We tested Apple's iWatch... er... Watch with watchOS 2

Oct 24, 2015 15:58 GMT  ·  By

 

VERSIONS AND PRICING DISPLAY AND DESIGN FIRST ENCOUNTER
PERSONALIZATION THE SMARTWATCH THE FITNESS TRACKER
WATCHOS 2 BATTERY LIFE CONCLUSIONS

We live in a world where smartphones have evolved so much that it's basically impossible to live without them and it's no secret that 90 percent of the population with at least one such device suffer from what's being called nomophobia. No joke, that's actually a disease and it's often described as the fear of living without a mobile phone that's either close or in the pocket.

Many people believe that nomophobia isn't such a big deal and it's not really a phobia, but more of an anxiety state, yet lots of studies have shown that people are actually afraid of living without a mobile phone. Why exactly is hard to tell, but this phobia exists and psychologists still have a hard time curing it.

But keeping the smartphone next to you is no longer a necessity, no matter if you suffer from the aforementioned disease or you simply don't want to miss a single notification, thanks to the boom the wearables business has experienced in the last couple of years.

Tech giants, including Microsoft and Apple, joined already renowned companies such as Fitbit and Pebble, to make smart wearables, which are essentially extensions of a mobile phone that can pull notifications, bring them on your wrist and, at the same time, double as a fitness tracker.

2015 was said to be the year of wearables and Apple couldn’t be late to the party. So on April 24, 2015, the fruity-named firm took the wraps off the Apple Watch, or the iWatch as some people still call it out there, which is the company's first smart wearable supposed to help set you apart from the rest of the crowd wearing either "normal" watches or other smartwatches.

The Apple Watch quickly became the best-selling smartwatch ever, just like any other Apple device out there, with stats showing that more than 4.2 million units had been sold in the second quarter of 2015. Impressive to say the least, but what made so many people buy the Watch? Was it the design? Was it the feature lineup? Or maybe the Apple logo?

Read on to find what the Apple Watch is all about.

Versions, pricing, and specifications

First and foremost, it's worth mentioning that Apple is selling three different Watch models: Watch, Watch Sport, and Watch Edition. Each of these three version comes in two different configurations: 38 mm and 42 mm. Pricing obviously varies, but it currently is as follows:  

Watch Sport 38mm $349/€310
Watch Sport 42mm $399/€350
Watch 38mm $1,049/€925
Watch 42mm $1,099/€970
Watch Edition 38mm & 42mm $10,000–$17,000/€8800-€15000
Just as expected, technical specifications of the three models vary a little, but the most striking difference is clearly their dimensions.

The 38mm version comes with a 33.5 mm (1.32 inch) screen and measures 38.6 mm × 33.3 mm × 10.5 mm (1.52 in × 1.31 in × 0.41 in), while the 42mm model has a display of 39 mm (1.5 in) and is a little bit bigger: 42 mm × 35.9 mm × 10.5 mm (1.65 in × 1.41 in × 0.41 in). The first has a screen resolution of 272x340 pixels, while the latter reaches 312x390 pixels because of the bigger screen.

All models come with 512 MB of RAM, 8 GB of storage space (which actually drops to 6 GB because of the operating system and the pre-installed apps), Apple's S1 chip (manufactured by Samsung, is based on ARM, and runs at 520 MHz), PowerVR SGX543 graphics, Bluetooth 4.0, NFC for Apple Pay, Wi-Fi support (although very limited), and a speaker.

The Apple Watch requires at least an iPhone 5 and Apple recommends to have iOS 9 installed to make the most of the latest watchOS 2 operating system.

Display and design

The Apple watch is undoubtedly a beautifully-crafted device. It follows the same design trend as the iPhone and it's no matter why. Apple wanted to offer the same premium quality finish and at some level, it managed to do it.

Although it makes sense for iPhone owners to see the watch as a smaller version of their smartphone, the device comes with a square-ish design for a reason. During the research and development process, Apple has reportedly figured out that a round design for the smartwatch would be a lot more difficult to use than a square version, so the company decided to go for the latter. That's not what Motorola thinks though, as the Moto 360 not only looks awesome but also feels very natural most of the time.

