If you’ve been holding out on a new Apple Watch, waiting for an always-on display, a new Fossil smartwatch available for pre-order today might make for an interesting alternative.
Fossil claims the watch can make it through a full day in this mode. Alternatively, you can opt for a lower-power mode which promises multi-day battery life…
Classic design. Modern tech. This 44mm touchscreen smartwatch features a black stainless steel bracelet, speaker functionality, increased storage capacity and three smart battery modes to extend battery life for multiple days.
Multi-day mode still apparently supports notifications and heart-rate monitoring and is coupled to fast-charging.
You won’t have to take your smartwatch off for long to charge it up – get up to 80% in one hour with rapid charging.
The latest Fossil Gen 5 will also include another handy feature for iPhone users: the ability to answer phone calls on the watch when your iPhone is in another room. Don’t expect this at launch, however. Fossil told The Verge that the feature will come in a fall update.
This is the first Wear OS watch that will be able to take calls from a tethered iPhone. (The feature is already available for Android phones.) Countless Wear OS watches before have been able to alert iPhone users that a call is inbound, but Fossil’s latest will actually let you listen to and answer calls through the watch itself. Unfortunately, this functionality will be missing on the August 5th release date; according to Fossil, it will arrive OTA in the form of a proprietary app sometime this fall. According to a Fossil spokesperson, “No action is required from your iPhone. The watch becomes another way to take your call via Bluetooth.”
Fossil smartwatches are compatible with the iPhone 6 and up.
Your wearable is compatible with Android and iOS smartphones, specifically with Android OS 4.4+ (excluding Go edition) or iOS 9.3+. All devices have Bluetooth 4.2 Low Energy and Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n.
The company says the watch is ‘swimproof’ and offers untethered GPS, so you can use it as a standalone device for things like tracking runs.
The Fossil Gen 5 is available for pre-order from today, shipping on September 7. It’s available with a choice of three color combos for $295.
More details — including a rundown of the smart battery modes – over at 9to5Google.
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