Is the Pixel Watch 2 finally the Android smartwatch to own?
Here are my thoughts after putting the watch through my daily routines
I've long been a watch guy. There have been very few days in my life when my left wrist hasn't been adorned with some type of timepiece. And I've never been too discerning about it. I've had extremely cheap, plasticky watches with goofy colors that could change with my outfit. And I've also had some more expensive traditional watches that could dress up any occasion.
So when smart watches first became a thing, I just assumed that I'd be a smartwatch guy too. But it's been a bit of a roller coaster trying to find a watch that can check all the boxes.
Yes, the Apple Watch has become the two ton gorilla in the industry. It's become the default smart watch for most people, and with good reason! My wife loves her Apple Watch and I've always been mildly jealous. But the experience of pairing an Apple Watch with an Android phone is still less than ideal. Full Apple Watch compatibility and iMessage green bubbles are really the last battlegrounds in the mobile OS debate.
What’s an Android user to do?
As someone who generally loves using Android phones, what should be my timepiece of choice? After letting Google sort out the issues in its first version of the Pixel Watch, I decided to jump into the Pixel Watch 2. It also didn't hurt that it was offered as a pre-order bonus when buying the Pixel 8 Pro. Any watch that gets bundled in for "free" is worth testing out right?
I've only been wearing the watch for a few days but so far I am pretty pleased with the experience. No smart watch is going to be perfect, it's still a technology that seems to be finding its place in the tech industry. But I do think that Google has made some nice strides to offer a decent competitor to the Apple watch. Let's break down a few of the pros and cons that I've noticed so far.
Pros
I really love the physical size of the watch. I know that plenty of people have complained that the screen on the watch isn't bigger, but it feels like the perfect size for me. Maybe my wrists are just small, but a big watch just feels heavy and uncomfortable in my opinion. The Pixel Watch sits really well on the wrist and doesn't feel bulbous or offer any pressure that bothers me. It's almost light enough to forget that you're wearing it.
And because it's so darn comfortable, I'm more likely to want to wear it during workouts and at night for sleep tracking. At the moment, I still think that the Oura ring offers superior sleep tracking in a more comfortable form factor. Having said that, I may write up a comparison of the sleep tracking experience with the two devices soon after I can draw more conclusions.
The design of the rotating crown is pretty great as well. Because the screen is so compact, sometimes you just want to use a tactile crown and button rather than tapping away at a tiny screen. It's really easy to navigate through the operating system without much fuss. And the overall user experience is a lot better than some of the older Wear OS watches I've tried. So far I've seen no signs of lags, skips, or freezes. Everything seems to flow very smoothly on this tiny wrist computer.
Cons
Ok, so what are some of the negative things I've experienced so far? These are mostly nitpicks but let's get into them.
I'm not a big fan of all the Fitbit integration. It's almost like the device is a simple fitness tracker with some smart watch functionality thrown in rather than just fully trying to be one or the other. The Google/Fitbit acquisition always felt like a strange fit to me. I liked what Fitbit was doing as a dedicated fitness tracker and I liked the early designs of Google's watches. It's sad to say that original Moto 360 smartwatch still looks as good as other option today even if it was designed over a decade ago.
I'm already in the Oura ecosystem for fitness tracking and I've used Google Fit in the past. I don't really want to duplicate everything over to Fitbit now just to use this watch. Google does incentivize with switch with 6 free months of Fitbit premium. So I suppose I'll reserve judgment until that period is over, but I don't imagine I'll pay for a subscription.
Call me old fashioned but I don't really see the benefit of having a speaker on a smart watch. I know we all fantasize about talking into our watch like Dick Tracy and having conversations on the go. But this just doesn't work. Answering calls on your wrist has such a narrow use case. Your phone is almost always nearby and you're almost always wearing headphones or earbuds. Just use one of those options for talking on the phone. My wife will sometimes answer my calls on her Apple Watch and the audio quality isn't great. You have to tell the person on the other end that you're talking to them on your watch and they aren't important enough to actually pick up the phone!
Anyway, a lot of these things can be turned off but I was amazed at how much the phone beeped and chirped when i first set it up. I don't need all those sounds. Just use the vibration on the wrist if you need to get my attention. I was also confused at how you can't quickly set an alarm that only vibrates with no sound. By default, they only let you lower the alarm volume but not entirely disable it. There is a bit of a work around where you have to manually deactivate the alarm sound on each recurring alarm that you've setup but it took me forever to figure out. Silent vibrating alarms are honestly one of the most magical uses for a watch and Google should recognize that and make it easier to implement!
Conclusion
Those are just a few of my initial thoughts after putting the watch through some of the normal paces of my daily life. I still want to play around a bit more with the GPS tracking for.runs and bike rides before I give it an accurate battery life assessment. It feels like I'll still want to do those workouts with a phone to get the maximum benefits which is a bummer.
Oh, and just to be clear, I am using the silver watch with the "Bay Blue" watch band. It was released to match the new color of my Pixel 8 Pro and I think they go well together. I appreciate the look of the silver watch but because the front glass on the screen overhangs like a dome, it still just looks like a black watch from afar. The strap is comfortable but I imagine the blue band will get old after a bit and I'll want something a bit more neutral. I'll have to try some of the other options and report back.
Overall, I think the Pixel Watch 2 will be a great companion for many Android users. As much as I love technology, I appreciate anything that gives us the info we need quickly without having to stare at our phones for hours. It may sound counterintuitive to add another screen to your life if you're trying to disconnect more but a well designed smart watch can let you live a more efficient life without getting sucked into the many time traps of the modern phone.
Anyone else out there using the new Pixel Watch?
Thanks for reading, I’ll see you next week!
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