To compensate for this, which could make the device look less of a smartwatch and more of some sort of smaller phone, Apple introduced several round faces supposed to make the device feel a little bit more natural on the wrist.

The Watch comes with just two different buttons: a so-called digital crown, which is nothing more than a small wheel that lets you interact with a number of features, plus a side button, which Apple calls just like that, a "side button." Pretty unusual for Apple to use such a typical name, but it perfectly describes the placement of the button.

Other than that, the device comes with a display that can vary in size, as mentioned above, so you can go either for the 38mm (1.5 inches) or for the 42 mm (1.7 inches). There are a total of 38 different models, which are pretty much versions of the same watch but with different colors and straps (which can be easily changed with the help of a small tip on the inside of the case.

Apple Watch case design
Apple Watch case design

All models come with Apple's signature Retina display featuring AMOLED tech, which also employs the company's brand-new Force Touch technology (also available on the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus as 3D Touch). Force Touch lets you access some specific features of the watch, such as faces, by pressing harder on the display. The pressure-sensitive screen also uses haptic feedback to let you know when Force Touch has been activated, just like on the new iPhones.

For protection, Apple used Ion-X glass on the Sport version, which is supposed to be super tough and lighter than similar technologies. And yet, the Watch is supposed to withstand only small impacts, such as hitting the corners of the walls or doors, which is pretty much the way all of us damage our watches. The other models also come with sapphire crystal glass, which makes them scratch-proof. At least, that’s what Apple said, but we all know that it all depends on the intensity of the hit.

As far as the case of the watch is concerned, it also varies by model. First of all, the Apple Watch Sport comes with 4 different cases in silver, space gray, gold, or rose gold, all made of lightweight anodized 7000 series aluminum. This is basically the very same material used on the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus and is not only build to withstand severe shocks, but also to be very light.

The Apple Watch, which is the more premium version of the device, comes with just 2 cases, silver or space black, made of cold-forged stainless steel. Now, here's the surprising thing. Although the more premium choice, the steel makes it heavier, so it weighs in 50 grams instead of 30 grams on the Sport version. Apple says that this model is even tougher, but seriously, you don't buy a smartwatch to throw it out of your window.

And last but not least, there's the super exclusive, uber expensive Apple Watch Edition which uses 18-karat gold for the case. It costs around $18,000 depending on the market, so it would be a really great gift for Roman Abramovich if you spend your weekends with Russian oligarchs on yachts and eating lobster. This version is even heavier - 69 grams, but it doesn't really matter because that's gold down there hurting your wrist.

The back of the case is made of composite for the Sport edition and of ceramic for the other two.

For straps, depending on the model you can choose between fluoroelastomer plastic bands, which is Apple's fancy way of calling the synthetic rubber, as well as leather and stainless steel. Since September 2015, you can also buy some pretty awesome and rather expensive leather bands made by Hermes.

Setting up and first encounter

Just like every other Apple device, the Watch was built from the ground-up to offer seamless configuration and be extremely easy to use, no matter if you're a tech-savvy user or a beginner (the latter category is very likely to find the Watch rather difficult at some points, but more on that later).

So when you set up the Watch for the first time, simply turn on Bluetooth on your iPhone, scan the photo on the display of the device with your phone's camera and everything should be performed automatically. It takes a few minutes before the configuration is complete, and up to 1 hour if the device is running watchOS 1 and needs to download the OS update. Afterwards, you should be able to see the default face and start using the device normally.

When using the Apple Watch for the very first time, it's probably the excitement that convinces you to hold in there, but it's pretty clear that this is not the friendly device you've expected it to be.

There are plenty of ways to interact with the watch, a plethora of settings, and many more on the Apple Watch companion app on the iPhone, but the amount of information that the parent company offers for all of these is simply ridiculous. For example, it takes a while to figure out the purpose of the digital crown and how exactly to use it. Things are by far simpler with the side button, which only calls for the favorites contacts that are configured on the phone and let you start a call instantly.

