Apple's iWatch may not be the most hyped gadget of all the time, but it's certainly one of the most anticipated products of recent years. Now it's here and the company from Cupertino is simply calling it Apple Watch. It will be available in early 2015, starting at $349 in the US, with prices elsewhere yet to be announced (a rough conversion would be £220 or AU$380).
The watch runs on a brand-new S1 processor, is equipped with a gyro-accelerometer and can piggyback off the Wi-Fi and GPS on your phone. It has its own operating system, and you press down on the crown to get to the home screen. The watch will take dictation, and Apple says it offers very precise synchronized time, to plus or minus 50 milliseconds.
Like the iPhone 6, the Apple Watch has NFC, and Apple was showing how the device could make mobile payments and act as a digital key to open a smart lock on a front door at home. Apps will also allow you to access other home-automation features, such as smart thermostats, using your iPhone's wireless connection as a conduit.
It's important to note that you need an iPhone 5 or later to use the Watch. That will obviously be a sticking point for some potential buyers -- smartwatches that only interface with Android phones have hurt their appeal.
Built-in infrared and LED sensors accurately record your pulse rate.Hands-on with the Apple Watch
Here's what Senior Editor Scott Stein had to say after getting some hands-on time with the Apple Watch at the launch event:
I tried on a stainless-steel Apple Watch with a metal link band, an Apple Watch Sport with a rubbery sport band, and a smaller Apple Watch with a leather band. They all felt really good; the best I've felt next to the stylish Meta M1 and Pebble Steel, and honestly, Apple's is a cut above in terms of look and feel.
The screen on the 42mm model is about the size of a Pebble Steel, which is one of the smaller smartwatches. It didn't seem too big. The smaller 38mm watch did feel too small (for me), but it's made more for women -- and it looked pretty good on slimmer wrists.
The watches I tried on ran a set demo loop, much like early Android Wear watches at Google I/O. For deeper features, you had to see one on an Apple employee's wrist. But even on the loop, you could feel Apple's "Taptic" engine, which sends haptic vibrations for notifications. It's much like vibrations on other watches, such as those from Android Wear and Pebble, but this one feels capable of a more subtle range of vibrations.
The little scroll-wheel digital crown on the side is a clever idea: home button and scroll wheel in one, it aims to help make pinch-to-zoom and scroll functions easier to pull off. IR and photo sensors give it extra sensitivity. That, and a button below that brings up favorite friends and contacts, offer a set of inputs that don't require the screen at all. You still can swipe and tap, too.The watch isn't surprising in design, but it's elegantly made. The bands in particular feel well thought-out: a steel mesh one has magnets that wrap and attach, and so does a cool segmented leather one. And the snap-on magnetic inductive charger is great; it avoids weird snap-on dongles, but that also means the watch won't detach from the charger when in a bag or an airline seat pocket.
The Apple Watch snaps into different straps as needed. There are three materials: stainless steel, aluminum, and even 18-karat gold. Its curved lines give it an iPhone flavor, but the Apple Watch also feels like the natural evolution of the 2011 iPod Nano.
With its starting price of $349, the Apple Watch is one of the pricier smartwatches. But Apple is clearly going to market it as a premium, lifestyle gadget, much as it did the original iPhone, which launched at a whopping $600.
Several mobile companies have already released or announced their own smartwatches, including Sony's SmartWatch 2, Motorola's Moto 360, Samsung's Gear Live and Gear S, and LG's G Watch and G Watch R. However, those devices have struggled to catch on with mainstream consumers. Part of the reason for that is a killer app for the category has failed to emerge. It also hasn't helped that the world has been waiting to see what Apple would bring to market.
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