I got the Apple Watch last year and I have been using it for every day ever since and I love it. Below is a brief review after using the watch for over an year.
tl:dr I love it and it is totally the best smart watch you can get. (You may want to wait a few months as apple watch 2 might launch in Oct 2016)
Pros:
- Works great as fitness tracker. It has tracking for most common workout needs you may have.
- Notifications on the watch have been a huge time saver. Huge time saver while driving or in meetings. Some times you can take a step forward and acknowledge messsages (A quick reply is just a tap away).
- A plethora of apps have evolved. They help with tracking productivity and reminders etc
- Siri works well.
- Bling aspect is still true as was when it launched.
- Watch faces and the interchangeable bands help suit the mood/trend/fashion.
Cons:
- Was too slow. (Not any more, watchOS 3 fixes it and the speed increase is phenomenal).
- Battery life wasn’t great. I8 hours wasn’t great in comparison to the fitbits and Garmins that last for a week. Not much of a deal breaker for me.
- Sleep tracking isn’t part of the watch at all. The pillow app fixes this. I wish the watch had native tracking like the Fitbits do.
Watch OS 3: It is a phenomal update that would be coming to the watch soon. I am testing it on my watch, it isn’t stable yet, but it opens up the watch in a multitude of ways and adressess most of the complaints and restrictiveness it had.
You may think, I am just an apple fan boy and hence my fanatcism with it. Actually I have tested the Fitbit Surge (still own one), Fitbit Flex and a Garmin Vivofit as my daily activity trackers/ smart watches. So far, the most satisfying experience has been from the Apple watch and hence my recommendation above.
Tim cook wrote about the essence of Privacy at Apple. Here is what he says on the site.
Our business model is very straightforward: We sell great products. We don’t build a profile based on your email content or web browsing habits to sell to advertisers. We don’t “monetize” the information you store on your iPhone or in iCloud. And we don’t read your email or your messages to get information to market to you. Our software and services are designed to make our devices better. Plain and simple.
He nailed it. Loud and clear. There is a whole site about how and where our data is used from our devices by Apple or by app developers, do check it out. If you haven’t enabled two factor authentication for your iCloud account, please do it right away.
Apple has paid excruciating attention to detail in the design and wearability of the Apple Watch. In many cases, its offerings make what is coming out of Switzerland (or Asia) look amateurish. But, let me remind you that I am looking at this object as just that, the physical form, not in the interface. If this was simply a digital watch, I could say it’s a well designed, well-executed one. But ……
Best written review of the Apple Watch so far. After viewing the live event, I was wondering if Apple did a mistake by positioning it as a watch. It has all the requisites to call it as a watch but that said it needs an iPhone for most of it’s features to work. If it can’t work independently with out an iPhone why call it a watch. Call it an Apple wear and position it into its own category like the iPods. Except for the name I am in love for the product. Apple’s attention to detail is its sole differentiation from all others and the watch is yet another example to its attention to detail. If you don’t believe me, do have a look at Apple’s watch page. Also don’t forget to read the review by Benjamin Clymer.
