As previously reported, Tim Cook today on the WSJ stage said that the Apple Watch would likely need to be charged once a day.
"We think people are going to use it so much you will end up charging it daily," says @tim_cook on Watch battery life http://t.co/wyOZWNtqcJ
—
Joanna Stern (@JoannaStern) October 28, 2014As Cook explained, the Apple Watch is profound and made to be used and clearly Apple is still working on the battery technology.
Apple's Tim Cook says the "watch is profound." Excited about new constituencies looking at it -- health, fashion. #Apple #WSJDLive
—
Connie Guglielmo (@techledes) October 28, 2014From the previous report,
Apple isn’t yet happy with the watch’s battery life, which isn’t going to break any industry standards. “It’s about a day right now,” said one, adding that Apple is working on various modifications ahead of the device’s 2015 launch to improve it. Reached for comment, Apple spokeswoman Nat Kerris declined to provide an estimate on expected battery life, but said the company expects users will charge their Apple Watches once daily. “There’s a lot of new technology packed into Apple Watch and we think people will love using it throughout the day,” Kerris said. “We anticipate that people will charge nightly which is why we designed an innovative charging solution that combines our MagSafe technology and inductive charging.”
I had also heard …some things… way back before the announcement.
Things I've heard about the 'iWatch' 3rd hand (so unreliable):
<24 hr battery
looks techie good, not fashion-y
screen rectangular, not huge
—
Seth Weintraub (@llsethj) August 30, 2014Cliché but on Apple watches you only get to pick 2:
1. Does amazing stuff
2. Reasonably thin form factor
3. More than a day of battery
—
Seth Weintraub (@llsethj) September 12, 2014
Charging a watch once a day… Nah. The last couple watches I bought (but never wear) are solar powered so I don’t have to worry about powering them at all.
And all they did was tell the time……
Two also had WWVB receivers, but VLF and 1-2 cm antennas never made sense nor worked too well. The Apple Watch is cool, but it just isn’t my thing. I’m just not a watch guy. They’re nice to look at, but I don’t like wearing them.
Solar Power, what a waste…. mine simply “charges” (well winds really) from being moved, it can also not only track time, it can deal with stop watch and SCUBA diving functions, dates, moon phases etc
Can your watch be used as a form of payment, accept phone calls and text messages? Can it read your health functions and report them to your smartphone for tracking? Can it provide turn by turn navigation, allow you to check and respond to emails? Control your music, allow you to check movie times and buy tickets, how about use your watch as a digital shutter switch for your smartphone camera or use it to check into flights at the airport?
I didn’t think so. The Apple watch does more than tell time and act as a stop watch. With all those features, plus more (when developers get it), slightly less than 24-hours battery time is okay with me. Especially considering I am rarely up for a full 24-hours at a time. My college days are past me.
This seems to have been taken out of context as the post it was in reply to seems not to be displayed along with it, The post was a jab at someone who had stated that their “basic” digital watch was solar powered and didn’t have the issue, I was pointing out that mine does not need solar power and does more, therefore the point was invalid.
Having said that, I honestly do not know whether I will purchase one, I like the idea of the health monitoring, notifications, music control and camera shutter. But the other functions I doubt I would use as I already have methods of doing the other things (when Apple Pay is in Australia anyway, can use Google wallet however) as we already have many, many NFC enabled payment places and with a phone, a Plastc (http://www.plastc.com) or one of other numerous devices I can achieve the same thing. But to be honest my biggest turn off is the design. I simply hate it, I prefer the round dials of the G-Watch and Moto 360, and some of the “integrated” designs that were fan designed before the initial launch.
And to think, my iPod nano lasts me more than a week on one charge, heh … I would appreciate not having to turn the screen on though.
Can’t wait to see for myself.
Hmm if the best they can say is “about a day”, that probably equals half a day of real world use :\
My Pebble Steel last me all of 6 days in use as a watch with notifications – a daily charge routine is a BIG ask !
That fact is inherent to the display and not its functions.
