What's next for Android smartwatches - What's the best Android smartwatch?

What's next for Android smartwatches - What's the best Android smartwatch

There's a new chip coming out for Wear OS smartwatches, and there's a new version of Wear OS, it's 2.0 and it's coming out to smartwatches right now and it has a whole new interface, but oh wait, now it says it's Wear OS 2.1, they keep changing it on me.

whatever, the important thing is it's the new version of Wear OS.

Here's a question, has anything really changed?

Wear OS, as you know, works with both iPhones and Android phones.

The truth is, if you have an iPhone and you want a smartwatch, your best option, it really is the new Apple Watch.

It's really great.

But if you have an Android phone, I still think you're basically looking at those same three options And just to review, that is a Wear OS smartwatch, it is a third-party smartwatch with a screen or a hybrid smartwatch, which doesn't have a screen.

I think right now the best third-party smartwatch is the Galaxy Watch, which is nice, but I kind of don't like it if you're not using a Samsung phone, because there's a bunch of extra software and the hybrid smartwatches, they're fine, they're still doing their thing.

But the real question is, what's going on now with Wear OS?

And actually, there's quite a lot.

Qualcomm has announced a new processor for Wear OS, it's called the Snapdragon 3100, and before you get too excited about it, the main thing that you should know about it is that it has a little co-processor that runs the thing in ambient mode and also it can detect all the sensors.

And it allows it to run in low power for a longer time, but the main processor isn't any faster.

So, it still feels basically the same when you use it.

That's not necessarily a problem, assuming that Wear OS has been updated to work better on like the existing chips.

So, I've been using Wear OS for the last week or so and you know what?

It's been updated to work better.

But the other thing about this new processor is we haven't seen any watches using it yet.

That may seem confusing, because you may have seen that a bunch of smartwatches just got announced at that tech show in Berlin called IFA.

But you should know that all those watches still have the old processor.

And here's one of them right here.

It's the Fossil Q eXplorist HR Gen 4.

And the HR stands for heart rate Because it can read your heart rate now.

They cost 255 bucks, 

the other new thing that it has is NFC so you can use it with Google Pay.

And you know, honestly, it's pretty nice.

It's got a really big screen, it's you know, kind of thick, but it's not too thick.

I think it looks pretty good, and I do kind of like it.

But I don’t know if I like it to the tune of 255 dollars for a smartwatch with an old processor kind of like it, you know what I mean?

Also, honestly, the battery life it's not that great.

At a high level, the biggest change is that Google seems to have figured out what a smartwatch is for.

Finally, or maybe again, I don’t know.

Google seems to have a really clear idea.

If you take a look at what's happening here, you begin to see something really important.

So, let's look at the new gestures on Wear OS.

So, when you swipe down from the top, you get a new quick setting screen

and it's just a lot more coherent than before.

There's a whole lot of new buttons here, there's a Google Pay button, so if you have NFC you can just turn on Google Pay really quickly.

There's a button to find your phone right away.

Do not disturb, airplane mode, it's a much nicer quick settings interface.

Now if you swipe up, you get the new notifications interface and it is way better than the last version of Wear OS.

Because everything is on a single scrollable sheet, you can still expand them, you can still see stuff grouped, and you can wipe stuff away that gets smeared on your phone.

Good job! Way better.

Thank you for making it the way it was.

Now from the home screen, if you swipe right if you swipe right? Yes.

Well, if you swipe left to go to the right.

Swiping is hard, I'd be really bad at Tinder, by the way, it's a good thing I'm old.

Anyway, you get to the new version of Google Fit, which just got updated, it's got two new scores, and Google really simplified it and made it easier to understand, so good job there Google.

And then when you swipe right, you get to the left-hand screen, which is the Google Feed.

This is the place where you can see, you know, ambient information, you're going to get the weather, you're going to get what Google thinks is, you know, the next thing in your calendar or whatever.

This where they can be a little more experimental. Put it all together, look at all the stuff in the new gestures, what do you really see? Well, here's what I see.

Number one, I see an operating system that is maybe slightly faster and a little bit more responsive than it was before. Now this could just be new watch syndrome, every time you get a new gadget you just think it's faster, but I don’t know, honestly, I do think Google has optimized things just a little bit.

Number two, finally, we see a coherent focus on the two things that people most want out of a smartwatch, fitness, and notifications. Both of those things are way better now and they're easy to get to from the home screen. Or the watch face, anyway, the features are more purposeful now and they're also more useful, especially Google Fit.

Now, Google isn't trying to compete at every level with the Apple Watch, Google Fit is maybe just a little bit more basic than the health stuff on the Apple Watch.

But, you know what, it works and I do think it's enough for a lot of people.

And then, the third thing that we see here and this might be the most important one, there is room to grow.

And especially in the Google Feed. Is it great yet? No.

Maybe it will be someday, that's always how we feel about the Google feed, but it is a place where Google can experiment with new features and ideas without mucking around with the core functions of the smartwatch.

Add those three things up and I what I think we're really looking at here is a reset.

Wear OS is now simpler, and it's easier to understand and that's more than I've been able to say about it for kind of a long time.

When you use an Android phone and you want to wear a smartwatch, your choices are actually kind of grim.

Yeah, you know what, grim is mean, but it's not wrong.

The problem with Wear OS is Google hasn't done right by its users with this platform.

The new update actually shows Google listening to its user and I'm really happy about it.

The third-party apps are alike not that great if you can find them at all, and digging through the piles and piles of watch faces to find the one good one that you like just takes forever.

Google recently put like this quality filter on the app store for Wear OS so that really low-quality junky stuff will go away.

So hopefully that will make it easier to find the good watch faces and what few good apps there actually are.

I kind of want to go back to Wear OS, which seems like a really bad choice.

Yeah, I actually kind of like it, especially with this new interface.

It's great as long as, you know, you don't need to have your watch work after 10:00 p.m.

because the battery dies.

Even though it might be the right choice for me, I don't think I can recommend a Wear OS watch to really anybody else.

Still true, but that might not be the case forever.

And let me explain why.

Wear OS is in a much better place now than it was six months ago and that comes down to Google solving the same problem that Apple solved with its watch. Knowing what a smartwatch is for.

Time, fitness, notifications.

Everything else is stuff you build on top of that foundation.

And foundations should be simple and sturdy.

And Wear OS? It finally is.

But, that doesn't mean that now is a great time to buy a Wear OS smartwatch, sorry.

It's worth waiting to see what these new Qualcomm processors do on new smartwatches and whether it makes a big difference. And honestly, it's worth waiting to see, software-wise what Google can build on top of this new foundation.