We’ve heard about Google releasing a Pixel Watch for years now. There’s been a lot of hype around Google wading into the smartwatch waters, and rightfully so. Right now, Android users are left with very few viable options, namely from Samsung’s Galaxy Watch lineup.
Google made good on that promise by delivering the $349 Pixel Watch alongside the Pixel 7 and Pixel 7 Pro. For the past week, I’ve been using Google’s first Pixel Watch -- a device that many hope will finally give Android users their version of the Apple Watch -- for about a week.
While it’s far from an Apple Watch caliber, there’s a lot to like, some to dislike, and plenty of potential left over for Google’s first smartwatch.
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A Traditional Design With a Modern Spin
I’ll get this out of the way now -- I love the design of the Pixel Watch. The solid black face of the watch that blends the bezels and the display into a seamless surface looks great, even in direct sunlight or in the dark. The housing is made of stainless steel and comes in matte black, polished silver or champagne gold color options.
The display, and for that matter the entire watch housing, isn’t very big. And that’s my biggest complaint about the design. It’s just too small. The entire watch has a diameter of 41-millimeters, with the display being smaller than that, measuring 30.48mm -- or 1.2-inches.
The Pixel Watch looks like a traditional watch thanks to its round housing and a crown that rotates or acts as a button to navigate the interface. There is a side button, just above the crown, that’s somewhat hidden that adds another navigation option, on top of the touchscreen display, of course.
There are several different band options, many of which look very similar to Apple’s own Apple Watch bands -- but it’s hard to get mad at that. Google developed a somewhat unique way of attaching the bands to the Pixel Watch housing, and it takes some practice to get the hang of. Google likens the attachment method to how fancy camera lenses are connected to a camera body, with it sliding and locking into place.
Removing the band is easy; you press a button on the right side of the band and then slide it to the right. Putting a band on, however, is a little trickier. The key is to press and hold the button in, then place the edge of the band over it and slide it to the left. I’m not sure that makes sense now that I read it myself. Rest assured, Google shows a brief animation shortly after setting up the watch that walks you through the process.
On the bottom of the Pixel Watch is where you’ll find all of the standard health sensors that are now commonplace in any smartwatch. There’s a heart rate monitor, Sp02 sensor for blood oxygen levels, and you can take an ECG using a combination of the bottom sensors and by placing your finger on the side of the crown -- which is exactly how it works on Samsung’s Galaxy Watch and the Apple Watch.
The bottom of the watch is also where you place the included magnetic charger, similar to how Samsung’s Galaxy Watch and the Apple Watch charge. Google claims you can charge the Pixel Watch to 50% in 30 minutes, or a full charge in about 80 minutes. That more or less matches my experience.
An Android Watch From Someone Other Than Samsung
As I mentioned earlier, there’s a lot of pressure on Google to deliver a WearOS experience that ideally surpasses or at a bare minimum puts pressure on Samsung to develop a better Android watch. Don’t get me wrong, the Galaxy Watch 5 is a fantastic smartwatch, but it relies heavily on Samsung’s software and services, and if you don’t have a Samsung phone, that can be frustrating.
The Pixel Watch runs WearOS 3.5 out of the box, and is full of various Google apps and services. And you’ll need to pair it with an Android smartphone running Android 8 or newer. Shortly after setting up the Pixel Watch, I used Google Maps on my wrist to navigate to a local restaurant in Brooklyn -- something I often do when traveling so I’m not constantly staring at my phone as I walk around. You can even control your Google Home devices directly on your wrist, or summon Google Assistant with a long press of the side button to set an alarm, play music, or get directions.
Google Wallet, too, is available on the Pixel Watch. I did use Google Wallet to buy a cup of coffee with tap to pay at one point, but I was disappointed to see that my boarding passes didn’t transfer to the watch. Hopefully that’s a feature that’s added in the future. To be fair, Samsung’s Galaxy Watch doesn’t have boarding passes either; I just hoped Google would bring that feature to the Pixel Watch.
I’ve enjoyed using Samsung’s Galaxy Watch offerings for the last few years, but after a week with the Pixel Watch and its streamlined WearOS experience, I think I’ve been converted.
As for battery life, well, you’ll need to get in the habit of charging the Pixel Watch every day. It has just enough juice to track your activities, put notifications on your wrist and even keep tabs on your sleep habits, but once you wake up, you’ll have to put it on the charger. I typically woke up in the morning with less than 10% of a charge remaining, and at its lowest, I woke up with just 2% battery life left.
