Now that the early Apple Watch reviews are in, the consensus is clear: Apple has designed the best smartwatch yet, but it’s not an essential purchase. (Read our full summary of those reviews, including the positives and negatives, here.) In an interesting break with past traditions, quite a few of Apple’s hand-picked reviewers either clearly or subtly advised most readers to hold off on buying the Watch. Another surprise was that the reviews contained quite a few previously unknown or under-reported details about the Watch’s real-world performance, so we’ve summed them up here for you.
While all of the Apple Watch reviews were mostly positive — and some were, predictably, entirely positive — the quotes below mostly focus on user experience problems identified by multiple reviewers. The topics include Watch OS’s overly complex user interface, reports of awkward screen activation issues, overwhelming notifications, slow speeds, and even some unexpected conflicts with cultural norms…
1. An Overly Complex UI. Concerns about over-complexity of the Apple Watch’s interface began to leak out after last month’s Spring Forward event, but quite a few reviews have quantified the issues, some in such detail that average people will get confused trying to keep track of all of them. The New York Times’ Farhad Manjoo led two separate articles with discussions of the Apple Watch’s “steep learning curve,” first noting in his review that:
It took three days — three long, often confusing and frustrating days — for me to fall for the Apple Watch. But once I fell, I fell hard… It was only on Day 4 that I began appreciating the ways in which the elegant $650 computer on my wrist was more than just another screen.
If you want to dive deep into all of Watch OS’s complexity, Manjoo’s separate diary extensively discusses all of the new UI and control issues, eventually concluding:
If all this sounds complicated, you’re right. It is slightly difficult to get the hang of the Apple Watch, at least at first. The biggest problem is figuring out which types of actions are available on which screens. …Since it’s a brand-new device, it stands to reason there will be a bit of a learning curve involved. Still, the Apple Watch presents an uncharacteristic first impression, one that many may find daunting.
2. Getting The Screen To Turn On Can Be Challenging. In one of the more critical looks at the Apple Watch’s performance as a watch, Bloomberg’s Joshua Topolsky wrote:
But what about the watch as a timepiece? I’ve found the experience somewhat inferior to that with a conventional wristwatch, due to one small issue. The Apple Watch activates its screen only when it thinks you’re looking at it. Sometimes a subtle twist of your wrist will do, but sometimes it takes … more. Many times while using the watch, I had to swing my wrist in an exaggerated upward motion to bring the display to life…. Sometimes, even if you do the arm-swing motion, the screen doesn’t turn on. Sometimes it turns on, then off. Sometimes you tap it and nothing happens. For all the noise Apple has made about what a remarkable time-telling device its watch is, I found it lacking for this reason alone.
3. Notifications Are Annoying By Default. Many of the reviews mentioned that notifications were incredibly annoying by default, requiring manual management and time to reduce down to acceptable levels — the opposite of Apple’s typical “it just works” user experience philosophy. Bloomberg’s Topolsky offered a particularly vivid description of the problem and his eventual solution.
Apple sends a push notification every time you get a corporate e-mail, personal e-mail, direct message on Twitter, message on Facebook, and for interactions in countless other services. Each of these notifications pings the watch. For every message, there is a sound, a vibration, or both. (You can mute them.) If you’re a busy person who communicates constantly on your phone, this gets overwhelming fast. I found myself turning off notifications from entire apps, which seems to defeat the purpose of the watch in the first place. …Eventually, I figured out that getting the watch to really work for you requires work. I pruned a list of VIP contacts in my mail app to make e-mail notifications more tolerable, I killed several app notifications that I found to be consistently interruptive, and I streamlined my list of applications to those that seemed truly vital to my day.
Similarly, Manjoo wrote for the New York Times:
Do you want every email to buzz your wrist, or just those from your VIPs? How about social apps like Twitter — when should you let them ring your watch? I spent many hours pondering such questions, and there was a lot of fine-tuning in the notification screen on my phone. In other words, it didn’t just work.
