[Wear OS General] bernarbernuli:
How is the Wear OS News

In the last 3 months there was more news about Wear OS than in the last 3 years, starting today I will put at the end of the week what has happened in the last 7 days about Wear OS.

To start with, I remember what has happened in the last 3 months since the Google I/O 2021 conference that energized Google's interest in Wear OS.

May

On May 18 at the annual Google I/O conference a new version of Wear OS, Wear OS 3 based on Android 11, is announced. Wear OS 3 will integrate the best of fitbit with its step-tracking features and achievement rewards system to keep you motivated. In addition, at that conference they have reported that:

Samsung's Galaxy Watch 4 and Galaxy Watch 4 Classic will launch in August with Wear OS 3 but with a custom user interface, One UI Watch.

Samsung will completely abandon its Tizen OS platform in favor of Wear OS, however it will continue to support the Galaxy Watch 3 and earlier running on Tizen OS for the next 3 years.

It will create a unified platform with the best of Google's Wear OS (such as access to Google Play apps and ecosystem) and the best of Samsung's Tizen (such as the interface), which will improve performance, longer battery life and more apps available for the watch.

Google Pay will add support for 26 new countries on the watch, beyond the current 11 supported countries.

YouTube Music will be available on Wear OS later this year. It will allow downloading songs and playlists for offline listening.

Spotify will soon be updated on Wear OS, and will allow music and podcasts to be streamed, as well as music to be downloaded for offline playback.

Fitbit will manufacture its own smartwatches based on Wear OS, instead of Fitbit OS.

Custom tiles will soon be allowed to be integrated by third-party app developers thanks to the new tile API that Google is giving access to. Popular apps like Spotify, Strava and Adidas are already working on new custom cards.

June

Fossil reports that it will not be upgrading the watches it currently has on the market to Wear OS 3.

Fossil Gen 6 will be released later this year.

June 16 sees the launch of mobvoi's new watch, Ticwatch E3. The second watch on the market with Snapdragon Wear 4100 processor (along with Ticwatch Pro 3). Among its main features: IP68 water resistance, training modes, heart rate, SpO2, sleep tracking and VO2, for less than 200 €.

Qualcomm claims that not only its new Snapdragon 4100, but also Snapdragon Wear 3100 processors could run Wear OS 3.

Samsung confirms that the new Galaxy Watch 4 will be unveiled at Samsung's Unpacked event on August 11, it will be the first device to feature One UI Watch and the new unified platform.

July

Watch's Play Store is updated with a redesigned "material You" interface (more compact typography and new icons) in order to adapt it to the future Wear OS 3.

Phone's Play Store is updated to allow apps to be installed directly on the watch from the phone's Play Store, as it offers a better browsing experience.

It is leaked that the new Galaxy Watch 4 will be released on August 27, 2 weeks after the launch event (August 11).

The Galaxy Watch 4 will be launched with Exynos W920 processor, brings with it a considerable performance increase over the Exynos 9110 processor that was used until Galaxy Watch 3 and thus be able to run Wear OS reliably. It is also leaked that the watch will bring 16 GB of storage and 1.5 GB of RAM.

Qualcom announces the launch of new Snapdragon Wear processor next year.

Google announces that only Ticwatch Pro 3 and Ticwatch E3 will receive Wear OS 3 update, however this update will be received in the second half of next year. The update will require factory reset.

Google reveals that new watches will be released from Fossil (planned Fossil Gen 6) and Mobvoi that will NOT run Wear OS 3 out of the box. These watches will be able to upgrade to Wear OS 3 if they want to (since factory reset is required) and when it becomes available (for now, 2nd half of 2022).

The OPPO Watch 2 is launched on July 27, among its main features: Snapdragon Wear 4100+ processor and support for eSIM. It will be released in 42 and 46 mm versions.