Google is reported to be working on a new smartwatch under the Pixel brand that may be launched this year itself. At the recently concluded Google I/O 2018 developers conference, the tech giant announced that it will be bringing some changes to its Wear OS operating system for smartphones. The company also released enhanced Google Assistant integration to Wear OS powered smartwatches last week.
In March this year, Google rebranded it’s Android Wear operating system that was introduced in 2014 to Wear OS. This was reportedly done because the company rolled out iPhone compatibility for its smartwatches in January this year. When Android Wear was introduced, it only supported Android smartphones to sync with its smartwatches. Now with iOS compatibility, the term Android Wear seemed to be inappropriate.
Now a Pixel branded smartwatch running on Wear OS may help Google to slowly capture the wearables market as well. Popular leaker Evan Blass has claimed that alongside the Google Pixel 3, Pixel 3 XL and the next generation Pixel Buds, the tech giant may introduce a Pixel branded smartwatch as well. It is likely to be announced at the annual hardware event of Google held in October every year.
As per another report by WinFuture has also supported the above-mentioned claim and has also stated that Google may introduce three models of the Pixel branded smartwatch. The three models have reportedly been named ‘Ling’ ‘Sardine’ and ‘Triton’. However, there is no information about the design of the three models and how they are different from each other.
But the report did mention some of the specifications of the rumored smartwatch like Bluetooth with apt-X, GPS, VoLTE support. It also includes additional features like heart rate monitor and step tracking.
The WinFuture report has also shared more details about Qualcomm’s new wearable processor that is set to launch sometime in this year. The new SoC will apparently launch as Snapdragon Wear 3100 that will focus on battery savings. However, it may come with the same 20nm processor that was used on the Snapdragon Wear 2100 launched in 2016. The quad-core SoC is also expected to be powered by ARM Cortex A7 and Adreno 304 GPU.