4. Fitness Sensors May Require Swapping On Apple’s Sport Band. Some people suspected this might be the case based on the way optical heart rate sensors operate, but the Apple Watch might need to be attached to a tight band — likely the Sport Band — for fitness tracking to work fully on some wrists. Joanna Stern of The Wall Street Journal said:
At the end of three workouts, both the Polar and the watch reported similar average beats per minute. That’s far more accurate than the Fitbit Charge HR and Microsoft’s Band. Apple’s sport band isn’t the most stylish, but it is the one you want for working out. With the looser steel Milanese Loop band, the watch struggled to lock in on my heart rate.
5. The Speakerphone Is Only Semi-Useful For Phone Calls. Several reviewers said that the Watch’s integrated speaker is underpowered, particularly outdoors; others noted that the microphone often picks up ambient noises that can interfere with calls and Siri. In an otherwise very positive review of the Apple Watch, David Phelan of The Independent amusingly mentioned:
Call quality was good, though on balance I found using the iPhone directly better. Also, maybe it’s just me but holding your wrist up to your ear for extended periods got tiring. Calls on the Watch are fun, and best designed for short calls.
Lauren Goode of Re/code suggested a different workaround that really doesn’t need the Apple Watch at all:
Both my boss, Walt Mossberg, and my mother told me that call quality was very good, and that they couldn’t even tell I was calling from a smartwatch. The volume on the watch doesn’t go up very high, though, so calls sounded best when I was wearing Bluetooth headphones.
6. The Apple Watch Is Slow, A Particular Problem For Maps & Location Services. Several reviewers complained about the Watch’s speed, most notably The Verge’s Nilay Patel:
Apple Watch, as I reviewed it for the past week and a half, is kind of slow. There’s no getting around it, no way to talk about all of its interface ideas and obvious potential and hints of genius without noting that sometimes it stutters loading notifications. Sometimes pulling location information and data from your iPhone over Bluetooth and Wi-Fi takes a long time. Sometimes apps take forever to load, and sometimes third-party apps never really load at all. Sometimes it’s just unresponsive for a few seconds while it thinks and then it comes back. Apple tells me that upcoming software updates will address these performance issues, but for right now, they’re there, and they’re what I’ve been thinking about every morning as I get ready for work…. Transit is set to show me the nearest mass transit options, but it takes so long to find my location I… could have just pulled out my phone. …the Uber app takes so long to figure out where you are that you’re better off walking home before someone notices you staring at your $700 Watch and makes a move.
7. You Need (At Least) Two Hands To Use It. Unlike the iPhone, which can be used with one hand, Patel noted that “you simply can’t one-hand the Apple Watch. It’s the simplest thing, but it’s true: because it’s a tiny screen with a tiny control wheel strapped to your wrist, you have to use both hands to use it, and you have to actually look at it to make sure you’re hitting the right parts of the screen. You have to carry your coffee cup in your other hand if you’re not interested in spilling on yourself.” The Wall Street Journal’s Stern commented that “snapping the sport band’s little clasp to your wrist, however, makes you wish for a third hand.”
8. Apple Pay and the Passcode Lock. Many reviewers described Apple Pay as one of the Watch’s best features, though it requires security measures — the Watch is passcode-locked, and must be unlocked every time you put it back on your wrist. The Independent’s Phelan said:
Every time you take the Watch off your wrist, it locks. You need to put in your passcode before it will do anything. You can disable the passcode lock, but it’s not recommended.
However, at least one review noted that the Watch could be unlocked automatically by bringing it into proximity with your iPhone. Shamrock Shake-loving Lance Ulanoff from Mashable described the Apple Pay process:
You register credit cards with it, just as you would with the iPhone. You take pictures of the cards with your phone and they feed into the Apple Watch utility, which pops them into the watch. Each one you put in gets a unique token. Apple Watch includes wrist detection, and Apple Pay won’t work if the watch isn’t on your wrist. If the watch is on your wrist, it’ll automatically unlock if your phone is nearby. If not, you’ll have to enter your preset PIN.
Other than that, it’s incredibly easy to make purchases with Apple Watch. I bought a Shamrock Shake at McDonald’s, where the clerk didn’t bat an eye when I double pressed on the side button, selected the credit card I wanted to use and then waved the watch over the NFC reader.