The digital crown, on the other hand, has multiple purposes: it lets you get to installed apps with just one tap from the watch face and vice-versa, while a quick double-press lets you switch to the latest app in a second. Additionally, rotating the crown on the fact lets you advance time and see upcoming calendar notifications (Apple calls this feature Time Travel), which might be helpful if you're the kind of person who keeps everything organized, but otherwise useless and pretty difficult to use.

The Apple Watch is available in several colors and plenty of combinations depending on the band you choose. Third-party bands are also available at a much more affordable price.

The Apple Watch also comes with what are being called glances, which are actually quick controls, information about the device or offered from apps, including the heartbeat, weather information, world clock, maps, and toggles such as do not disturb and airplane mode. You can easily access them by swiping up from the bottom of the screen, but once again, this is very counter-intuitive because you're unlikely to expect such a behavior on the home screen. Swiping down from the top of the screen brings up the notification center, just like on the iPhone.

All in all, the Apple Watch might be the kind of device supposed to be easy to use, but it certainly isn't. There is a learning curve and you should be able to use it at its maximum potential after one week or so, but such a thing is clearly unexpected from an Apple device given the experience the company has in this field.

Personalization and configuration

Basically, the only way to customize the Apple Watch is to change its face, either with one of the 10 pre-configured ones or by creating your own. Apple says that there are millions of combinations, but there are just 10 different, which you can further customize with different information displays in the 4 corners of the screen, but also by changing colors of the displayed elements.

You can choose between battery level, weather temperature, moon phase, world clock, fitness statistics, and some other details, some of which are pretty useless for the majority of users.

The best thing is clearly the color customization option because this way, you can truly make the watch face look just the way you like it. There's also a setting to use your own photos as face background, which really adds a nice touch to the personalization portfolio.

Additionally, the Apple Watch app lets you adjust brightness and text size, enable bold text, choose the app layout, manage the apps that show notifications, configure glances and complications, and customize sounds and haptic feedback.

Apple Watch the smartwatch

One of the key features of the Apple Watch is to act as an extension to the iPhone, so it's supposed to get all notifications that arrive on your mobile phone and bring them to your wrist.

And the Watch does this in a brilliant way, but it also fails in some key areas which Apple should really have in mind when designing the next version.

First and foremost, it's worth mentioning that the Apple Watch works with notifications from any app, both those pre-installed by Apple on the iPhone and third parties. iMessage, text messages, emails, WhatsApp messages, Outlook emails, Facebook notifications, you name it because everything works amazingly well on the Apple Watch.

Every time a notification arrives on your phone, it takes just another second to arrive on your wrist, and the Apple Watch supports not only vibrations, but also ringtones which are being used for calls and messages. Because yes, the Apple Watch can be used for calls (both received and started by you), because it also includes a speaker and a microphone. The quality of the call is impressive to say the least, despite the fact that it has just one speaker and one mic, but software optimizations are playing a key role here to reduce noise and make your voice and your contact's louder.

You can always silent notifications if you simply swipe up from the bottom of the screen, put the Watch on airplane mode, or enable Do Not Disturb (which can mirror the settings on your iPhone) with a few taps.

Apple Watch is one of the most comfortable wearables we've ever tried.

But as far as notifications are concerned, there's a big issue here: every time you receive more than just a single notification from the same app, let's say WhatsApp, the Watch no longer displays the content of the message, but just a text revealing the number of unread notifications. The only option you're provided with is "Dismiss" and if you want to read the received messages, you have to manually open the notification screen. Otherwise, it's barely impossible to read them faster.

Although called Apple Watch, the device doesn't have a watch mode, so the display doesn't stay on all the time. That's because it has an AMOLED display, which is a low memory screen and not only that affects the battery of the device, but it could also experience more serious issues, such as burned pixels. To compensate for this, the Apple Watch automatically wakes on wrist raise, but this feature isn't working exactly as expected all the time. For example, the watch can easily wake when you're driving and it detects a wrist move that might mimic the one used to check the time.