That’s with the always-on display enabled, something Google warns will zap the battery. Recharging the battery doesn’t take very long, though, so that’s a plus. I was able to put it on the charger while I got ready for the day, take my kids to school and come back to a fully charged watch in under an hour.
The interface of the Pixel Watch is easy to use and intuitive. If you swipe left or right across the watch face, you’ll see one of your various tiles to view information such as the current weather, Google Maps shortcuts to home or work, or start at Fitbit exercise. A swipe down on the watch face reveals all of the quick settings and this is also where I discovered the bedtime mode button is located. When enabled it turns off the Pixel Watch display while you sleep, helping to save battery life and eliminate a bright screen waking you up at night in the process.
To view and interact with notifications you swipe up on the screen, or turn the crown up, where you can then tap on the alert to open it, and interact with it if the app supports it.
A Fitbit but by Another Name
Google’s acquisition of Fitbit only elevated the pressure and Pixel Watch expectations. Fitbit came into Google with a respected track record of creating outstanding fitness trackers, but with a mixed history of creating smartwatches.
With the Pixel Watch, there are plenty of Fitbit features built into it. It, of course, tracks your steps, heart rate, sleep, and workouts. You can take an ECG to check for an irregular heart rhythm as well.
All of the health-related features that are currently available on the Pixel Watch work as you’d expect. You start a workout, the watch tracks it, and then records it to the Fitbit app where you can see your stats and progress.
However, the Pixel Watch launched without some of the staple Fitbit features that users have come to expect. For instance, even though it’s equipped with a blood oxygen sensor, you can’t take a reading right now. The Pixel Watch also has fall detection that can call for help should it detect you’ve fallen, but that’s also missing from the current capabilities. For comparison, the Apple Watch and Galaxy Watch already support both of these.
Another feature that’s missing in the traditional sense is automatic workout detection. Instead of identifying when you’ve forgotten to start a workout and prompting you if you’d like to record it, the Pixel Watch will instead record the activity after the fact, without ever alerting you.
For example, if you go on a long walk and forget to start the outdoor walk workout on the watch, there’s a chance you’ll see the walk recorded in the Fitbit app after you’ve finished. However, there’s no guarantee that it’s being tracked, because the watch is looking for indicators such as an elevated heart rate and other factors to passively record the activity.
The ability to automatically start, stop or pause workouts is a major selling point of Fitbit devices. Is the lack of support on the Pixel Watch a deal breaker? Most likely not. You’ll just need to get in the habit of manually starting your workouts, or trusting the watch enough to track workouts in the background.
My biggest gripe about the Pixel Watch and its health features is a fairly simple feature -- use my sleep goals to create an alarm on the watch that gently wakes me up in the morning. Right now, there’s an option in the Fitbit app for a bedtime reminder, however, you can’t set an alarm. It seems like such an obvious feature that Fitbit devices, mind you, currently have. Why it’s not included in the Pixel Watch doesn’t make sense to me.
To get the most out of Fitbit integration you’ll likely want to sign up for Fitbit Premium, a service that unlocks workouts and dietary tracking for $80 a year. However, Google is including 6-months of Fitbit Premium with each Pixel Watch.
Bottom Line: Is The Pixel Watch Worth it?
Google’s Pixel Watch is very much a first-generation product. There are a lot of features that Google and the WearOS team delivered on, such as Google Maps or Google Home integration, but then there’s stuff that’s missing that makes you scratch your head -- such as the lack of airline boarding passes in the Wallet app. Maybe the screen is too small to accurately display the QR code for airline scanners? Who knows.
Then there’s the tight integration with Fitbit and the health features, which are full of promise, but the lack of key capabilities like Sp02 at launch makes you second-guess Google’s decision-making.
With any first-generation product, there’s a tendency for press and users alike to give a partial pass on mistakes, chalking it up to lessons learned and hoping that the second iteration will correct the course. With the Pixel Watch, outside of battery life and overall size, most of the issues I have with the experience are software related. With that in mind, the Pixel Watch has plenty of room to grow into the watch I, and I’m sure many others were hoping it’d be on launch day. But, here’s the rub: I’ve never advocated that you should buy a product based on what it could be, but what it is today.
With that in mind, if you’re looking for an Android smartwatch to accompany your Android phone, regardless of who made it, and Samsung’s Galaxy Watch lineup isn’t appealing -- the Pixel Watch delivers on its WearOS promise. If you’re looking for a fitness-focused smartwatch that also happens to work with Android, then perhaps the Galaxy Watch 5 or even the latest Garmin is a better choice for you. For now.
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