Gadgetory

hey what is going on guys long hair from Android authority and Sonia is certainly no stranger to the SmartWatch game and it was only a matter of time before we saw an Android wear SmartWatch from Sony but with the growing number of Android wear smartwatches how does Sony stack up to the competition well that's what we're here to find out with the Sony SmartWatch 3 with the design of the SmartWatch 3 Sony has chosen to go a different route from other OEMs it's a square face so it's not trying to imitate the look of a real watch or be elegant or classy so it's certainly not the type of watch you'd want to wear to a fancy dinner or night on the town instead the design of the SmartWatch 3 has more of a fitness look and feel to it so it's being aimed more at an active audience the wrist straps are made out of silicone and there's an adjustable metal clasp making it very easy and quick to put on the metal clasp is a nice touch and the silicone band feels very soft and comfortable on the wrist but like many products made out of silicone is a dust and lint magnet making it very difficult to keep clean the face or body of the watch is what Sony likes to call the core so it's a similar implementation to the smartband Sony released earlier this year it's removable but there's not a whole lot of reason why you'd want to take it out unless you were swapping wrist straps this also means you're not going to be able to use any watch straps of your choice and instead you'll be limited to what Sony has to offer but as of right now black is the only color available on the Google Play Store the SmartWatch 3 features a rating of ip68 so it's resistant to water and dust just like any other Android wear watch but unlike other Android wear watches this is the first one we've seen so far that doesn't feature a heartrate monitor which is a very odd omission as far as the size goes I personally don't think it's all that big it's very similar in size to something like the Moto 360 but obviously size is a very subjective thing so depending on the size of watches that you currently wear right now that is going to influence whether you think the SmartWatch 3 is a big or a small watch the display only Sony SmartWatch 3 if you couldn't already tell is a square and it's a 1.6 inch trench selective LCD display with 320 by 320 resolution putting it on par with the competition but the quality of the display doesn't quite stack up it's bright and has great viewing angles but colors look washed out and there's a yellowish tint to the display it's mostly noticeable when you're looking at anything with a white background but considering that Android wear has a lot of white elements you're pretty much going to notice it right away the bezels on the display are also pretty thick but that's to be expected right now with any Smart Watch featuring a square screen the SmartWatch 3 features a 1.2 gigahertz quad-core processor and 512 megabytes of RAM which is really more than enough power for what our smartwatches are capable of right now so there's not much to say about these SmartWatch 3s performance except that it's very fast and responsive it runs Android wear about as well as any other wear watch so you're not going to encounter any lag stutters or drop frames leaving you with a very smooth and enjoyable experience with the latest Android wear update Google brought GPS functionality and offline music storage and the SmartWatch 3 is the first Android wear watch that has the hardware to take advantage of both of these features Sony built this watch for fitness and what they built in GPS you can track you're walking or running independently of your phone meaning you don't have to love your phone around with you in order for it to work because everyone knows how much of a pain it is to have your phone with you when you're working out right now Google's own my track app is the only app that supports it but this will most likely change in the coming weeks and months as developers update their apps the same story goes for music so you can now store music directly onto the watch's four gigabytes of internal memory for offline listening but as of right now the only app that currently takes advantage of it is Google Play Music so if you're not a play music subscriber you're basically Sol and these songs are transferred to the watch via bluetooth and since watches don't have 3.5 millimeter headset jacks you'll need a Bluetooth headset to listen to them so essentially if you don't have a play music subscription or a Bluetooth headset you won't be able to take advantage of this feature but if you meet both of these requirements then you are good to go Sony's life log app has also been updated to support the SmartWatch 3 and if you're not familiar with the life log app it's an app that not only keeps track of your exercise but also other daily activities like sleeping playing games watching TV and browsing the web anytime you've hit any of your daily goals your notifications will appear on the watch the rest of the Android wear experience is practically the same mostly because Google doesn't allow OMS to modify the experience outside of the watch faces and Sony has added a few watch faces but they're all pretty bland looking and don't feature any additional functionality outside of telling the time with the 420 milliamp hour battery the SmartWatch 3 has a larger capacity battery than most other Android wear smartwatches right now so you would think the battery life would be slightly better but it's really just average hours getting anywhere between two to two and a half days worth of battery life depending on if I had always screen on turned on or off but this is with rather normal usage if you plan on using the GPS a lot for tracking your walking or running the battery drains extremely quick and I was losing roughly 20% within an hour's time so depending on how many hours you use the GPS a day you may or may not even make it through a full day the good thing about the SmartWatch 3 is that it doesn't use a proprietary charger so there's no wireless charger there's no cradle and there's no dock it's just good old-fashioned microUSB the one that Sony provides is kind of short so you'll most likely want to use a different one it's not the most elegant or nicest way of charging a SmartWatch and plugging in the microUSB cable into the back of the watch is kind of a chore the good thing is you can charge this watch a lot easier because microUSB cables are a dime a dozen and in more places like in your car for example so while the microUSB might seem very pedestrian not having to carry around a specific charger is a definite benefit the Sony SmartWatch 3 is priced at to $49.99 on the Google Play Store making it one of the more expensive Android wear watches on the market and putting it at the same price point as the Moto 360 it's certainly not as classy but it wasn't designed to be so whether the $250 price tag it's worth it will depend on how important having the built-in GPS is to you and how much you plan on using this watch for fitness because that's the only thing differentiating this watch from the competition and there you have it for the Sony SmartWatch 3 with Sony's entry into Android wear there are now plenty of choices to pick from and depending on what you're looking for in a SmartWatch that will determine which one is right for you if you're looking for the best fitness centric Android wear watch the Sony SmartWatch 3 is the one to get but the $250 price tag might be tough to swallow especially when you take a look at the watch as a whole as always guys thank you so much for watching this review if you enjoyed it please give it a thumbs up down below and also subscribe his channel which is also down below and don't forget to check out our website you already know what it is and Road Authority calm because we are your source for all things Android