It shows me important notifications on my wrist, saving me from ending up spending unnecessary time on the phone. That is smart enough for me and is something one could easily replicate with any basic smartwatch or even a fitness tracker if the small screen isn’t an issue.
Those basic smartwatches are indeedsmart-watches, albeit a little less so than what you can callsupersmartwatches.
On the smartness spectrum, your analog timepiece will sit on one end with thePixel Watch 2on the other. Everything else falls in different positions across the band, and the only difference among all of them is their operating system; that’s what defines the watch’s capabilities. Plus, there could be a strong opinion against calling a fitness tracker a smartwatch because of its design — this terminology indeed helps differentiate between form factors.
That appellative exception aside, those basic smartwatches are indeedsmart-watches, albeit a little less so than what you could callsupersmartwatches (although we don’t discriminate based on one’s aptitude). The kind of complexity one wants on this second screen tied to the wrist can vary considerably from person to person, especially when basic capabilities are nearly the same across the board. So, what’s smart for you may not be enough for another person.
This debate will become as trifling as “what is a computer” once was.
Otherwise, this debate will become as trifling as “what is a computer” once was. Should one only call a fully decked-out Windows gaming PC a computer? Can a thin-and-light MacBook, a tablet, and a smartphone also fit that definition? Or does whatever works for you qualify as acomputersmartwatch? I think the latter is the answer.