9. Third-Party Apps Aren’t Very Good. Many of the reviewers said that the first round of third-party apps don’t do much, and some described problems even getting them to work reliably. For instance, Manjoo of the New York Times said:
Third-party apps are mostly useless right now. The Uber app didn’t load for me, the Twitter app is confusing and the app for Starwood hotels mysteriously deleted itself and then hung up on loading when I reinstalled it. In the end, though, it did let me open a room at the W Hotel in Manhattan just by touching the watch face to the door.
Mashable’s Ulanoff concurred:
However, I often found that new apps took forever to install, and they then worked sporadically. I installed Trivia Crack and initially couldn’t get it to work. It took initiating a game on the iPhone for it to finally be available on the watch.
10. iPhone Dependence Is More Complex Than Previously Understood. Several reviewers pointed out details about the Apple Watch’s link to the iPhone that weren’t known before. Yahoo’s David Pogue said:
When the Watch is in a known WiFi hot spot, the watch can perform the most essential online functions even when your phone is completely dead, turned off, or absent. It can query Siri, for example, send and receive texts, and send/receive drawings and tap patterns to other Watch owners. That’s impressive.
That can be helpful, as you’ll notice a battery hit on your iPhone when the Apple Watch is being used. The Independent’s Phelan noted:
I noticed that my iPhone 6 battery burned faster when I was using the Watch (and therefore the phone) for a lot of stuff such as Maps and Workout. Some of this may be down to getting used to the Watch, and the phone never ran out of energy entirely. As I’ve used the Watch more, the iPhone usage has settled down, though it’s not surprising there’s been an impact using the two together.
A few reviewers (including the WSJ’s Stern) also pointed out that the Watch’s ability to operate independently during fitness activities, including runs, was impacted by distance/location accuracy issues caused by a lack of access to iPhone GPS data. However, they generally felt that the Watch’s performance improved in this regard over time, as Marissa Stephenson of Men’s Journal explained:
You may have heard that you can’t hit the road without your iPhone, because the Watch needs the GPS tracker to dial in the distance. In the beginning, this is true. (The Watch was wildly off for pace and distance the first time I went out for a run without my phone.) But according to Apple, the more I work out with my iPhone and the Watch, the more it will learn my personal movement, and dial in accuracy, so in a couple weeks, I won’t need to bring my phone with me. I noticed this start to happen after a couple of runs. But without GPS dedicated, runners will likely miss the map functions that provide more granular data like elevation gain, altitude, or an actual map of a run.
11. Apple Watch’s Battery Life Lives Up To Apple’s 1-Day Claim, Most Of The Time. Battery life was discussed at least briefly by many of the reviewers, who generally seemed satisfied by the Watch’s ability to last through a single day of regular use. Almost every review found that the Watch consistently survived until the evening, including Re/code’s Goode:
Apple has promised that the battery will last 18 hours per charge with normal use. It hasn’t yet died on me during the day, or even late at night. My iPhone actually conked out before the Watch did… When your watch does die, recharging takes a long time — around two and a half hours to get the watch to 100 percent.
However, battery life remains a point of user anxiety, as noted by Patel at The Verge: “By the end of each day, I was hyper-aware of how low the Apple Watch battery had gotten. After one particularly heavy day of use, I hit 10 percent battery at 7pm, triggering a wave of anxiety. But most days were actually fine.”
12. Despite the MagSafe-Style Connector, Apple Watch Still Has Some Charging Issues. Several reviewers noted odd recharging issues, but tended to write them off as anomalies, like Mashable’s Ulanoff:
For charging, the MagSafe inductive charging mechanism automatically snaps into place on the back of the Apple Watch. I never had an issue with it, though I did one time accidentally miss-seat the plug in a wall outlet and woke up to find the watch had 16% power. I got it to a full charge in an hour and a half.
The Apple Watch had a near-perfect record… until Sunday, when it inexplicably ended up with 5% power at 6 p.m. — hours earlier than normal. I enabled Power Reserve mode, which turned the Apple Watch into a very expensive digital watch of basics, no notifications, no apps, no activity tracking, just a digital readout of the time.
I also don’t love the design of the inductive charging cable. It’s too easy to accidentally disconnect the watch from the cable. I would rather have an inductive charging cradle like the one that comes with Moto 360.
