Gadgetory

they are arguably the two main SmartWatch ecosystems available right now and they do work on pretty much any Android smartphone that you can throw at it so after using them for quite a while I have some thoughts that I want to share with you so it's Josh regard from an authority what's going on everybody and this is Android wear versus the pebble now obviously when it comes to trying to pick between Android wear and the pebble we do have to start with the hardware because you are going to be donning that SmartWatch on your wrist and it has to fit your style luckily in either ecosystems you get a few choices in the pebble ecosystem you have a couple of main ones they are the classic plastic version that came with a silicone band and you can also get the pebble steel which comes with a metal or a leather band there are a lot of new colors available for the classic version so you can also take a look at that as well the special LCD that is used on the pebble allows it very low power consumption but also it is easier to view in daylight after that you have the buttons on the sides which give it a different Navigation feel especially when compared to Android wear but then we shift on over to Android wear which already has a few choices but plenty more or on the way right now we have the LGG watch the more simplistic of the two and the Samsung gear live which takes on the look of Samsung's already established gear ecosystem from there though we have the simple bands especially more simplistic on the LG G watch and then full touch screens with no buttons as you will be navigating using presses and swipes there are a couple of other additions that might be found on various types of Android wear watches one example right now that we have is the Samsung gear life having a heart rate monitor but nonetheless you will be having either the square faces of the ones we have now for example or round faces like will be found on the Moto 360 and like I said already plenty more on the way but that's when we have to get underneath the surface and really find what the differences are between these two ecosystems we'll start off with the pebble which is connected to your phone via the pebble application which then uses bluetooth in order to connect the two the pebble uses the app in order to do all of its work and all of the applications and watch faces that are available for it are found within actually has gotten a lot easier to customize the pebble interface to what you want it to be because of a recent update that brought an official pebble app which then consolidated all of the apps and watch faces into one place it's actually been quite good and from there you can look for apps and watch faces eight of which you can install on your pebble whether it is the original or the pebble steel you can only install eight but luckily that does allow you to really figure out what the essentials are for you and to be able to really see what applications would be most useful to have installed on your watch connecting an Android wear watch to your phone is largely the same procedure you will be able to use the Android wear application in order to not only connect it via bluetooth but also pick the default applications that will be used when you perform certain actions whereas all of the applications in pebble will be installed via that application and are real pieces of software that are put onto their Android wear applications are often companions to already existing applications you may have already installed on your phone a lot of them may range from hangouts from which you can reply to messages or even the Google Play Music application which will allow you to control music and to even other ones like lift which will allow you to a call a cab or rather a ride using your voice but before I get into the differences I do want to say that both of these ecosystems perform their core tasks very well when it comes to showing notifications and thus not needing to take out your phone very often both of these systems work very well the pebble can use the built-in notification system or you can replace it as is available inside of the pebble app store in order for a more customizable experience with your notifications as opposed to Android wear which has cards a very nice attractive way of looking at your notifications especially considering the nice screens that might come with those particular watches and you are able to swipe up and down swipe to the right to dismiss or swipe to the left in order to find even more functions for the particular application who is notification your viewing well with the pebble you do have the buttons that give you a real tactile feel and you can remember what kind of presses are needed in order for you to perform a particular task and that's really nice especially the one you can't be looking at your watch because you have to keep your attention somewhere importance compared that to Android wear in which you pretty much can't do anything without looking at the screen and actually swiping and tapping around until you find exactly what you need to do now that might not seem like a very big deal when it comes to control but to be honest it's really big deal when you consider one particular a situation that I always find points of contention in and that is driving now if smartwatches are supposed to make it so that we don't look at our phones too often well unfortunately with Android wear it's really just taking our attention from one periphery and putting it onto another which is the screen on our wrist so I found plenty of times or when I'm trying to figure out what the next direction is a navigation or trying to change the music track I would have to actually activate my android wear wearable and look at it keeping my eyes off of the road just as badly in my opinion as looking at my phone really the driving example is the best one that I can give you because it's the one that I feel like I have contended with the most and I'm sure a lot of people out there will as well it's really only in those situations that I have to consciously think about which watch would be better dogging on my wrist in order for me to easily control my music or anything else while I'm on the road but there is one thing I will say even if the pebble has a little bit better control because you don't necessarily have to look at the watch in order to perform tasks I will say that the trump card in Android wear is it's voice dictation doing commands and messages using your voice on any Android wearable is still really awesome and is something I do all the time especially when I'm responding to hangouts messages and what you'll probably find is that the pebble app store definitely has a lot more to offer then Android wear does I draw Android wear really tethers on to what applications are already installed on your phone so it may not be as easy to find extra applications for you to install on there meanwhile on the pebble it's all under one roof and there are a lot of offerings available for you to really experiment and find what is the best situation for you so those are just my thoughts on Android wear versus the pebble but I will say that I still think that they are kind of on a level playing field because while one ecosystem might perform better in one situation there's yet another situation that you can use the other form and I do think that that levels things out a little bit because well you can get a lot of functionality from both of these ecosystems as long as you kind of dig deep and try to find exactly what it is that you want out of a SmartWatch but as notification hugs you really can't go wrong with either one it really is a matter of what you want out of a SmartWatch that you need to figure out and truthfully if you really need a SmartWatch at all there are plenty of people out there who tell me that there perfectly fine just taking their phones out and looking at it because it's not that big of a hassle anyway but for the rest of you out there Android where it is really great and I'm sure it's going to grow in the coming months but pebble has already gotten a pretty good head start and it has a lot of merits on its own as well so it's just a matter of what you want out of what you're going to put on your wrist so keep it tuned to Android authority I'm sure we're going to be seeing a lot more from pebble and we're going to definitely see some Android wear wearables coming out in the coming months perhaps an ephah which is only just a few weeks away so keep it tuned for all of that coverage and for even more drop with some likes in our videos because we'd love to see their thumbs up subscribe to our channel if you haven't already and remember that Android Authority comm is your source for all things Android