Back To The Future

Earlier this year, when Google announced three watches based on their new Android Wear platform, the Moto 360 took the smart watch world (however large) by storm with its innovative round design. Everyone immediately appreciated how cool it would be to have a full-featured smart watch that appears to be a traditional, round-dialed watch.

Unfortunately, the Moto 360 wasn’t made immediately available like the other two announcements, the LG G Watch and Samsung Gear Live (both available now). The latter two watches look almost identical and use the same chunky square design you see in all other leading smart watches today including the Pebble, Samsung Gear 2 and the Sony Smart watch 2.

Design: Round is the New Black

Based on the unlisted teaser video below, the new G Watch R appears to be a direct clone of the Moto 360. It’s sleek, very cool looking and now has a button on the side, which the original does not.

The new circular display is a welcome upgrade from the squared-off, uncomfortable and overly simple G Watch.

You can swap-out straps, too. The G Watch R uses a standard 22mm leather band which can be easily replaced by standard bands to suit your style.

Apps

Here’s the teaser video released by LG this week, which will give you a feel for the look and feel of the apps. Very nice, we have to say.

The G Watch R runs Android Wear, which means it has access to a huge army of developers. Over 100 Android Wear apps are now available on the Android app store.

The new G Watch R comes with a beautiful set of round watch faces.

Fitness buffs should be happy, too – the new device includes a strong set of health monitoring features including a heart sensor and a very nice pedometer function (see image).

Specifications

The G Watch R runs Google’s Android Wear platform. Its hardware specifications are almost identical to its sibling, the G Watch. These include:

1.3-inch P-OLED with 320×320 pixels resolution

1.2GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 chip

512MB of RAM

412mAh battery good for 1-2 days of use

4GB of internal storage

IP67 dust and water resistance

stainless steel body

9-Axis Gyro/Accelerometer/Compass sensor

barometer

PPG heart-rate sensor

While the short battery life remains a big concern, many will overlook this to get their hands on one of the first truly stylish Android Wear watches. The Moto 360 is the only other choice if you want a round design.

Hands-On Review

Here is a 4-minute video walkthrough of the new G Watch R, taken at IFA 2014 in Berlin by Mobilegeeks.de.





Availability

The LG G Watch R will be available ‘in the fourth quarter”, whereas the Moto 360 is available for sale now.

Given the short timespan separating the release of the original G and the new G Watch R, it is clear that LG was working on both watches all along. Apparently, they understood the appeal of a round design but decided to introduce a simpler G Watch to appease immediate demand and to get into the game.

The second half of 2014 will be a really exciting time for smart watches. Next week, at IFA Berlin 2014, the smart watch market will be kicking into high gear with the expected formal announcements of at least 5 new wearable devices, including: