Android SmartWatch works with iOS, but it doesn't actually run Android (hands-on)
Guess what? A watch company is out there called Android. And it's decided to make smartwatches, too.
- Nearly 20 years writing about tech, and over a decade reviewing wearable tech, VR, and AR products and apps
Here it is, at long last...an Android watch that works with iOS. Well, on a technicality. The all-too-cleverly-named Android SmartWatch is not, actually, a watch that runs Android. Android is the name of the watch company, which has held the rights to call its products "Android" since before Google ever made its mobile operating system. Unlike the Omate TrueSmart, which is an actual Android OS watch, the Android SmartWatch is just another smartwatch with design ambitions.
Android previously made traditional watches, but this is the company's first smartwatch. Based on pure features, it's pretty packed: music control, a speaker/microphone for dialing and answering calls via your wrist, voice memo, pedometer, calculator, stopwatch, notifications, incoming calls -- maybe this is the superwatch? Most features apparently work when paired to both Android or iOS phones, except for text messages on iOS (which is weird, because other watches like the Pebble have achieved this).
At $200, the Android SmartWatch is competitively priced with the rest of the smartwatch market -- it's even a bit lower-priced than some recent arrivals. A variety of bright colors and a leather band don't help draw attention away from how boxy and square the design is, though, or how the color TFT touch display doesn't have nearly as much pop as the Samsung Gear's AMOLED technology.
I'm mildly curious to try one, but I'm skeptical as to how its battery life will perform and how well it will accomplish everything it's supposed to. But at least it proves that some traditional watch manufacturers are getting into the smartwatch game early.