Huawei’s smartwatch for Android, iPhone arrives October

Keen to try the whole smartwatch thing but not sold on the square designs that Apple pushes out? Huawei has a circular smartwatch coming, and the good news is that it’s now compatible with both major smartphone platforms, iOS and Android.

The smartwatch sector of the market is beginning to heat up, and one company has Apple squarely in its sights, as Huawei builds a premium smartwatch meant to take on the likes of Apple’s own Watch, albeit running something with quite a few apps already made for its ecosystem.

It’s called the Huawei Watch, and back when Huawei first showed this off earlier in the year at Mobile World Congress, we said it didn’t have the most imaginative name, an opinion we stand by.

Huawei's silver Watch with the mesh bracelet ($649)
Huawei’s silver Watch with the mesh bracelet ($649)

Fortunately, Huawei doesn’t have to worry so much about the name, getting by on looks that the company says has been “inspired by Swiss timepieces”, incorporating sapphire crystal glass in the design for toughness.

A circle is key to the design — because most Swiss timepieces are circular — and Huawei is relying on a 400×400 1.4 inch circular display for the Watch, with AMOLED technology here to make this look bright and vibrant.

“The Huawei Watch offers a range of smart features in a carefully-crafted timeless design that is sure to impress,” said Howard Chen, Director of Huawei’s Consumer Business Group in Australia.

“Today, consumers are not only looking for a feature packed smartwatch; they’re looking for a fashion statement. The Huawei watch is the first watch on the market to truly bridge the gap between fashion and technology.”

The leather band on the silver Huawei Watch is several kinds of pretty.
The leather band on the silver Huawei Watch is several kinds of pretty.

We haven’t yet been treated to a list of what’s under the hood, but the good money is on a spec list similar to that of the LG G Watch R and Moto 360, suggesting a variant of the Qualcomm Snapdragon 400, half a gigabyte of RAM, and 4GB storage to run Google’s Android Wear, which is the operating system of choice.

And, as a result of going with Android Wear, Huawei not only has access to the apps and watch faces Android Wear works with, but it also will work with Apple’s iPhones out of the box, now that Android Wear exists on iOS.

Huawei is also providing 40 customisable watch faces in the software, making it a little more than just a stock Android Wear watch, with a heart rate monitor, accelerometer, and six-axis motion sensor thrown in for the ride.

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A 300mAh battery is included with the watch, as is the same style of watch band hinge connections used with most watches, so if you don’t like the band, you can change this.

That being said, Huawei has apparently focused on the bands with the Watch, providing quite a few options upon release in October.

As such, you’ll find the silver Huawei Watch fetches $549 with the leather band or $649 with either the mesh strap or the link bracelet, while the black edition of the Watch only arrives with a black link bracelet for $749.

Huawei’s Watch will be available from October 15, however, with most of the major electronics stores getting this from that point.

Prefer black? That'll be $749. Yowza.
Prefer black? That’ll be $749. Yowza.