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The furor if the old bands don't fit this watch will be spectacle worth witnessing!

It would indeed be worth watching.

I'm still pretty happy with my series 4. The battery health is still at 90% almost 3 years after I bought it, and since I got a decent case for it, it hasn't a scratch.

I can't really see any compelling reason to upgrade from a 4 to the rumors about the 7.
 
I think existing bands will fit but if not then yep some people have bought abd collected dozens of bands since 2015. However in the same context, you could argue that we have to replace our phone cases when we replace our phones so……
There aren’t as many $100/$200/$300/and up, phone cases out there.

Plus— if the bands are only compatible with the new watches— they cut out a HUGE portion of the market RE: aftermarket band sales. If only AW7 owners can buy new bands, then their band sales numbers would tank. I’m sure it’s not a huge revenue line for them, but they are a high profit margin item, that they historically have been able to sell in decent volume.
Aftermarket watchband sellers would be tickled pink if people needed new bands for the 45mm. That’s a whole new market for them.

Watchbands are a huge revenue opportunity for everyone producing them. If Apple wasn’t making money on them then they wouldn’t be investing as much time and money on them as they have been. Heck I bet even the cheap Chinese knockoffs are bringing in some serious coinage.
 
Hopeful the S7 casing is compatible with existing/old bands, and that the design lasts 3 series like the last two case designs. That would mean complete band compatibility through series 9, at least.

I have an SE, and likely won’t upgrade until S8 or 9, and keep that unit for another three years. Soooo— hopefully my bands remain useful for at least 5-6 years, and beyond. Perhaps a 2024 SE model would still use the S7 chassis for cost savings, etc, and extend that compatibility timeframe even more!
 
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I’m not sure what size I should get. If it was a traditional watch, I go no larger than 38mm, but as these devices hold a completely different use case with rich densely packed information, the larger size seems more useful.
but I guess we have to wait and see them in person on try them on to decide which size is best for each of us.
 
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"since the device's size name refers to the size of the display rather than the size of the casing"

Surely this is incorrect. The 44mm Apple Watch is 44mm x 38mmcase with a 45.2mm screen. The 40mm Watch is 40mm x 34mm case with a 39mm screen. The device name has always been the case size on the apple watch - odd error to make but I've seen it repeated on a few sites now.
 
It would indeed be worth watching.

I'm still pretty happy with my series 4. The battery health is still at 90% almost 3 years after I bought it, and since I got a decent case for it, it hasn't a scratch.

I can't really see any compelling reason to upgrade from a 4 to the rumors about the 7.

Apple Watches are already function over form, and they look pretty bad but are very convenient. An Apple Watch in case must be ugly as sin.
 
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They should just classify the bands as small/large or something like that although I think at one time bands were also sized that way for length. But the different numbers are getting harder to remember.
 
Why not just call the bands small/large, or wide/narrow. Changing the specific mm measure every few year is just confusing if the bands are still forward and backwards compatible.
 
So the smallest Apple Watch will now be closer in size to the first biggest Apple Watch.
I was wondering just that, it's interesting. I'll be upgrading from a S1 this year (yes, finally), so I was thinking maybe the small watch might be better for me this time. I'm pretty fine with the screen size I have now. It'll be worth checking out both before I actually order either one.
 
Considering this new design will last at least for 3 models, and given that some leakers said old bands will be compatible, this means that band compatibility will last from April 2015 to August 2024 at least (possibly even more).

9 years.

I remember back in 2015 some people were concerned that then-current bands would become useless pretty quickly because of broken compatibility with subsequent models, and that Apple would even leverage this to force user to buy new bands.

Such a solid “band ecosystem” is one of the “X factors” that makes the Apple Watch leaps better than other attempts at wrist gizmos.
 
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This report that we are commenting on refers to display size and not case size. It only says that the case has increased in thickness and not length and width. It refers to slimmer bezels and making the case flat thereby increasing the display area
The report is about the case size being 41/45mm and MacRumors keeps calling it screen size, the mm measurement on an Apple Watch measures the case length not the screen. The 40mm watch is physically bigger than the 38mm. A 41mm watch will be 1mm (give or take rounding) longer in length than the 40mm watch.
 
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In terms of screen size yes but not in terms of case size omitting thickness otherwise the existing bands wouldn’t fit
No... The size of an Apple Watch is the vertical height of the case, not the screen. So the smallest case for Series 7 (40mm) is closer in size to the largest case for Series 0/1 (42mm).

The bands don't really have anything to do with the model's "size" (vertical height). It's the width that matters. Just as an example, they could develop a 70mm & 80mm Apple Watch, but still keep the widths the same so that existing bands will fit. (Obviously a watch like this wouldn't exist; it's just to show that the bands depend the width of the case, not the model's "size".) This is how all the bands we have today are still compatible. Even though the sizes (heights) have changed in the past, the widths of the case have mostly remained the same.
 
I hope apple brings back the stainless steel space black seeing as we will see matte black on the new iphones
 
I see zero reason to upgrade this year. I get tremendous battery life with my series 6, I have a ton of bands I can use with it, and watch OS8 is literally a nothing upgrade. The design will probably look cool but I’m just not feeling the upgrade this year unless some crazy feature is announced.
 
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