I don’t get it. Do I need another screen to distract me from the world? Do I need another device to charge everyday? Those were the thoughts I had about smartwatches. I did not take them seriously until Apple came out with their smartwatch because it would make the product category mainstream. Even then, it didn’t have any killer feature that persuaded me that I needed one. But, as I’ve talked to people who own smartwatches, not just the Apple watch, I’ve learned that a smartwatch is greater than the sum of its parts.
Several of my coworkers got the original Pebble smartwatch from its Kickstarter campaign. I heard about it through tech blogs and it is a brilliant idea to use e-ink as a screen; you don’t need a high refresh rate and its low-power usage meant that it didn’t need to be charged frequently. Still, the price was higher than my perceived value for what it did, so it was a novelty item rather than must-have.
I talked to one of my coworkers about her Pebble and to check the time during soccer games that she coached without pulling out her smartphone, especially in the rain. She also liked being able to receive texts without looking at her phone too. The smartwatch told time and saved time.
As I considered how a smartwatch would benefit my life, small examples started to add up. I was late to a few meetings at work because I couldn’t feel my phone vibrate in my pocket for the calendar notification. I missed a text from Jenni that would’ve been helpful to see sooner.
The last time I wore a watch was in middle school. I had received one as a gift and I wore it until the strap broke and I kept the watch in my pocket. After I got a cellphone, the watch was redundant. Ten years later, I’ve added a watch back to my inventory. I purchased a “dumb” watch for $15 to see if I wanted to have something strapped to my wrist again.
I found myself surprised at how useful a watch is for my day-to-day routines.
- I was at ease knowing what time by my checking my wrist instead of getting distracted by checking my phone.
- I didn’t bother looking for the closest clock in my house since the time was with me all the time (pun intended).
- When I walked to the MAX train, I knew how much time was left before it arrived without pulling out my phone repeatedly. I just left when the train was less than 10 minutes and could see how many minutes left from my wrist.
- I could set a timer to help the kids transition without seeing notifications on my phone. Tip goes to Jake from work about using a timer as a transition signal.
- I knew what time it was as we played in the pool during the summer.
- The beep that chimes each hour kept me grounded in reality (and drove Jenni crazy). But I can’t count how many times we’ve let the kids stay up too late because we got caught up in something. Having a little beep has saved us from going too long into the night, if we were disciplined to follow through.
- When I play basketball with coworkers and the scoreboard timer is on the fritz (more often than not), I just set a timer for 40 minutes, and the game ends when my watch beeps.
- I know the date and day of the week from my wrist.
Even without going to a smartwatch, I benefited from a watch.
Jake allowed me to borrow his Pebble watch for two weeks. He had upgraded to the Apple Watch and his Pebble was sitting around. I did not find that it added enough to the watch experience for its cost, but there were a few nice benefits.
- Vibration notifications were a great, discreet way to alert me about something. From meetings to incoming texts, having a silent alarm was great at notifying me and not everyone else. I just had to be selective as to what apps could alert me on the watch so it wouldn’t be buzzing all the time.
- Custom watch faces allowed me to view the time, date, day of the week, and current weather conditions in a glance.
- Viewing text and email previews and dismissing them on the watch made it easy to stay up to date without switching mental contexts.
- While I didn’t utilize it, the active Bluetooth connection would allow me to bypass my phone’s security code as long as the phone and smartwatch are nearby each other.
A smartwatch proved to be a great convenience item and I’m excited to see where it goes next. Since I’m an Android user, I’ll keeping an eye on Android Wear, but I do hope there will be a version that uses e-ink.