It just collects dust now.
- The health tracking and gamification of exercise was somewhere between meh and useless for me. I don’t have exercise issues.
- The freedom from the phone has potential, but the ostensible ease of use just isn’t worth the hassle of wearing a watch. I’m ok just pulling out my phone.
- The deep breathing option was probably the app i liked most. Now I just do deep breathing exercises at regular times during the day for, what I assume, are similar effects.
I can certainly imagine that it can improve the quality of life for some (many?) people, but I don’t find myself to be one of these people.
That said, I really wish I did have a profound experience with it. I’m always down for good quality of life improvements.
If anyone has ideas for using the Apple Watch that some people seem to miss, please let me know. I’m willing to give it another go.
Well that's what I told my brother, don't get one because you do sports 3-4 times a week anyway. For me it was a motivational thing, seeing my trends in activity, getting nudges, doing competitions with friends, seeing my Vo2max go up over-time, are all great, but unnecessary for my brother.
> the ostensible ease of use just isn’t worth the hassle of wearing a watch. I’m ok just pulling out my phone.
I'd say there's a mix-up here. The watch isn't easy to use versus the phone, which is the primary reason that it allows freedom from a digital device that demands constant attention. Secondly, if you're okay pulling out your phone, then you're really saying you don't have any wish to be free from your phone, so there's an audience mismatch here.
The freedom from the phone first requires you to actually agree that you need it, for many of us that's the case. If you do, the second part is being able to leave your phone at home when you go for a walk, go to the gym, go see friends, go clubbing etc. But for many that's a step too far, without any alternative offering functionality like payments, music, maps, messages, calls. The watch offers that, but in a way that's not super easy to use, but will get the job done. This is why the watch will never be a place where you scroll through social media for hours, or refresh your 5 news apps for the news junkies among us, but the easy-to-use phone, will be.
Contactless payments are fairly nice as you can double tap the button, and hold the watchface over a reader, no need to get out your wallet and find the card you want to pay with.
Back when going out with others was a thing, it’s calculator has features for tips and splitting checks.
Being able to listen to podcasts and audio-books on my watch while going for walks and running errands has been great. With Apple Pay I don't even need to take my wallet with me and can just tap with my watch.
Also the reminder to "close my rings" and being able to enter "competitions" with friends has been a great motivator for me to exercise.
As a fitness tracker I'd say it's superior to the apple watch.
But to me, while a fitness-focused watch does signal sportiness etc, which are great qualities, so does a heartrate strap or sweat band. You wouldn't wear it in the office, at a dinner, or at a party. Of course those are some extreme examples that aren't 1:1 comparable with a garmin. But the general principle to me is the same, to me a garmin 945 looks great on people doing sports, and out-of-place on people not wearing sports clothes.
I think this looks really classy for example, and could easily be worn on something casual (that's not sport clothes) or formal, without looking out of place: https://media.karousell.com/media/photos/products/2019/04/15...
The way that the watch is mostly screen and that screen can show a style compatible with any situation, with swappable bands, is a lot more stylish and versatile than something bulky, with a very large bezel, limited watch face choices, a dim low-resolution screen, often not always-on etc. (not sure 'bout the 945 on all of these btw, just my general impression).
But it's just that in Norway, sports wear is so in fashion that it bleeds over to everyday- and even formal clothing. Instead of a wool sweater, one wears a sporty wool baselayer like "kari traa". Instead of sun glasses it's sports glasses. Instead of a winter coat it's a ski jacket etc.
The Apple Watch is much more versatile and general purpose. Having access to Siri on my wrist has been pretty helpful, paired with AirPods and I can navigate most of life without my phone.
We’re quite habituated to charging our phones every night. Doing the same with your watch (especially if you purchase a stand for it), is a very low friction habit to follow.
What is BT?
These things are not life changing, but they have their fun use cases. If you can accept that it’s not going to 10x your productivity and just want something technically neat maybe you’ll find a use for it again.
Or not, and you can just sell it for a quick buck :p
At least for me it is. And thus I get around 2 days battery life with a 4 year old series 2 watch.
Their official test includes "45 minutes of app use, and a 60-minute workout with music playback from Apple Watch via Bluetooth"[0] - so unless you plan on doing that you can easily expect double the battery time.
It doesn’t take long to get a reasonable charge on it. I usually keep it around 80% at most anyway. It gets me through the day at 80% and through the night since I use it for sleep tracking and alarm.
My colleague gets 24 hours battery life on her series 6. Still uncomfortable compared to the usual week+ battery life Garmins.
On the cheaper side, another colleague has an Amazfit Blip Lite which lasts 30 days on a 2 hour charge and can withstand up to 30 meters underwater.
I think the difference is the Series 6 screen never fully turns off. I imagine disabling "always on" mode would likely push battery life much higher, but that's just a guess
This plus the first few Google search results tell me it's not going to work without an iPhone.
This is why I do not buy into the Apple ecosystem, even if individual elements are superior to competitors. I do not want to be completely constricted to one ecosystem. My world involves Microsoft, Google, Steam, Epic, Blizzard, Logitech, Fossil, Asus, HP, Lenovo, etc. and I will continue to swap in and out components as desired.
