How is WearOS doing in 2023?
I'm thinking about making a return from Garmin in the near future with Samsung announcing the Galaxy Watch 6 making a return with the ever-so-popular rotating bezel, and Google is now focused on their own Pixel Watch. For people who are currently using a WearOS device, what are your thoughts on the current state of the platform as a smartwatch and fitness tracker as of mid 2023?
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I may be weird, but I hate my WearOS devices. I highly prefer a Mi Band.
It gives me all of the same info my WearOS watch does (heart rate, spo2, sleep tracking, steps, app notifications, timers, alarms, phone call alerts, weather, etc) but is a more comfortable compact package, and the battery lasts 5+ days vs 18-25 hours. Not to mention the price is usually 5-15x cheaper.
I know I'm a minority, but I genuinely don't understand why people want a WearOS watch?
Funny, i just went the reverse way, from mi-band to wearOS. I've got one of those two screen devices (LCD and OLED) and most of the day, it uses the LCD. Three days is my battery life. Which is ok by my standards. I mainly changed over for the screen size of the notifications and the ability to see the time instantly. Got it second hand, it was much cheaper than new and the state was really good.
What do you mean by being able to see the time instantly?
My miband has an always on OLED display (if you want it) or the ability to have lift to wake with all of the different delays and sensitivities.
If anything, I'd say my miband shows the time quicker. My watch is also LED, not OLED, which is a bummer.
I don't even need to lift to see the time, i just glance at it, the led pannel is on permanently like a casio watch, it glows when I lift, and the oled within it wakes up for notifications, incoming texts and calls, when I'm using maps, to control media players etc...
Ya, my mi band has that, too. It's called always on display. Since it's OLED, it doesn't cause a ton of battery drain, and I can see the time without lifting it.
Yeah, they probably changed things around since the miband 3 then the 5 I had, it used to eat the battery like there was no tomorrow when left in AOD, it wouldn't last more than 4/5 days... But then again if you left the AOD on, the OLED screen was so bad (i mean after a few years the clearcoat was so scratched up and the pannel was not enough bright) you couldn't read the time when the sun was on it. I guess all brands evolve to give better quality... Software wise, pretty happy about gadgetbridge, that was a life saver, xiaomi's software was deplorable, zepp is even worse, it calls home all day long.
For me the GPS feature with GPX import and music was the one that sold me for running with the Galaxy Watch 5 Pro. If it wasn't I wouldve bought a Garmin.