I take it that the watch will not be designed to track sleep stats? (Unlike the fitbit or Gear watch). Rather disappointing, seeing as sleep stats are included as an option in the Health app
Totally unacceptable. I am not spending $350.00 on a watch that needs to be recharged daily. Its no different than the Moto 360. I am sure Apple’s software will be more useful. That’s Apple’s forte. They will need to do much better on the battery before most consumers will bite.
History would say you’re wrong.
>Apple iPhone
>Released at a time where charging a phone everyday was not considered the norm
>Look at where we are today
The problem for me isn’t the charging. It’s the price. I am really hoping that once the second generation Apple Watch comes around, that Apple will keep this first generation in the lineup.
I take my watch off at night. Charging it at the same time as I charge my iPhone won’t be onerous.
Clive Sinclair made the first digital watch in the 70’s. It failed because the battery time was so low. You had to push a button to turn it on each time you wanted to know the time.
So Apple take note, a <24h battery life is absolutely atrocious.
If you're going to make a watch, at the very least make the features that other watches have, equal to, or greater than.
Yes it can do a whole lot of functions that other watches can't.
And what if you're out at a disco some evening and go home with a chick. Then you don't wake up on time the next day because the battery died and so you don't make it home on time to your girlfriend.
She gets pissed off and puts a knife through your heart because you came home late.
So its not only irritating, but also DEADLY with a <24h battery life.
Actually it didn’t fail. The battery life wasn’t all that bad because all it had to do was keep the time, which didn’t take much current, and Flash an LED display for a second or two a few times a day. The battery would last months. By today’s standards that’s not that great, but for back then it wasn’t too shabby. I do agree though, a less than 24 hour battery life on a watch is pathetic.
By the way, I love your life and death scenario! LOL!
One day of battery life on this thing is way too low. If you forget to charge it overnight, bye bye bells n whistles. For me that’s the end of the story. Back to my analog watch.
Now, people have commented that you can do all sorts of things with an Apple Watch:
– pay stuff. No thanks, I like my money physical and tangible. I might just get an iPhone 6 if I want that
– answer calls. Guys, please get over the Dick Tracy years. My bluetooth headset will do a much better job at it. Plus the watch’s speaker is gonna do a horrible job and suck away precious power while doing it
– view images. Right… I thought 4 inches (my iPhone 5S) was a bit small, so I might as well move down to . Gotcha, brilliant.
– interact through haptic feedback with my gf and send finger-drawn emoticons to friends (Sketch, Tap, Heartbeat). Right… this is gonna be a useful one. That’s what I was missing all this time to express myself…
Now the useful stuff:
– tell the time. Done very well, apparently.
– track health. A rather bulky system to measure only your pulse. I guess I have to buy that (pun intended). I just hope Apple engineering made the right tradeoffs in there.
– handle text messages. Fine as long as it sticks to reading texts. For replying, I’ve hardly ever used canned replies but anyway.
My take on the Watch is that Apple strived to cram all bells and whistles in there and finally releases a mediocre product. It should have had a better battery life. Period.
Tim’s team needs to learn that all these “features” are no good if the battery is dead. And on my 5S that happens way too often for me to leave the house without a battery pack (which defeats the purpose of having an ultra-thin phone – hello iPhone 6).
I have a strong feeling the Apple Watch is going to emulate the Apple Pippin.
I totally AGREE – this product will FAIL……. all that is “apple” is not gold – never has been. Time we started a “Remove COOK” campagn – seriously…..
Cook is also responsible for the iPhone 6/6+ and all the cool features of Yosemite and iOS 8 like continuity, iCloud drive and Mail Drop. I think Cook is safe in his job for now. Not every Apple release is going to change the world.
Charging once a day? LMAO #ByeFelicia
This is a TOTAL FAILURE for Tim Cook’s Apple….. I hope he is finally removed over this one….. time for fresh blood at Apple……oh and lets not forget the huge OS X 10.10 wifi failure (that ceases to be addressed by him publicly……)