But I am sad that WearOS options are generally so terrible (at least in performance and features, though some of the physical designs are much better than anything else). And a little jealous of the happy M1-based Macbook users with their battery life!
Ah to dream of having your cake and eating it, too. But we each must choose our own collection of compromises!
If I just wear it without running anything, then yes, it can last days. But if all I want is to track heart rate, sleep, and such, I can get that with a much cheaper watch.
It’s great! I silence the hell out of my phone (on top of having almost all notifications off) so the watch vibrations are useful to me for not missing messages I care about.
Super easy to read 2FA codes through SMS without digging up the phone. The LastPass Authenticator has a watch integration but it’s never worked for me. I’m sure there are other authenticator apps that work for the watch though.
Logging workouts is easy, it’s fun to compare rings with my partner but we’re not serious about it and don’t really need the watch to get motivated about being active.
Hands down my favorite feature is surprisingly the maps integration. If you just ignore the baseless memes about “Apple Maps bad” (works fine for me these days, but I saw how bad it was at its inception back in the day too) and just use it, you get the watch integration for free too. The vibrations for left/right turn are a very nice feature that don’t require averting attention at all, but you have the option of viewing the watch for a quick preview of the maps route (distance to next event and a visual, i.e. right three lanes to exit right).
Just some feedback from a guy without strong opinions for or against the thing.
I thought I might only wear it when I was training, but it turns out having information on my heart rate all day long is super interesting, and I'm really happy I have it.
Also I have turned off most of the notifications, but having the ones I want on my wrist without taking out my phone is actually super nice.
* I can answer calls while driving and not have to fumble around for my phone while driving my truck (The wife's SUV has fancy bluetooth integration)
* I can open and close my garage from my watch.
* I can voice message my family through Messages.
I only wish that the battery life were much longer than it is and that Apple could settle on one method of charging their devices, especially in vehicles with limited room.
They don't allow your phone to show Fitness+ on the TV through HDMI, nor through airplay. The phone screen is just way too small.
So what's left are iPads, which can be a really great experience, particularly on the 12 inch pro, but it's a shame they don't allow Macbooks... I'm okay with the buy-in to some extent but man... A watch, phone and an apple tv is necessary, all from the same company, plus a subscription just to do a video-assisted workout that shows your heartrate on the screen? That's a pretty insane proposition. Would've been great if they allowed more options or third-party stuff. Just casting from my iPhone would've been a good start, or casting on my macbook... Honestly it's pretty ridiculous.
Happy Macbook, iPhone, Apple Watch and Airpod Pro user, otherwise.
https://www.macrumors.com/2020/12/14/apple-fitness-plus-no-a...
Not sure I'd have gotten it otherwise. But at the same time, it's pretty easy to rationalise any cost when looking at it as a monthly payment haha. A 3-year usage and a 20% resale value on the SE ($280) will get you a $6 a month price. If that improves your daily activity by just 5 or 10%, that's probably the cheapest medical intervention in your life, ever. That's probably why the insurance companies offer cashbacks, it's a cool model. They can give me a watch for free every few years and get in return a person who, on average, spends >1x the apple watch less on healthcare costs, every year.
1) activity tracking is fake. Turn over on sofa, get told "congrats! you finished your activity"
2) sleep tracking is fake. Forget to wear it, get told "You slept great!
3) water proof is useless. I bought it because I was going to be surfing and wanted to know if it was close to time to meet up with others. But, while it is water proof you can't use it if the screen is wet
4) Not good for telling time - because often I'd twist my wrist and the face would not light up, try again fail, try again fail, RAGE! get out other hand to manually wake it up
Sold it 2 months after I got it.
1) is health data, in a way a computer or phone just can't do. It tracks things like heartrate that a phone + heartrate strap is too convoluted for, for non-athletes. Plus it's all-day and quite accurate. My phone counts my steps in my pocket for example, but not when I'm at home or in the office. My watch can differentiate when I'm cycling to work with my phone in my jacket and detect exercise, whereas my phone may think I'm in a tram or on a motorised scooter.
2) is gamification of exercise. Closing rings, notifications, nudges, vibrations, competitions. It all demands attention and lets you 'jump in' from the wrist much easier, than an app on a phone. It's been a great extrinsic motivational tool to jump-start a change in behaviour for a few months, that can then turn into a long-term intrinsic habit.
3) freedom from the phone. You can open digital locks with the watch, pay with the watch, listen to music or podcasts, get directions on maps, make calls, send (dictated) messages, keep an eye on your mail and calendar etc. I can reliable leave my phone at home, or just leave it in my jacket when I'm visiting friends. Notifications can be set to only allow priority ones in certain settings. It's the first time in 10 years that I'm moving away from having a phone available and in-vision all the time. The Watch doesn't induce mindless scrolling and consumption in a way a phone does, and can be configured to only demand your attention for things you want it to (e.g. certain notifications).
It's definitely not quite where I'd like it to be. Things like battery life, looks, software etc, there's much to gain still. But as a form factor I'm pretty convinced I will be using this for many years to come, and getting upgrades when they become available.
First time series 6 user by the way.