Along with the Galaxy Note 9 announcement, Samsung also revealed its latest smartwatch: the Galaxy Watch. It looks like a hybrid between the fitness focused Gear Sport and rugged Gear S3 smartwatches. It has the rotating bezel of the Gear S3, but the sleeker look of the Gear Sport ($285). It also comes in LTE models, so it can go completely sans phone.
Unlike Samsung’s previous smartwatches, the Galaxy Watch can charge wirelessly, but it also comes with a few other neat features. It has a much-improved battery that the company claims will last up to four days on a single charge. And it can track up to 40 different activities, including running, swimming, and mountain biking.
What I loved about the Gear Fit2 Pro and Gear Sport smartwatches was that Samsung partnered with Spotify so that you could download playlists to those smartwatches for offline listening — a very rare feature. At the event, Samsung didn’t mention anything about this partnership as it pertains specifically to the Galaxy Watch, but they did announce that Spotify was its official partner across all its devices. I’m not sure, but I’m assuming you’ll be able to download Spotify playlists to the Galaxy Watch, too. (I’ll confirm.)
The Galaxy Watch will be available in two models: a 46mm silver version ($330) and 42mm black and rose gold versions ($350). You can pre-order them on August 10 and they’ll start shipping on August 24.