Everybody these days is making a smart watch. Even if Samsung and Sony are the only major manufacturers out of the gate, many more are finalizing plans to launch one within the year. Now a new report has found that the next smart watch to hit the market may be from Google.
The Wall Street Journal reports that Google’s smart watch is “in late-stage development” and could be available within months. At the moment, Google is in talks with Asian suppliers to build the smart watch. Once that’s wrapped up, we could see Google’s take on the smart watch very soon.
So, what would a Google smart watch look like? It would obviously run Android, but it would be modified to place an emphasis on Google Now. By connecting to a smartphone, the Google smart watch would be able to fetch showtimes, flight times and traffic information, and display all of that information on your wrist.
Aside from software, Google is working to perfect what it reportedly feels is the biggest problem with the current smart watches on the market – battery life. Some devices, like Sony’s SmartWatch, can sometimes require a recharge every day. Google wants to prolong battery life, but it doesn’t say how long of a time period between recharges the company’s engineers are aiming for.
It’s also suggested that Google will work to make its smart watch more useful and cheaper. The former is actually rather important as smart watches have really yet to prove their worth to the mainstream consumer. The Galaxy Gear is definitely more useful than Sony’s SmartWatch, but it being restricted to Samsung devices limits its usefulness. It’s reliance on a custom OS that’s not Android also limits the kind of apps that developers can make for it. As for affordability, hopefully Google can come in under the $300 price point set by Samsung for its Galaxy Gear. It’s a little much to ask consumers to pay more than $200 for a smart watch.
[Image: Wikimedia Commons]