You can obviously disable this gesture, but then the only way to check the time is to manually tap the screen every time - this saves battery life, but when you receive new notifications, the Watch only vibrates unless you tap the screen to see the alert.

There's also a nightstand mode, which is supposed to show you the time during the night while you charge the watch. And yet, it's not the nightstand you might expect it to be because the time doesn't stay on all the time because of the AMOLED screen. The time is displayed horizontally and the screen brightens in the minutes before the alarm is triggered, which is quite a neat feature, but an always-on nightstand would definitely be a lot more helpful.

The Apple Watch is clearly one of the most comfortable smartwatches on the market and we've tried almost all of them. It's extremely light, which is critical for something supposed to stay 100 percent of the time on your wrist, it has a soft band, and looks good with every outfit, depending on your band arsenal.

But there still are things to improve as far as its smartwatch capabilities are concerned, so the first-generation Watch is living proof that Apple can do better in the wearables market with the next model.

Apple Watch on wrist, one of the most comfortable smartwatches ever
Apple Watch on wrist, one of the most comfortable smartwatches ever

How does the Apple Watch connect to your iPhone? The answer is interesting, to say the least. First, it uses Bluetooth to communicate with the phone when the two are near each other, because Apple says this helps save battery life. But if the Bluetooth connection is not available, the Apple Watch can use your Wi-Fi connection for the same thing. And yet, the Watch cannot connect to a wireless network on its own, and unless your iPhone wasn't connected to the network before to get the password and other details, it won't work.

Apple Watch the fitness tracker

Apple wanted more than just a watch that looks good on the wrist and displays notifications from your iPhone, so the Watch also comes with fitness tracking capabilities supposed to help you stay in tip top shape and keep an eye on your progress all the time.

The experience you get with the Apple Watch in terms of sports tracking pretty much depends on your previous experience with fitness trackers. If the Watch is your first such device, then it might be the one. If you've previously tried Fitbit Surge, Microsoft Band, or one of the many Garmin models, then you might be disappointed.

The learning curve that we've previously talked about exists here too, so it could take a while until you actually discover all capabilities of the Watch.

The Activity Tracker that comes with the device uses rings to help you keep an eye on exercises, burned calories, and the time you spent standing. Every time you reach your goal, the app notifies you and helps improve your shape, but the amount of statistics that is provided is rather limited, at least as compared to other fitness trackers on the market. The Watch can count steps too and remind you to stand up every 60 minutes, but we've discovered that this latter feature doesn't work exactly as expected all the time. Sometimes, it tells you to walk around for a minute even if you moved a lot in the last hour, so the Watch doesn't always correctly detect your activity. This is probably the gyroscope's fault, so here's another feature that Apple must improve on the next model.

Statistics provided by the Apple Watch after a workout session
Statistics provided by the Apple Watch after a workout session

If running is your thing, then the Apple Watch might fail exactly where it counts. The Watch doesn't have a GPS module, so it needs your iPhone to provide you with information on your laps and covered area. And once again, the information it offers is very limited. While it calculates and displays the average HR, you can't see the top and lowest figures, or split times. Obviously, this might be less important if your goal isn't to become the next Usain Bolt, but other devices, such as the Microsoft band already come with much more advanced capabilities in this regard.

Its lack of GPS leads to another bit setback. The Apple Watch doesn't accurately calculate the distance and we've noticed a difference of approximately 400 meters for every kilometer. After running for about 4 kilometers, the difference between the Apple Watch, Fitbit Surge, and Microsoft Band increased to 400 meters, which obviously raises some questions regarding its accuracy. But you should be fine if you don't expect precise measurement every time you exercise.

The Apple Watch can also provide sleep tracking, but again, the amount of information is very limited. It might seem like we have an obsession with this, but if you're looking for a fitness tracker, Apple Watch might not be the one. For sleeping, you can see the total time you've slept, number of times awake, and that's about it. The gyroscope is responsible for pretty much all of this, which is the basic behavior for every fitness tracker. Heartbeat activity is not monitored during the night, but with third-party apps, there's a huge opportunity for the Watch to do a lot more.

