I love my Apple Watch but can’t recommend it to many people
As satisfied as I am with my Apple Watch, I still struggle to be an evangelist for the product
I love my Apple Watch. There isn’t a single day I haven’t worn it since I bought it around a year ago. That said, there are very few friends and family who I would recommend it to.
Why this discrepency?
Much as I love my Apple Watch (Sport edition, Space Grey), there is no denying it has plenty of limitations. And it falls well short of all that Apple promised it would be.
For a start, third party apps are largely pointless.
I have the Dark Sky weather app installed as both a Glance and a Complication but other than that, I only use my Watch for the information on the Modular watch face I use and for push notifications.
Whenever I do try to use a third party app, I soon give up as it takes sooooo long to load and it’s always quicker to pull out my iPhone.
But again, I love my Apple Watch.
Being able to raise my wrist and quickly glance at the time (obviously) and weather, as well as tracking my daily activity, is great.
But my favourite feature of the Apple Watch is the notifications. Getting push notifications to my wrist rather than feeling my leg buzz via my iPhone is wonderful.
Like seriously. Wonderful.
I had a day when I was without my Watch for most of it doing some updates and it felt like going back to the dark ages having to check my phone for reminders, appointments, and text messages.
I don’t have a lot of apps set to send push notifications, but for reminders and appointments especially, it is far more convenient to be gently tapped on my wrist and be able to quickly glance at (and dismiss, snooze, mark as done, etc) these notifications.
I can’t imagine life without it.
Oh, and football and rugby scores for my favourite teams is like a gift from above. So good.
Much as I am happy with the money I spent on the Watch though, I don’t find myself as an Apple Watch evangelist yet.
It seems odd to say I can’t live without it while also still questioning whether any of my family and friends really need one. But that’s where I’m at.
I get enough value out of it but I’m not sure others will feel the same.
£259/£299 is a lot of money. And for what is very much a first edition, I genuinely think most everyday Apple users will probably be better off waiting and seeing how Apple continues to develop the Watch.
Unless you are specifically in a need of a watch, want something more than just a FitBit device for health and activity monitoring, and really like the idea of having notifications on your wrist, I’d suggest holding off.
It seems almost certain there will be an Apple Watch 2 later this year. It’ll bring together all that Apple has learnt over this last year or so from early adopters using the Watch. It will no doubt fix many of its shortcomings, and—hopefully—add a few more compelling features that would make me truly start recommending it to those around me.
All told, I am excited about the future of the Apple Watch. And though I don’t forsee everyone ever wanting one, I do expect it will become something increasingly useful and desirable to more and more people. It may not be all there yet, but I am optimistic about it’s long-term success.
