Hands On With the New Google Pixel Watch

Oct 7, 2022

Smartwatches

Speaker 1: If you’ve been waiting for the future of Android watches while we’ve come to Brooklyn to check it out, the Google Pixel watch is coming October 13th and it looks like the most complete and advanced Android smart watch that we’ve seen in a while. Now I am also thinking about the Samsung Galaxy Watch for and five, which have been part of Samsung and Google’s reinventing of where Os that started last year. And Samsung’s watch is really fully featured, but some of its features [00:00:30] do require you to have a Samsung Galaxy phone.

The Pixel Watch is going for a universal type of clean design and most importantly it’s a partnership with Fitbit, which by the way, Google owns, but Fitbit has not been on an Android watch before like it’s been on the Pixel Watch. This is part of what will be an ongoing series of products, really the future of Fitbit where the Pixel watch at three or £50 sits at the top end of Fitbit’s product line, but also represents a true smart [00:01:00] watch. Speaker 1: Fitbit did have a smart watch that came out just a short while ago, the Versa four and also the Sense two, its smart watches have had its own apps and watch faces and they’re gonna continue on for iOS compatibility as well.

The Pixel Watch is Android only and it’s features are meant to take advantage of the Google Play Store and Android and a lot of the similar types of features in design. It’s a round watch and it looks really sharp. It’s [00:01:30] got a domed gorilla glass display and it has a stainless steel casing.

The whole look of it is very sleek next to an Apple Watch series eight. It’s kind of similarly small and elegant looking. I really like the circular look.

The one thing is that there’s a bit of a bezel around the display, which gets hidden because a lot of the watch faces and the interface have a very minimalist look. Speaker 1: Kind of like previous Apple watches that went for mostly black with colors layered on top. The look looks really sharp though [00:02:00] the watch straps look really nice and there are a variety of them.

They also attach in a different way. They sort of slide on and click. It’s meant to be easier to put on.

It took a little, a few moments for me to understand it. There’s also a haptic response in the Digital crown, which is similar to the Apple Watch. You can feel this clicking movement that’s very satisfying.

Now as far as features go, this has got all the stuff you’d expect out of a basic, uh, premium smartwatch. It’s got a very accurate sounding heart rate monitor, which Fitbit is [00:02:30] boasting pings once a second and that’s a much faster ping rate than are on other smartwatches and it’s more equivalent to what you get on an everyday Fitbit. Speaker 1: So that heart rate sensor could be worth it on its own.

The battery life will be about 24 hours, so it still should last a good chunk of time, but not as long as other Fitbit watches. It also has ecg, which is something that I didn’t expect to see, but ECG will check to see if your atrial fibrillation is out of whack and that’s something we’ve seen on other watches before. [00:03:00] It also has some features like gps, a Compass. Eventually it’ll get updated for blood, oxygen and fall detection.

What it does not have fitness wise are some of the more advanced sensors that we’ve seen on other Fitbit watches like the sc, the Fitbit Sense too has the ability to detect possible stress through, uh, to checking sweat levels, the different type of sensor. And it also has body temperature, which is something that Apple introduced on the Apple Watch Series eight. Speaker 1: Temperature is not [00:03:30] on this watch, but it looks like the way Fitbit is looking at this watch is a way to eventually have future sensors make it to this over time.

There are things that you still can take advantage of in the Fitbit landscape readiness scores, sleep scores, these types of general wellness scores will be available on the Pixel watch, making it effectively a full Fitbit, which is encouraging. Now there is some stuff still with the Google Fit landscape that’s not really meant for Fitbit. You have these two different fitness platforms or health platforms. [00:04:00] It’s still supporting Google Fit, but Fitbit is really where you wanna be with this watch.

And Fitbit Premium is a subscription service that costs extra. You can get six months free if you get the Pixel watch, which is similar to what other Fitbits have. But just keep in mind I think it’s kind of an essential feature and you will have to pay extra to make the most of that.

Speaker 1: The Pixel watch can be upgraded to £400 for a cellular version. That’s interesting because there’s been no cellular Fitbit before. £400 [00:04:30] is not a terrible price. Three 50, £400 basically falls into uh, a premium smartwatch territory and falls definitely less expensive of where a lot of the Apple watches climb up to.

We haven’t done a full review of this watch yet, but using it for just a few moments here in a demo room, uh, it looks really nice. The display looks crisp. Uh, the Fitbit interface is very familiar and the watch faces that I went through we’re all pretty fun to play with.

What else do we think about this? You’re gonna have to wait and see for our full review. [00:05:00] The Pixel watch does seem like a whole new step forward for Android watches, but also keep in mind that the chip set in this is a Samsung EXOS processor, not a tenser processor. Speaker 1: The reasons for this we don’t know, but at this point that’s part of the package deal.

We may see further revolutions in where the pixel watch goes over time. This is only the first watch in the series, but I think that this could represent for other watch makers a way to maybe have a platform to build Fitbit onto [00:05:30] other types of watches that have Android capability. We don’t know about that yet, but it seems promising.

What do you think about this watch? Is this something that you’d like to wear? Do you like the design?

Uh, do you use Fitbit?

Let me know when the comments below.

Thanks a lot for watching and make sure to like and subscribe and we’ll be back soon with a full review.