Comment by kungito | Hacker News Reader

Comment by kungito | Hacker News Reader

I for one welcome this change. I want a standalone smartwatch good enough so that I can stop using my phone. The state of smartwatches right now is quite sad (I cannot afford an Apple smartwatch so I cannot speak for those). The simple list of things I want from a smartwatch right now are barely fulfilled by the best I could find which is Huawei Watch 2. I want Google Pay, calls and LTE, proper Maps navigation, sending voice messages through some Facebook owned chat app which everyone uses, some very very simple browser experience, bluetooth connection for headphones, Youtube and Spotify.

The Huawei Watch 2 I have constantly crashes, the battery life is horrible, charger doesn't connect well, Google Maps doesn't offer directions (only location), WhatsApp and Discord aren't supported, Google Pay works but I have to use PayEnabler because they don't care, Spotify isn't there and Youtube is very very laggy.

I guess the biggest issue is actually Qualcomm because the current chip is 3100 which is 28nm (is that like 5-6 year old tech?). I sincerely hope that with this acquisition and Qualcomm rumored Snapdragon wear 439 (they are rebranding it as 3500 or something) I will finally in the May of 2020 get an actually good (no need to be great) standalone Google Pixel Watch.

The Apple Watch Series 3 with cellular is $329. How much cheaper can you get a smart watch with cellular, gps, health sensors, etc?

The Series 3 without cellular is $199 and you can find a cellular model on sale under $250 all the time too.

Yeah well I'm from Eastern Europe where it's more expensive, never on sale and I have less money

Out of curiosity, what is the cost of an iPhone 8 (the cheapest current iPhone) + Apple cellular watch where you live?

In a shop or used? 1788kn watch + 2452kn iphone 6s = 635$ usd. Average net salary is about 750$ usd.

I think this is the cheapest new: https://edigital.hr/apple-i-dodaci/iphone-c18325?filter%5Bse...

And watch

https://edigital.hr/apple-i-dodaci/watch-c29547?filter%5Bsea...

And it's looking like this year's Black Friday deal is that model for $199 (cellular for the price of the regular).

Yeah but you really need to buy the IPhone to go with it.

Point taken.

You can see the same thing happening with the Apple Watch needing an iPhone as what happened with the iPhone needing a computer early on.

It wasn’t until iOS 5 that you didn’t need a computer running iTunes to activate and update an iOS device.

Apple has slowly been detaching the Apple Watch from the iPhone. First with a cellular connection and then with an independent Watch store and adding better APIs for third party apps.

Right now, you can get away with only having the Watch with you in day to day use and the phone company already assigns a dedicated number to the watch (even though you can’t use it), I can see in the next couple of years not needing a phone at all to use the watch.

A cheap beat up iPhone SE fulfills this requirement for $75.

If you're leaving it at home anyways it doesn't need to be pretty or fast. Just needs to allow you to set up the Apple Watch.

Friend of mine decided to go phoneless -- borrowed an iPhone 6S from his QC department and used it to activate an Apple Watch, which is now his sole mobile device.

The Apple Watch cellular requires an active phone subscription to pair with it.

The Ford Mustang and Chevy Camaro are each better because the other exists. I think Apple users should be especially happy when Google enters the game.

Does it have a 6 day battery? My Fitbit does.

Does your Fitbit have a cellular connection? He explicitly said he wants something that allows him to leave his phone at home.

Is there a way to send voice messages without using the phone? Does any of the bigger chat apps offer the "record voice" button?

I haven’t tried any of the other chat apps. But you can send a voice message with the built in messages apps from the watch. It should work with both iMessage and SMS.

Are you thinking of the dictation option, which makes text from voice?

I don't see a way to send a voice message in my watch interface.

That's a completely different product than Fitbit is. Even its full blown smartwatches are very light, very dumb peripherals with very low power that last a week on a charge. They're really not the same type of product as a Wear OS or Apple Watch type device, and trying to turn them into one will take away all of why Fitbit owners choose them.

Well there's also market segmentation you know. Xiaomi is entering the Wear OS smartphone market, no reason why FitBit couldn't also. This move from Google is obviously a way for them to speed up their own watch tech so that they don't have to start from scratch. This doesn't mean there wont be these simpler dumber versions of smartwatches for the people who want exactly those

I do think an Apple Watch meets all of your requirements pretty easily. You’d have to spend more on an LTE model, though.

I don’t think Fitbit has ever tried to compete in this space.

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