Apple Watch + Music
13. Apple Watch’s Music Playback Is Mediocre. The Verge’s Patel noted that the Apple Watch’s music player isn’t great. “It’s not as good as wearing an old iPod nano on your wrist,” he said, discussing issues with the UI design. Mashable’s Ulanoff pointed out that the Bluetooth range is also limited, saying that “the effective range was no more than 25 feet between the watch and my Jambox before the audio started breaking up.”
14. Siri Is Pretty Restricted. Several of the reviewers pointed out that Siri’s performance on the Apple Watch isn’t great, including Re/code’s Goode:
[A]sking Siri specific questions on the watch often leads you right back to the iPhone.
Hey Siri, what time is the national championship on? Siri: Use Handoff to search the web for [insert question] on your iPhone.
Hey Siri, how much rain has fallen in California this year? Use Handoff to search the web for [insert question] on your iPhone.
Similar comments were made by Patel at The Verge: “When Siri did work, it was for the small stuff Siri is generally good at, like converting units in the kitchen or setting a timer. Anything more complicated generally resulted in Siri prompting me to use my iPhone.”
15. Apple Watch Breaks Cultural Norms In A Bad Way. Serious concerns about the Watch’s cultural impact were raised by The Verge’s Patel, who described his experience attempting to use the wearable in public while out with a co-worker.
“It turns out that checking your Watch over and over again is a gesture that carries a lot of cultural weight,” said Patel. “Eventually, Sonia asks me if I need to be somewhere else. We’re both embarrassed, and I’ve mostly just ignored everyone.”
Bloomberg’s Topolsky sounded a similar alarm:
All these new functions, notifications, and tapping do make the Apple Watch very distracting. In some ways, it can be more distracting than your iPhone, and checking it can feel more offensive to people around you than pulling out your phone. The watch wants and needs you now, as its insistent taps make painfully clear…. If while you’re talking to someone, you check your regular watch, it can feel as if you’re sending a not-so-subtle ‘let’s wrap this up’ message. With the Apple Watch, factoring in the animated wrist-whip and the length of some of the notifications you receive, it’s downright rude.
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Headline is a bit misleading. This is basically just a round up of most of the negative bits from each review.
That’s why most people take the time to read the text below the headline. “While all of the Apple Watch reviews were mostly positive — and some were, predictably, entirely positive — the quotes below mostly focus on user experience issues identified by multiple reviewers.”
Most of the positive details were obviously publicized by Apple itself prior to the review embargo; they’re not newsworthy. But the new issues raised by the reviewers are interesting.
Then perhaps the headline should say user experience issues, not details. And maybe don’t use the word new? I was expecting to find stuff I didn’t know about. Not known things that weren’t working well.
Thanks for those pointers!
Thanks to the author for responding to his readers’ concerns and advice. It’s always pleasant to see a writer engage their audience which engenders highers levels of respect in both directions.
And kudos to readers making supportive comments.
Yeah but Google doesn’t show the subhead. Just saying.
I agree. I came here expecting to get some new neat tricks, but instead just found all the negative comments in one place.
I agree. Although I enjoyed the article, not to mention the honesty of the reviews–I was expected “new” unknown features to get excited about. The expression under-reported means things Apple glossed over in its keynote(s) that people discovered through using–because no one has used them yet.
The reviews are worth our attention and reveal a few things I expected to be troublesome (namely the inconvenience and regular interruption notifications would have on socializing). But the lead up to the reviews could be tweaked a bit for better clarity.
Still a good article, though.
Most reviews seem to identify issues with user experience elements as the main criticism. Batter life was almost universally deemed as adequate and most reviewers seemed to like the design and basic watch face implementation.
Sounds like a real blessing to own and use!
…with your tongue firmly in your cheek eh, chrisl84
Correction: with his tongue firmly in Samsung and Google’s buttholes.*
@Smooties, never owned a single Samsung or Google device but by all means keep lying
It’s not an essential purchase? Lol, also known as buying a wristwatch in the 21st century.
Also as known as every other purchase besides food.
“I hit 10 percent battery at 7pm, triggering a wave of anxiety.”
