the introduction
On Friday, Oppo announced that it will be releasing its watch to global markets. The Oppo Watch (even sounds like “Apple Watch” as well as being very close to its design) is China’s first Wear OS smartwatch. The Chinese version runs on a modified version of Android 8.1, but the universal variant has some key differences.
The first is the inclusion of the Snapdragon 3100 Wear platform, which is about two years old at this point, but is the fastest available wearable chip from Qualcomm. In contrast, the Chinese version of the watch runs on the Snapdragon 2500 Wear. Both versions also have the secondary Ambiq Micro Apollo 3 chipset. that runs a second low-power operating system.
Oppo Watch Specifications (Global):
Even the watch's packaging is familiar to anyone who's opened an Apple Watch case. The watch comes with a magnetic pin charger, which can recharge the 46mm figure up to over 40% in 15 minutes, and a 75-minute charge brings the watch to a full battery. There's also a ring Additional watch strap.
Design and display
This model's 46mm screen is larger than the larger Apple Watch in the Series 5. That, and the fact that it offers a square screen is a big change from the primarily round smartwatches we've seen on most Wear OS smartwatches in the past few years.
The display curves gently over the edges, benefiting Wear OS gestures you swipe. We love how the bezel and back panel look like a miniature sandwich glass phone. Even the watch's back panel has tapered edges.
The frame is made of 6000 series aluminum, while the back is made of plastic, the dome where the heart rate monitor is made of ceramic on the 46mm model, and the 41mm version is all-plastic at the back.
There are two buttons on the right side of the case – one is the home/app drawer button, and the bottom button (the button with green accent) is a programmable hotkey. It also doubles as a power menu when pressed and held. A speaker port is found on the left side From the watch case, also in a similar fashion to the Apple Watch. The microphone is back to the right side between both physical switches.
The strap is made of a material that Oppo calls “fluororobber.” Honestly, its surface looks like a silicone strap, but it has a more solid construction. The band feels comfortable and soft on my wrist. This watch uses special watch straps, so the choice will be very limited compared to other Wear OS watches. .
The AMOLED display looks beautiful on the Oppo Watch. This is a flexible 1.91-inch AMOLED 3D display with a screen-to-body ratio of 72.8%, and a pixel density of 326ppi.
software
So is it weird seeing Android Wear in something that looks like an Apple Watch. I wasn't sure how I felt about it at first, but I feel pretty comfortable with it.
Wear OS is somewhat unrecognizable. It still behaves the same way, but the custom app launcher and smooth performance really add to the experience. It has the look and feel of Color OS, with vibrant app icons and bubble animations in the app drawer.
It's also refreshing to see Wear OS in a square shape as well as many of the round ones we've seen in the past several years. A square watch lets you see more on screen contents, and it looks very different from regular use of the Skagen Falster 3 and TicWatch Pro 4G.
The watch uses the Hey Tap Health companion app from Oppo. It syncs your steps, heart rate, workouts, sleep information, and daily activity with your phone. This is also the go-to app for managing watch faces with photos from your gallery, and quickly creating a watch face to fit your outfit.
The app is also used to push notifications to the watch when it's in power saving mode. This is the secondary OS the watch uses to go longer on a charge. It can keep track of your heart rate and steps and send you notifications, like a primary fitness tracker.
In this mode, the battery is supposed to be up to 21 days. When running full Wear OS, the battery life is only 36 hours, so this would be a charging type smartwatch every day.
The 46mm watch can get a 46% battery charge in just 15 minutes on a charger. The watch can charge up to 5V @ 1.5A or 7.5W with a full charge expected in 75 minutes. We haven't seen yet how the battery life and charging behave in real life. .
First impressions
The Oppo watch got me excited about Wear OS. It kind of proves that Wear OS in its purest form isn't enough to compete with other watch platforms. With enough attention to detail in software and additional app to integrate with health and other features, it might be enough to gain market share in Wear OS devices.
Viewing and responding to notifications on Wear OS is great, and using the Oppo Watch is fun so far. It will have some shortcomings like battery life and average vibration, but it's the start of Oppo's journey in wearables and a new page for Wear OS going forward. Still Wear OS needs to work from Google, and Qualcomm also needs to build a more efficient chipset for smartwatches.
Overall, the Oppo watch shows a bright future for Wear OS. We hope to see more OEMs trying to improve the experience of using the current Wear OS. Some OEMs have done a great job improving the software and the smoothness of the OS already. Google continues to tease Thumbs up when you think about the future of Wear OS, which hasn't seen a major update since 2018. We wonder if that will change soon.