Even if you don’t know much about a product, you can always guess by its name what kind of a product it is. But there are also products one could never notice what it is, even after spending hours to figure it out. Gear S is probably one of those products. The amount of volume the company must have poured to let the world know of its new name is beyond our imagination, but it’s still not easy to come up with a smartwatch from the name Gear S, unless you are a digital geek who even knows about its history. 

One of the certain solutions was to change the name. But, that was not as easy as turning one’s hand because it was a huge adventure to change the Gear S series which was the representative line-up of ‘Gear’, a professional wearable brand for many years. 

Nevertheless, Samsung chose the future over the past and chose the new name ‘Galaxy Watch’. It’s a new name that was chosen by burying its wearable brand ‘Gear’ into a grave that shall never be opened again. 

Typical package of a digital product 

Frankly speaking, no one would consider Samsung as a professional watch brand. But it sure is one of the top manufacturers when it comes to digital products. Here comes the question. How would Samsung’s smartwatches be evaluated?

Samsung should be the one to answer the question, but I must say that I was never happy with its smartwatch package that always looked too much like the package of a digital product than a watch. Of course, we cannot deny the characteristics of the smartwatch shown on the display, but I was always unhappy to see the same typical digital package with the product and accessories wrapped in plastic along with a user guide. 

One difference of the Galaxy Watch package from the previous Gear S2 is the cubic package. Other than that, the image is similar. Once you open the box, the Galaxy Watch reveals itself first and the charging adapter and cable wrapped in plastic, watch strap and small manual are found underneath. Everything is the same. Even the disposable film that prevents scratching on the screen and main body is the same as before. 

The package has everything that a digital product would have, with a neat composition. But the issue is that it cannot hide the aura of a digital product just with a good composition. That package did not contain the firmresolution to overcome the feeling of resisting the outcomes of mass production or to find novelty that cannot be found from the familiar, and to show a watch with a new name.

Outstanding default watch faces and the sound of the second hand

It’s natural that the Galaxy Watch has inherited the basic genes of the Gear S2 and S3 that rotate the bezel. It’s because Samsung is the only brand to have a smartwatch with a rotating bezel according to patents. But, the basic build of the Galaxy Watch resembles the Gear S3 a lot. Changes were not made to the rotating bezel and two-buttoned structure of the 46mm model with a 1.3 inch AMOLED of 360×360 pixels. However, changes such as the wider and more tilted rotating bezel, the small and sharp bezel cog and shining silver main body wouldn’t be difficult to notice for the Gear S3 users but would look similar to those who don’t have sharp eyes.

Albeit the minor changes on the exterior, there are still a couple of features that proves the company has been in the smartwatch business for quite a long time than others. First, the Galaxy Watch is a fake watch that runs digital, but hard work has been made to melt in the features of the analog watch to the basic watch in the digital setting.

A quite amount of efforts must have been made about the default watch face. The default watch face of the previous Gear S3 was also better than other smartwatches, but the Galaxy Watch adapts an animation effect so that shades can be seen for the inner subdial and index according to the angle of looking at the default watch face. Also, as it is possible to change the color of the default watch face and the functions of the subdial, the user can set up the watch face with preferred functions. Not only do most of the default watch faces go well with the Galaxy Watch, but the performance of the device itself was made to be efficient to greatly contribute to the degree of completion of the product.

On top of that, the sound of the second hand is applied for the first time. When you turn on the sound of the second hand in the watch screen and listen closely, you will hear the ‘tick tick’ sound of the rapidly moving second hand. When you are looking at the watch lying down in a quiet room, you will naturally hear the sound of the second hand if you listen carefully. It is a pity that there is only one type of the sound. It would have been better if we could have chosen the sound of the second hand according to the different movements of the second hands of each watch face. 

A game about sufficient battery life and functions

The Galaxy Watch has a ‘Watch only mode’. The Watch only mode allows you to turn off all functions of the Galaxy Watch and to only have the index and hour/minute hand to use the watch as long as possible. The watch will be rebooted once this option is turned on and can be used up to almost 42 days without any charging.

Even without turning on the Watch only mode, it’s not necessary to worry about the battery life of the Galaxy Watch. With a single charge, the watch will last for at least two days and up to three days. Battery capacity of the Galaxy Watch is 472mAh, 88mAh more than the 380mAh of the Gear S3. Increased battery capacity and improved management ability of the low-power processor resulted in higher battery efficiency.

But it was not quite pleasant to wear the Galaxy Watch right from the charging pad, as the heat from the charging still remained when wearing the watch. The watch could keep your wrist warm in the winter, but in the hot summer it can be very annoying to wear it along with a rubber leather strap. This is why those who got the Galaxy Watch with the Ducati strap are lucky.

The Galaxy Watch does prevail over other watches in terms of the identity as a smart device than a watch. The dust and water resistance grade of IP68 is not particularly different from other smartwatches, but the heart rate sensor and altimeter/barometer with improved accuracy and degree of completion of the functions that log the routine and save the location information while running makes clear that Galaxy Watch is definitely ahead. Samsung Pay is still run on the Galaxy Watch but only with the NFC instead of MST. Although NFC-based payment terminals are on the increase, it will not work at places without NFC payment systems. 

Bixby, Samsung’s smart assistance function that is first applied to the Galaxy Watch, is immediately called by pressing the on-button twice. Bixby answers pretty well to simple questions such as information about the weather, exchange rate, nearest station or convenience stores. It is also not difficult to make a call or send text messages from the Galaxy Watch without taking out the connected phone. For more complex questions, Bixby will show a list of search results and recommend to check on the smartphone. Many times, Bixby will fail to understand in somewhat noisy places or if the voice is too low. One needs to be patient as its ability will grow the longer the learning period is, but Samsung Galaxy’s Bixby got substantially better than the initial S voice. 

STRENGTHS

• Functions and basic watch faces that raised the level of completion
• Battery that will sufficiently last until the next day even if you’d forget charging today 

WEAKNESSES

• Changes are not bold enough considering its new name
• Package looks too much like the outcome of mass production