Nilay gets on my nerves so much for some reason. If that gives him a wave of anxiety than he’s got a pretty good life. Nilay was best when paired with Topolsky and Paul Miller. That was the best podcast ever when it was them three. Now it’s just three guys that think they are hilarious and really aren’t.
And other reviews got much better battery life. I don’t trust that Verge review one bit because I think they had an agenda going into it. Unfortunately it seems to be getting the most attention so that could sway consumers.
Spend 500 on a watch that is dead by dinner when your friends ask you to show them the features….I promise you’d have anxiety about that too.
It wasn’t dead by dinner. It was at 7% at the end of the night. And I promise YOU, I will NOT have anxiety about that. Why would I have anxiety about showing someone my smart watch?
And secondly, when I get the Apple Watch I’ll show everyone the minute I get it!
Mashable said they had 20-30% battery life at the end of the day and that’s with heavy use. Even Nilay said it didn’t die on him.
Lol 7% at dinner means it can die at minute…..Ive had iPhones require charge when showing 15%. By all means twist your brain into thinking 1 day AT BEST battery for a watch is great. LOL you just sound silly.
It’s not just a watch. It’s a smart watch. You either make compromises and get better battery life like the Pebble, no NFC, no retina display, can only show certain amount of color, smaller screen, no wifi direct, no speaker, OR you add in all those features and have a watch that lasts all day.
I have a fitness tracking watch that has 18 month battery, but it only does fitness tracking and tells the time and the screen is ugly. But that’s ok. The Apple Watch provides so much more and the battery seems great to me!
Notice how chrisl84 completely ignored the fact that none of the reviewers had a dead watch before bedtime even after heavy use, and continues to cherry pick the one negative anecdotal experience. Also notice earlier snarky comments for no reason. This all smacks of pure trolling and nothing more. Don’t feed it. He’s just another Apple hating drone who can’t stand that most if not all reviews state the Apple Watch is easily the best smartwatch available now.
Everyone now knows that battery life with any modern device is extremely dependent upon use patterns and individual cases, and no one makes a modern smart device that lasts forever, and almost all need daily charging. It’s also a well known fact that all new gadgets get better battery life after the first few days of them being new because the new WOW factor wears off, all settings are dialed in, and people start to go about their days as usual rather than constantly playing with their new toy. If these early reviews have no problem to get a full day, average use after a few weeks will be more than that guaranteed (but should still be charged daily cause why go to work with 35% charge on it?)
@JRox feel free to respond to me so I can address you idiocy directly. It doesnt matter that a handful of reviews said they didnt die after one day because I said KEEP TELLING YOURSELF ONE DAY BATTERY LIFE IS ACCEPTABLE FOR A WATCH. It isnt in any way shape of form. And after 6 months of recharges that capacity is going to be about 70% of what it was at launch. And you know damn well that to be the case.
Thanks for the top photo. Been wondering what sports edition would look like with a more expensive wrist band. And actually it looks fine so I won’t need to purchase the stainless steel version saving c. £190!
What identifies this as a sport model?
The matte finish is only found on the Apple Watch Sport. All others have a polished bezel.
Yes! That top picture is what drew me to the article. I have been waiting to see what the sport looks like with a nicer band.
I am jealous… Your picture seems to show a space gray Apple Watch with a midnight blue band… But as far as I can tell, that conbunation cannot be ordered. :-(
Social aspects of using a Watch is perhaps most interesting – when notification comes on your phone it is generally in your pocket. So if you are in the meeting that very fact will restrain you from looking at that notification right away. With Watch because its on your wrist it is much harder to resist. I am not sure that most notifications are useful anyway. If I were to get the Watch I would most likely only keep messages notifications.
Judging by hand-off in Yosemite, I think loading apps from iPhone to watch will be a real life issue. On paper handoff is great, but I have yet to see it working consistently enough for me not to wonder if it fails. While its a mere convenience on the Mac, it is essential if try to use an app on the Watch as you need it right away. I think device pinging is just not a good solution for frequent requests. Bluetooth pairing works fine for headphones as they are pinged once and connected. With apps and handoff what I see that frequent re-pinging just breaks connection and loading hangs. I think there is a need for a dedicated new protocol for these cases.
would you check you iphone every single time it buzz ? no ? so why would you check your watch more ? there’s a setting app for that. Sometime I wonder why those people are tech journalist if they can’t figure out a simple user interface …. I’ve only watch 2 minutes video and I already know how the watch works.
exactly. its not the watch’s problem. its equally annoying when people keep looking at their phones or computer screens.
