Apple Watch Sales Falling Continuously Amid Lack of New Models

[fhall1]

Apple needs to re-evaluate it's battery life philosophy on watches and iPads. In the before times a Mac laptop battery lasted 6 or 7 hours and the iPad at 10 hours seemed amazing - get through a workday without looking for a power plug. Now the laptops last 18+ hours and the iPad is still 10. They should at least be close to what the laptops give, if not more. Same with the watch - 18 hours after all these years is pathetic. I'm not getting one of those expensive watches until I can get through a weekend without having to charge it...my Pebble Kickstarter edition did that (and more) 10 years ago (or whenever they came out of Kickstarter).

 

[dampfnudel]

Maybe next year the AW Series 12 should introduce a round design to increase sales?

 

[Abazigal]

Well it is poor by smartwatch standards. My old-model Garmin gets 11 days plus - meaning that I don’t have to think about charging it the night before a run. I also don’t see how sleep tracking can become a nightly thing if you need to charge your Apple Watch while you’re sleeping. Unless you factor in a half-dead watch every morning.

I wake up at 5 am and leave for work by 6 am. The battery life on my series 10 has been pretty good and is around 60%. Switching on the charger brings it back up to 100% in around half an hour while I wash up and shower.

I can see myself wearing the watch all day, then looking for an hour a day to charge it. Finding small pockets of time during the day to charge a device with all-day battery life is not exactly the Herculean task.

 

[Someyoungguy]

I had a series 2 and a series 4. I gave both away.

To come back I need to see 4+ days’ battery life; or, a super cheap SE that doesn’t sacrifice EKG. Until then, I’m sticking with my Garmin (4 days of battery, NFC payments, GPS workouts, Music).

 

[Someyoungguy]

I wake up at 5 am and leave for work by 6 am. The battery life on my series 10 has been pretty good and is around 60%. Switching on the charger brings it back up to 100% in around half an hour while I wash up and shower.

I can see myself wearing the watch all day, then looking for an hour a day to charge it. Finding small pockets of time during the day to charge a device with all-day battery life is not exactly the Herculean task.

Not Herculean, but also not desirable.

 

[TracesOfArsenic]

Someone gave me a series 8 and I want to like it but I just... can't get into it. Never been a watch person. I also just don't love the design. Aside from making the screen bigger, it's more or less looked the same since release. And yes, I understand I'm not the target audience for it.

I am a watch person but I wouldn't wear an AW (not even for free) in its current form over my current analogue watch. It's still too cookie cutter for my liking and I just don't think it'll ever get where I want it to be, like a traditional timepiece. I also prefer to distance myself from technology, notifications, distractions etc so another smart device strapped to me goes against that.

 

[J InTech82]

Apple is going to have to add new health features like BP monitoring if they hope to spur sales. Some of these are difficult to do well, but it's hard to understand why they haven't at least brought back oxygen measurements by coming to an agreement with Masimo.

They’ll probably add the oxygen measurements in the next big watchOS update, calling it a new feature! Honestly tho, they’re probably just fine tuning it and will release it in the next big update stating that it’s back and better than before.

 

[Chungry]

I wake up at 5 am and leave for work by 6 am. The battery life on my series 10 has been pretty good and is around 60%. Switching on the charger brings it back up to 100% in around half an hour while I wash up and shower.

I can see myself wearing the watch all day, then looking for an hour a day to charge it. Finding small pockets of time during the day to charge a device with all-day battery life is not exactly the Herculean task.

I think it's sad Apple doesn't have a watch tailored to/ aimed at serious athletes, I wish they would make one. If all you want to do is track steps, close rings, and get notifications you're good.

 

[Howard2k]

Finding small pockets of time during the day to charge a device with all-day battery life is not exactly the Herculean task.

Agreed. I charge it while showering or doing the dishes and never have any issues. I wear it probably 23.5/7.

 

[Truckondo]

I went from a Series 2 to a Series 7. At that rate, I’ll upgrade when the 12 is out. It will probably still lack the rumored blood glucose monitor.

 

[segfaultdotorg]

SAD! Update the iWatch already, Tim Apple!

 

[Fzang]

I originally bought it for Maps and notifications, which I thought would be core competences of the watch.

The notifications sometimes don't show previews, and eventually crash if there are too many in a row.

Maps is now only dark mode, I'm guessing for battery reasons, which makes it more or less unreadable on bike. It's also slow to reroute and pick up on directions any more complicated than "turn left in 500 meters".

I'm really disappointed. I thought we had come further, but I guess the 7-9 other previous iterations were just to add pointless niche features to push sales.

 

[Octavius8]

My series 6 is basically the same as a 10. No longer battery life, no killer app, apps that half work, like the search or the walkietalkie, and useless for opening door and NFC accesses. Truly that same device and same capabilities since 5 years ago!. The price should be lower every year based on that.

