Sony’s been offering smartwatches for a few years… which is why the latest model is called the Sony Smartwatch 3.
But the new model is the company’s first to feature Android Wear software. It’s also the first Android Wear smartwatch with built-in GPS, allowing you to use Google’s new location tracking features even when you don’t have a phone around.
Verizon Wireless is now taking pre-orders for the Sony Smartwatch 3 for $250.
It should be available from the Google Play Store soon as well.
The watch has a 1.6 inch, 320 x 320 pixel transflective LCD display which Sony says is sunlight readable.
It has a 1.2 GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 quad-core processor, 512MB of RAM, 4GB of storage, WiFi, Bluetooth, and NFC as well as an ambient light sensor, motion sensor, and an IP68 water and dust-resistant case.
The Sony Smartwatch 3 has a black silicone wristband and charges via a microUSB cable. It may not have some of the fancy features you get with rival watches such as a round display or wireless charging. But the support for GPS running apps could help set this model apart from the competition.
It also features support for third-party Android apps for mapping, travel, notifications, and more. And with the latest Android Wear update, you can pair the watch with a set of Bluetooth headphones and listen to music on the go even when you leave your phone at home.
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Ooh transflective display! I’m excited because this could potentially mean the display stays on all the time with pretty much no power draw but I’ll have to wait for reviews before I do anything. My old Nokia N900 had a transflective display so should have been great in sunlight but instead it decided it wanted to fight the sun and went to maximum brightness, draining the battery in a couple of hours… Silly software.
Transreflective display, water resistance, and GPS all sound great. Will be interested to see reviews. Probably won’t turn many heads though and apparently can’t take alternative bands – unless the watch body actually pops out of the back of the band and can go into a casing with that option. Some of Sony’s wearables are designed like that.
The extra features over most current Android Wear watches are nice and it doesn’t seem to have the higher pricing Sony devices often come with to cover those extra features.