< Usage of smartwatches

~aei

They're neat! (To an extent...)

I never really tried a "smartwatch" but I have tried fitness trackers for a year or two a while ago, which I did get uses out of sleep tracking, receiving notifications from my phone, and also setting timers/alarms helped me without bothering those around me.

I am interested in getting a smartwatch in the future as I do miss some features a bit.

But modern smartwatches? Some stuff are a bit gimmicky.

From a technical standpoint, I think they're cramming way too much tech into a small form factor, it's just hurting battery life and performance.

I always see that the good performing watches usually run their own operating system rather than something like WearOS, even if it is nice to have a decent version of Android on a watch build, it's not really what I'm looking for.

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~kirk781 wrote:

Wear OS watches [or for that fact, even Apple ones] aren't very great on battery life. Samsung Galaxy 6/Pixel Watch 2 can eke out couple of days if used with AOD turned off. But start doing things like streaming music from watch to earbuds and battery takes a tumble.

I used a fitness tracker before. In hindsight, it wasn't as accurate as even the couple of years old Galaxy Watch 4, but it had couple of weeks of battery life.

A fun fact, there's a local company here that actually installed full blown Android and in their marketing jargon, created a "wristphone". Problem is, they are marketing it to people who wish to consume videos and stuff on watches [ why would anyone want to do that, I dunno] but it's battery life, as expected, doesn't inch beyond 2 hours.