While I m not super sold on the watch I am going to get one. I know there will be things that will annoy me but I want it for primarily for payments and I am hoping it will be accepted at many more places and for things other than payments as well. THe secondary reason why I want to get it is I m looking forward to see how haptic feedback on the wrist helps me be aware of things without looking at the watch e.g. different taps for left and right turns.
Or so you think.
Yup sounds like a First Gen Tec. Let the wealthy hipsters and absurdly religious apple followers beta test the first and second gen Apple Watch. By version 3 it should be pretty good with all the UI glitches smoothed out, increase in battery life and a much better intro price range for techies.
How is this possible “7. You Need (At Least) Two Hands To Use It.”? With it on your wrist, unless you have extremely flexible wrists (which no one does), there is no possibility, without removing the watch, you can do this.
I meant “you cannot do this”
The first reviewer’s comment was that the iPhone can be operated using a single hand, which the Apple Watch cannot as it sits on one wrist while being interacted with using the other (an issue when handling, say, a cup of coffee while trying to use the Watch). Another reviewer said that securing the clasp on the sport band was difficult enough that an extra hand would help.
Or the reviewer wasn’t coordinated or smart enough to put it on..
You do realize that you could hold the cup of coffee with your watch hand…right? Wearing an watch does not inhabit your ability to hold something in that very hand ;-) So there would be another free hand to use the watch.
demeetreee: Well no, you wouldn’t be able to see the watch’s display. If you twist your hand you’ll spill the coffee.
I’m glad you’ve only highlighted the negative bits. I’m buying a Watch, but it’s nice to have a summary of the current issues. The main issue for me is certainly the App lag, but as I’m aware, Apple have said they’ll have the fix for that prior to launch.
Could someone answer this? When you install an app, I understand at the current time they still need an iPhone App to work, with no native Watch Apps. BUT, when they’re loading – even if it’s a totally offline app, would it still be pulling a lot of date from the phone, hense the lag?
I used the Apple Watch during a developer lab. There is no noticeable lag for offline apps. Maps is slow but that’s about it
I know the watch is water resistant but can you operate it when it or your hands are wet? e.g. running in the rain. Also has anyone tried the watch podcast app yet ? I would really like to see a mini review of this.
Yes, it is water resistant enough for that (it’s something like 30 minutes, a foot under water)
Showers, swimming and hot tubs are probably too risky though.
But my question is dows it use a different screen technology to the phone then becsuse if you touch that with wet hands it goes haywire and you have to use something like an aquapac bag to be able to interact with the screen. I notice samsung are very careful in their ads to show the screen being dried before use after getting wet with garden hose etc
I’m sorry, but Patel is just a conceited, full of himself, tech douchebag. Have you ever heard this guy on a podcast? His tone of voice farily drips with condesencion. He gets on my nerves, big time.
I agree he seems that way and that’s the first time I’ve ever heard him.
My experience is that he’s a bright guy with smart things to say, especially on legal matters. His review was comprehensive; his concerns seem sincere. Even if you hate his review, the graphics on the website are impressive. On Jeremy’s concern #4, Patel *does* use the sport band; but, still has trouble with pulse monitoring.
Nope he seemed highly ignorant and unobjective and the review was pointless most of the time. He said “Anything that’s not cardio doesn’t really get picked up, so weightlifting, yoga…things that don’t make your heartrate go up don’t really get accurately tracked by the watch” this is a complete fallacy in that both weightlifting and yoga increase heartrate. Weightlifting can increase heartrate substantially. It’s a testament to how ignorant that man is.
oosmoothieoo:
Of course he seems highly ignorant and conceited – he criticised Apple for gods sake.
