Pebble today announced its latest smartwatch with a color e-paper display — the Pebble Time. The watch has been redesigned from the ground up and is 20% thinner than the original Pebble with a waist size of 9.5mm.
To aid ergonomics, the watch is slightly curved so that it can fit easily on your wrist. Unlike the original Pebble, which sports a black and white e-paper display, the Pebble Time sports a “revolutionary new” color e-paper display with excellent outdoor visibility and “always-on timekeeping.” Thanks to low power nature of the display, the Pebble Time provides a battery life of up to 7 days. It is protected by Gorilla Glass with the front being made of stainless steel. The watch is water resistance and can survive your swimming sessions with ease. The watch also comes with a microphone that will allow you to send voice replies to your notifications or compose new ones. While Android users will be able to use voice notifications across all the popular apps like Hangouts, Gmail, Facebook Messenger and more, iOS users will only be able to use voice replies for Gmail notifications.
The 22mm soft silicone band of Pebble Time comes in a variety of colors and with a quick-release mechanism that will allow you to easily switch bands in under 10 seconds. Additionally, Pebble is also publishing the 3D data that will allow advanced users to create their own straps, covers and docks for the watch. There is also a smart accessory port on the Pebble Watch that can be used by developers to create sensors and smart straps.
The watch comes with a new version of Pebble operating system that chronologically displays your notifications. The hardware keys on the watch can be be used to view your past notifications, your current notifications and any upcoming events. The OS is compatible with all the 6,500+ existing Pebble apps and watch faces. The company is also working with The Weather Channel, ESPN, Evernote, Endomondo and others to build new experiences for its watch.
The new OS will work on the original Pebble as well, though a release date is yet to be decided. It is open source in nature and features many new APIs for developers to take advantage of. Pebble Time will be available in May 2015 in three colors, which are as follows:
Black watch case and silicone band with black PVD stainless steel bezel White watch case and silicone band with silver PVD stainless steel bezel Red watch case and silicone band with black PVD stainless steel bezel
Pebble Watch is compatible with all Android devices running Ice Cream Sandwich or higher, including the ones from Xiaomi and other Chinese OEMs. The watch retail price of the watch will be $199, but you can grab it for a slightly lower price by backing Pebble’s Kickstarter project. Make sure to hurry up as the project has already received more than $1.5 million in funding in less than an hour of going live.