WatchOS 2

The new version of watchOS was released with much fanfare this September, introducing several new features and unlocking others to provide the device with new capabilities and make it easier for developers to create apps that can modify the way it looks and works.

watchOS 2 comes with new watch faces and time lapse support, which lets you choose from a selection of time-lapse videos hot over 24 hours in well-known locations across the world. You can also use a photo from your album as watch face, as well as live photos, exclusively available on the iPhone 6s/6s Plus.

The new OS also introduces more ways to customize your complications, which are the little pieces of information displayed on your watch face. As mentioned above, you can choose between a wide array of items, such as weather, battery info, moon phase, world clock and even use third-party apps to track flights.

Time travel and nightstand mode are two new features that are brought by this OS version, but just as explained, they're both in their early days and need significant improvements. The latter doesn't stay on during the night, which is quite a bummer given the fact that it's called nightstand.

Apple Watch watchOS 2.0 screenshot
Apple Watch watchOS 2.0 screenshot

Siri also arrives on your wrist with watchOS 2, but her capabilities aren't as advanced as on the iPhone. You can perform basic tasks, such as starting a call, but for more complex tasks you need to pull out the phone. Apple Pay is also a pretty fantastic addition because you can simply pay with your watch at some retailers, but this feature is only available in the United States for now.

Apple's watchOS 2 also brings support for quick actions for emails and messages, so you can reply, flag, mark as unread, or quickly remove a specific item. While this is clearly a very helpful feature if you like to keep things organized without using your iPhone, there's still no way to customize the list of pre-defined messages you can use for reply, which is clearly a major setback if you want to answer a message straight from the watch. You can, however, dictate a response, but this doesn't work quite alright in other language than English. One neat feature is the ability to display different pre-defined messages depending on the language of the email or text you receive.

But the biggest addition to watchOS 2 is clearly the way it can run apps. Apple has removed some of its restrictions in the OS, so apps can now use the Taptic Engine, Digital Crown, accelerometer, the HR sensor, the speaker or the microphone for additional capabilities. Developers can create apps that can use all of these and the best example comes from fitness tools which can better monitor your activity using the aforementioned sensors.

And if you use a home automation system, here's something really outstanding. The digital crown can be used to control house lights and adjust light intensity. Pretty neat, isn't it?

But it's not all just milk and honey with the new OS version. Installing apps on the watch could really be a nightmare and we've discovered that it sometimes takes up to 5 minutes to do it, depending on the size of the app, but at random times, the process simply freezes. So you have to stop it, uninstall the app, and then try to install it once again. There are lots of complaints in this regard, so Apple should really have this in mind when developing OS updates.

Other than that, watchOS 2 seems to be a big step in the right direction, but updates and improvements are absolutely needed to unlock new capabilities and remove more restrictions for developers. There are lots of apps in the store that can work on the watch right now, but their capabilities are still limited for the moment because of Apple's well-known restrictions.

Battery life

Apple says that its watch should provide approximately 18 hours of use in "normal" conditions, but most likely, the Cupertino-based company played the safe card here.

The device can easily get you through the day and we haven't had the slightest concern that we could run out of battery with a full battery at 7 AM in the morning with what Apple calls normal use.

On average, we experienced around 32 hours of battery use, which should be enough to find a power source and charge the device during the night. But battery performance obviously depends on how you use the device.

According to Apple's figures, if you use the Watch just for time checking, it should provide around 48 hours of battery life, while talking drops it to just 3 hours. If listening to music is your thing, then the Watch can stay alive for 6.5 hours, with the same performance offered when working out too.

The Apple Watch feels just like a first-generation product.

Just like a regular phone, the Apple Watch can get improved figures with a lower brightness level and settings that no longer light up the display for every notification. Disabling sounds also helps a lot.