 

[Dorfdad]

It’s not failing because of needing new models it’s failing because it’s very limited what it can do currently. I’m a diabetic and have been waiting forever now for a real glucose monitor built in. The screens to small to most anything it can’t even play music with another device added. It needs a better battery as well

 

[WilliApple]

They do, the Ultra.

too expensive

 

[groove-agent]

I have recently switched to a Garmin smart watch and I’m having difficulties wanting to go back to the Apple Watch. While the Apple Watch has fantastic integration with the Apple ecosystem, the Garmin does health tracking and wellness metrics so much better than the Apple Watch does the Garmin can track so many more useful things such as stress, body battery and sleep and explains it to you in Laymans terms. With the Apple Watch, these are all additional add-on apps to do the same thing that costs you additional subscription fees. I’m sure the Apple Watch will get caught up to the Garmin in time, but for now I’m keeping my Garmin.

 

[bruinsrme]

My wife had a series 3, 5, 8 and now 10.
After the first day of wearing the 10 she was mist impressed with the readability of the screen.

 

[AndiG]

I‘m still on my AW6. It has LTE, always on, heart monitoring. There is absolutely no reason to upgrade it,\. I thought about a titanium version with a leather band, since I‘d like to see some more grown up version and design of the watch - but I decided against it, it is boring and my AW6 works and is still in good shape.
Ordered an original Apple wristband made out of real cow leather (in sale of some shop) to avoid all those toxic plastic stuff and it is good go for some more years.

I’d like to see a tic-toc release cycle for the AW switching between a more edgy, flat design (more like the ultra) and the round design.

 

[Sundaypapers123]

I wake up at 5 am and leave for work by 6 am. The battery life on my series 10 has been pretty good and is around 60%. Switching on the charger brings it back up to 100% in around half an hour while I wash up and shower.

I can see myself wearing the watch all day, then looking for an hour a day to charge it. Finding small pockets of time during the day to charge a device with all-day battery life is not exactly the Herculean task.

Sounds like a lot of battery management.

 

[brgjoe]

I am still using my series 5 AW. Bought it on sale at Walmart when the AW6 came out. Still wearing it and has over 80% battery life still left. Does everything I need it to do. I like that I can just pay at registers with NFC capability by using my Apple Watch.

Probably won't replace it unless it dies or feature useful to me gets added (like reliable blood pressure readings).

 

[mpuk]

I wear an Amazfit Band 7 that gets 2 weeks from a single charge.
It's marketed as a fitness tracker but is closer to a smartwatch. Good sync to iPhone and supports Apple Health.
It does heartrate, SpO2, sleep tracking, and a full stack of features.
It's a touchscreen, no moving parts, it's rated 5 ATM for water-resistance.
You'd be shocked at what you get for the money compared to Apple.
It's 50€.

 

[The-Real-Deal82]

I currently wear a Series 10 which I bought in September and have been wearing an Apple watch since 2016, almost daily. I am starting to wear my mechanical watches again and getting the watch bug back, so at some point I can see myself ditching the AW tbh. My wife is currently in the process of selling her Series 10 due to some joint pain that her consultant said may be enhanced by her watch, although its unknown and the pain is due to an injury initially. She stopped wearing it a couple of months ago and gone back to wearing her mechanical again and loves the lack of connection again to her phone. I think that is becoming a trend now too as more people are realising we are too reliant on our smartphones and lots of health initiatives promote reducing screen time.

Another thing I notice is people generally keep their Apple Watches for 4-5 years between upgrades, so it is unsurprising sales aren't as frequent as iPhones for example. I kept my Series 2 for 3 years, Series 5 for 5 years and if I continue wearing my Series 10, I'll keep it for as long as possible. So many of the people I know are wearing Series 6, 7 and 8's.

 

[Grayburn]

the oxygen sensor works which is something you can’t say with any new model unfortunately.

You can, it works in every watch its on that's sold outside of the US.

 

[Cunir]

They could try introducing a completely new shape, i wouldn't mind having a round one. I've got a garmin and you can still read plenty of text on it

 

[Abazigal]

I think it's sad Apple doesn't have a watch tailored to/ aimed at serious athletes, I wish they would make one. If all you want to do is track steps, close rings, and get notifications you're good.

Yeah, I don’t really need the health tracking all that much. I use my watch mainly for notifications, Apple Pay, apps like 1password and Authy, music controls and little conveniences like unlocking my Mac (and my phone, back when I wore masks during the pandemic period).

I like that it’s like an extension of my phone. Like paying with your phone feels cumbersome compared to simply lifting your wrist, and I no longer need to fish for my phone for 2FA codes.