Several reviewers mention the incessant notifications as an issue. Why not turn on ‘Do Not Disturb’ mode before dinner and meetings? You’ll still get important notifications from your VIP list.
Because they aren’t anywhere near smart enough to consider that.
Nice article ! Thx for resume , I’m lazy to read all blogs I just read yours :) . Happy to see most of the bugs can be software fix.
Still can’t wait to get mine ! I loved my polar loop, Apple watch is my polar loop on roids .
Jeremy, you should know better. Using out of context sound bites from reviewers adds to the confusion, especially to the uninformed. I read Farhad Manjoo’s review and thought his review was enormously positive. Your coverage however is misleading! The title of his Apple Watch Review is: “Bliss, but Only After a Steep Learning Curve”; yet on your Page 1 lead story, you omit the word “Bliss”!
Flagrant foul!
Shame on you!
— Howie S.
No, Howie: shame on you. If you can’t be troubled to understand the headline or the first paragraph of an article you’re commenting on, you really shouldn’t be commenting on it in the first place. You’re so busy seeking the “bliss” that you don’t seem to realize that this article is, by its own specific terms, spotlighting previously under-reported/unknown issues with the Apple Watch user experience. That point is something the title and the introductory paragraphs made abundantly clear. I even linked to the very story you were apparently looking for in the first sentence of this article.
For what it’s worth, Manjoo wrote two separate pieces for the Times, beginning both of them with the discussion of the UI complexities. One was headlined to include that point, the other had a very lengthy discussion of it. The discussion was impossible to miss in either of his articles, which is the reason I cited both of them, mentioning that other reviewers had raised the same issue.
Hi Jeremy,
Thanks for the reply. I guess i was having a bad hair day, and may have over-reacted. I actually enjoy your articles and coverage of Apple & all things tech. I went back and re-read your lead-ins as well as Manjoo’s articles again in print this morning. I guess I take exception in general to so many of the blogs out there that use headlines as “click-bait” that purposefully distort the truth to pull you in (i.e., Business Insider, Motley Fool, Huff Post…). In retrospect, I think your opening paragraphs were quite balanced and appropriately summarized Manjoo’s coverage… “bliss” aside:)
Peace bro!
— Howie
This is a new space for Apple and they will learn and improve the watch as they discover the good, bad and the ugly. I’m willing to try one out and see for myself how it fits into my daily life. It might be a hit or a miss. Just think of what the first iPhone was and what it has become.
The overriding and most important point here is the last one, number 15. Of course most people overlook that and the buzzing senses are itching to buy one. For sure, this thing is gonna cause a LOT of social commotion.
I’m really curious as to why anyone is taking any of these reviews for serious? Almost NONE of the 3rd party apps are finalized and the OS is definitely not finalized.
And just like with any NEW OS (like 8.0), they can only have so many people beta test them, and they have to release them at some point.
They will do what they normally do, release the Watch with the OS as well put together as possible and then when MILLIONS of people buy them, they’ll get OS and UI feedback immediately and fix all the kinks in a couple weeks, max.
Those are just my two-cents. I hate reading product reviews of products that haven’t even been released yet, it’s a waste of time and creates controversy for no reason.
This is actually great information. I think people need to know you aren’t going to just slap one on and go. Every smartwatch I’ve owned from Pebble to Moto360 to 2 of the Samsung Gear smartwatches took time to learn them.
I already expected there’d be a learning curve with Apple Watch too. Although I was thinking the interface wouldn’t be quite so complicated. I expected there would be some lag like in Gear 1. Gear S is actually the best experience for me so far. Moto360 is great too…. but it doesn’t have many features, like health and fitness, web browsing or stand alone calling in Gear S.
After trying Apple Watch on it felt good on the wrist and all, but I’m thinking I’ll wait till they bring out stand alone calling like Gear S, probably in the next model release. Mayve even a revision of some type before year’s end. I’m a huge Watch Collector… and change ’em up daily. Nice that bands are so easy to change out and in!
If they have released this watch now, it will be more than. Year before they have stand-alone calling. Expect a long wait.
I’m not sure why you need that anyway, it’s not practical to do everything from a watch (Internet reading, half-decent email etc.) so you need to have your phone near.
