This report comes from Business Insider, and has also been corroborated by The Verge. Which says that this smartwatch is “round and has no physical bezel” and will also use proprietary watchbands. A lot like how Fitbit’s wearables are. It will also likely require daily charging, and it’s gonna be slow. A bit of interesting information in this report is that Google is planning to have Fitbit integration in Wear OS for this Watch. This should not come as a huge surprise though, since this was announced as being in the works back at Google I/O in May. It’s not clear what the name of the watch will actually be, and we likely won’t know until closer to its launch. But internally, it has been referred to as the “Pixel Watch” or “Android Watch”.
This smartwatch is expected to compete more with the Apple Watch
The Verge said in its report that the “device is expected to cost more than a Fitbit and compete more directly with the Apple Watch“. Since the Fitbit Sense is $299, and the cheapest Apple Watch Series 7 is $399, it’ll likely be around $350-$400. The device is currently being tested among Googlers outside of the smartwatch team. And a launch is planned for early next year, “if the latest testing round is a success.” This would be huge for Google, as it would be their first smartwatch that they have launched. And it’ll likely work really well with the Pixel smartphones. Since Google seems to be making its own ecosystem around the Pixel. Much like Samsung and OnePlus have done with their smartphones. This could also help improve Wear OS and make it not so clunky.
