Hope everyone's doing great! Sorry, but it's another long one. You'll need a cuppa!
It's been a while since I last shared anything here. Recently I ordered a Galaxy Watch4 (LTE) version, and had it arrive yesterday (even though it comes out next week!) Thought I'd share some first impressions
As you probably know, the Watch4 runs WearOS 3 instead of Tizen. And so far, I'm loving the revamped WearOS so far. It's defo more responsive than I remember WearOS 2 being. I'm also loving the integration with the Play Store, as I can download apps and search for Watch Apps at the same time. We're no longer limited to the Galaxy Store! Additionally, for those people who use Google Pay, you should be able to download this on your Watch4!
Other things I love about the watch include the new BIA sensor, which was pretty epic to try (although the result told me I had too much skeletal bone, so I'm consulting with my GP to work out how many limbs need amputating!) Back to the love, I also love how responsive the watch is when I tilt my wrist to turn the screen on. Especially when playing my music with the media controls on display.
However, every product has it's downsides, and there's a couple of things that I had access to on my Watch Active2 that I'm missing on the Watch4.
The first thing I'm missing is the Auto Bedtime Mode - my Watch Active2 used to be pretty on-point with detecting when I was asleep and enabling bedtime mode. Scheduling bedtime mode on the Watch4 is an option, but that doesn't really work for me as I go to sleep at different times each night - I much preferred the way the Watch Active2 handled Bedtime Mode.
The second thing I miss is the animations that used to appear after charging - the jumpy smiley face and star. Now, this one might be a bit of an odd one, but hear me out! I felt there was something comforting when I'd pull my watch off charge and I'd get a smiley face or a jumpy star. It gave the watch personality.
I'm guessing Samsung's team could possibly bring in the above features, so I really hope this feedback reaches the software team. Because, despite these couple of bits that I miss from Tizen, Samsung have done a really great job here, and I really really like my Galaxy Watch4. But those couple of missing bits really do stop me from "loving" the product!
To those thinking about buying a Galaxy Watch4 - if you want a decent all-round Smartwatch that's compatible with Android, there's no better choice than the Galaxy Watch4!😀
(Also, side note, but if you're looking to buy a 4G/LTE version of the watch, I would strongly recommend buying it through your Mobile Provider. I say this because I spent a couple of hours dealing with O2 yesterday trying to get an eSIM set up.)
Best wishes,