That’s interesting that it doesn’t have ‘health and fitness’ as a feature set, considering that’s one of the major feature sets that it has. Anyone that wants to browse the web on their watch when their iPhone is in their pocket…no hope.
A lot of those are deadly serious problems. This product is a long long way from right. It’s gonna need a lot of work over the next few years. Stick to your guns Jeremy. Pebble way, way ahead in practicality, value.
Hi. Number 15 is a real consideration. Most of the others are software / hardware issues. It’s up to the owner to sort their priorities. I would encourage Apple to locate do not disturb and airplane mode in an easily locatable position. So far it looks like; tap digital crown to go to home page, go to settings app (I will likely move this next to the watch app in the centre) and flick on or off. As a teacher I will have airplane mode set up for class hours anyway similatniously saving battery.
Unlike the phone it would be excellent if the watch (and ios9) could include multi Do Not Disturb schedules. I would like preset windows where I can receive notifications.
I believe that Do Not Disturb should be activated whenever you are in conversation with a real person who is actually in front of you. What would the The Victorians think of today’s willingness to be interrupted? The irony here is that these devices are supposed to increase communication, they seem to be pulling us all away from people rather than to them.
I love tech esp Apple but my wife and I make massive efforts to not use our devices infront of the kids and often have a Saturday or Sunday where everything is turned off and left in a draw.
i’m sorry… it is really considered to be negative that you need your second hand to operate a device strapped to your first one?! (numbers are just to identify both hands as not everyone wears the watch on the same wrist) … if i was carrying two bags, one in each hand, i would still more easily handle the watch than a phone in my pocket… because you don’t actually need two hands, but rather one finger, while the other 9 can hold on to things…
The contrast he was referencing was with the iPhone. One of the marketing pitches for the Watch is that it’s supposed to be more convenient than the iPhone, but the reviewer (like some others) suggested that there are common situations like handling a cup of coffee where it’s less convenient.
I’m not defending any one of the reviewers here, or telling you that you should agree with any or all of them. But I personally found the new points raised in the reviews to be interesting and worth considering, even if they might not all be ones I would personally experience. It’s just food for thought.
i fully understand that but the statement “you need at least two hands” is – simply put – wrong… if one was wearing the watch on the left wrist, one would need the left arm plus probably one finger, maybe two as counterpressing with the thumb might add convinience… but for sure one would not need any part of the left hand because it is actually, technuically impossible to control a watch on one’s left wrist with any part of the left hand…
yes, the cup of coffee is a valid point as it might have a negative effect on at least your coffee, maybe also clothes and other stuff if you were to turn your wrist while holding the cup… but there are tons of other activities that are not that sensitive in regard to the position of the left hand – like carrying two items with handles, each in one hand – which would work just fine while i would have to put at least one item down to grab my phone…
it might be though that this is more of an issue with people who are not used to wearing watches… like with the comments that find it rather heavy when it really is not even half the weight of my usual watch…
Stern’s comment about wanting a third hand (the “at least”) part was a tongue in cheek way of saying that the Sport Band’s clasp is a challenge to buckle. Patel’s full discussion gets into the “some things are less convenient with Watch, some things are more convenient” concept, but his point (again, discussed by others as well) was simply that the Watch can’t be used for most purposes without involving both hands.
I didn’t read every review, but I wonder how many of the reviewers are already using a smart watch like a Pebble for real (not just for reviewing). I am pretty used to a lot of these issues (being tethered to my phone and the awkwardness of checking my watch), and you get used to them. After a while, you don’t literally look at every notification, you scroll through them when you have a minute. Pebble apps are terrible, so there is no real growth for that platform. Apple has shown they can cultivate a vibrant 3rd party app ecosystem, and that is really what I’m looking forward to.
Most of these reviewers nit picking the apple watch would, if reviewing a sun dial, complain that it doesn’t work on cloudy days or at night. This first edition watch is clearly a major step forward in wearable tech.
Oh come on, so now you check your watch a bit more often , if little miss sensitive finds this an issue she needs to get out more and grow up. This is the next frontier of mobile technology and it is us pioneering first adopters who will provide the feedback to drive the development so tell Sonia it’s not all about her.