Charging times are not at all impressive, but they shouldn’t matter too much if you're doing it during the night. The Apple Watch can reach 80 percent in 1.5 hours and go up to 100 percent in 60 more minutes. According to Apple, the battery should be in perfect condition for 3 years and can only be replaced at the Apple Store (obviously if you don't want to lose your warranty).

For charging, the Apple Watch uses inductive charging, which means that you only have to place it on the charger, without the need for plugging in any cables. This is why it takes more time to complete a full charge, but it's actually a nice workaround to make it water-resistant because no ports are exposed. And yet, you should check twice that you position the watch right on the dock every time because we've noticed that sometimes, although it might seem to be in the correct place, it doesn't charge, so you just have to remove and reposition the device once again.

Apple Watch also comes with a so-called Power Reserve mode that helps saves power when running low on battery. The feature kicks in at 10 percent and when you reach 0 percent, it can provide an additional of 72 hours of battery life, but with very limited functionality. Only the time is displayed with a digital face and in the simplest possible way, but at least you won't feel embarrassed when someone wants to know the time and your watch is turn off on your wrist.

Apple Watch battery level
Apple Watch battery level

The bottom line

Overall, Apple's Watch is one of the best devices of its kind, but it certainly loses points where others don't. It might be super comfy and look like a premium device, but aside from pulling notifications from your device, it doesn't do much else.

During our two-week testing, we've been asked several times by friends and colleagues what the purpose of such a device actually is and the answer was unconvincing in almost every single case.

The Apple Watch looks good on your wrist, and clearly fits almost every outfit if you change its band, but a successful device also needs to score points in terms of functionality too. It's not all about the looks and Apple certainly knows this very well, so the next-generation model is likely to bring a significant upgrade in this regard.

The Watch is far from being the perfect fitness companion, and if you're an athlete who wants to be in tip-top shape all the time, there are plenty of other and more advanced choices out there. Although rather expensive, the Apple Watch lacks key features, such as GPS support, so it needs the phone 99 percent of the time. Running with your iPhone in the pocket, just because you need GPS tracking, is a painful experience, especially if you own the Plus. This is why devices such as Fitbit Surge and Microsoft Band could seem a better choice for sporty people.

The Apple Watch seems to be a love it or hate it device. It has features that could make you fall in love with it, but at the same time, it lacks others that could prove to be deal-breakers. Having notifications on your wrist is a fascinating thing, but Apple still has to work on this. Receiving more than 1 notification at the same time makes it almost completely useless, while its fitness tracking capabilities are clearly behind those of rivals.

The Watch has a learning curve and for iPhone users, that's clearly unexpected because you can't simply pull it out of the box and start using it at full capabilities. You need to discover pretty much everything, and every new day with the Watch is a new day learning to do something with it.

In the end, the Apple Watch certainly feels like a first-generation device, so the next models can only improve in almost every regard. The second Watch should arrive in spring 2016 and by that time, watchOS is also expected to reach its maturity, so the future sounds good for Apple in the wearables industry.

Update, October 24, 2015: Apple has just released a new version of watchOS, now at 2.0.1, which comes with several performance improvements and optimizations supposed to make it work smoother on the Watch.

For example, watchOS 2.0.1 includes fixes for problems that could cause software updates to freeze, which was really an issue in the previous releases, especially when taking into account that new versions of the OS were pretty large and took a while to download and install.

Additionally, it comes to repair a number of unknown bugs that were impacting battery performance, which according to Apple, should lead to longer battery life. We've tested the device and a somewhat improvement can indeed be noticed (up to one hour in normal usage conditions), but nothing that's really significant.

And last but not least, this update addresses problems that were affecting the way live photos were being used as watch faces. Customization is essential on the Apple Watch and using your own photos as watch face was a neat feature, but that was troublesome before due to bugs in the core OS.

As you know, iPhone 6s and 6s Plus bring support for live photos, which are essentially moving photos that capture more than just a still moment, but also up to 3 seconds of video. Thanks to this, owners of new iPhones can configure live photos as watch faces on their Apple Watch, so this update comes to make this possible by addressing bugs that previously caused instability on the device.

Apple Watch with watchOS 2 (58 Images)

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