Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

perezr10

macrumors 68020
Jan 12, 2014
2,014
1,486
Monroe, Louisiana
Apple didn’t really upgrade the Series 5 processor. The S4 and S5 are mostly the same. So in terms of processor generations, the Series 3 is only a couple back.
 

jglavin

macrumors regular
Mar 21, 2006
128
13
I would say 2 years tops.

The series 3 is very, very slow. I wouldn’t buy one at this point. You will get more for your money with a newer model.
I decided to trade up this cycle from a series 3 and it was mostly because of the slower speed and the updating process - with only 8GB onboard storage I had to completely wipe the watch every time I wanted to apply an update. That's not to say it's totally necessary to do every update, but the ownership experience was starting to get annoying. On the other hand, the hardware itself was in perfect shape and I handed it down to my son who still uses and loves it. I've been quite impressed with the duraability and reliability of the apple watch.
 

Jack Neill

macrumors 68020
Sep 13, 2015
2,272
2,308
San Antonio Texas
I decided to trade up this cycle from a series 3 and it was mostly because of the slower speed and the updating process - with only 8GB onboard storage I had to completely wipe the watch every time I wanted to apply an update. That's not to say it's totally necessary to do every update, but the ownership experience was starting to get annoying. On the other hand, the hardware itself was in perfect shape and I handed it down to my son who still uses and loves it. I've been quite impressed with the duraability and reliability of the apple watch.
This really annoying for me too. Why do I have to wipe this thing every update? I still use for S3 on my work phone when I am working from home, so I don't update it very often.
 
  • Like
Reactions: max2

kiranmk2

macrumors 68000
Oct 4, 2008
1,662
2,306
Not certain it will get OS8. Even though Apple always supports 'currently on sale devices' with OS updates they have pulled this trick before and pulled devices mid-year. I believe one of the older iPod Touch models was pulled from sale mid-year and lost iOS support at the next update.

For me the AW3 is missing too many features and faces now - it doesn't even have the handwashing countdown - and combined with the smaller faces and annoying low storage issue at updates means I would always recommend the SE as an entry point. Alternatively you should be able to pick up a 2nd hand S4 for less than the cost of a new S3 wich is what I did.
 
  • Like
Reactions: max2

EugW

macrumors G5
Jun 18, 2017
14,724
12,672
Not certain it will get OS8. Even though Apple always supports 'currently on sale devices' with OS updates they have pulled this trick before and pulled devices mid-year. I believe one of the older iPod Touch models was pulled from sale mid-year and lost iOS support at the next update.

For me the AW3 is missing too many features and faces now - it doesn't even have the handwashing countdown - and combined with the smaller faces and annoying low storage issue at updates means I would always recommend the SE as an entry point. Alternatively you should be able to pick up a 2nd hand S4 for less than the cost of a new S3 wich is what I did.
The iPod touch (5th generation) was released in late 2012, and then was sold until mid 2015 during the era of iOS 8, but its last OS supported is iOS 9, which came out late 2015 with iOS 9.3.5 coming out summer 2016. ie. It lost iOS update support one calendar year after it was discontinued.

I think there is a good chance Watch Series 3 will get discontinued mid-year 2021, but may still get WatchOS 8 in fall 2021, with support into 2022.

Mind you, it is possible that WatchOS 8 will be even slower on Watch Series 3 than WatchOS 7 reportedly is now.
 
  • Like
Reactions: max2

jwolf6589

macrumors 601
Dec 15, 2010
4,917
1,643
Colorado
Not certain it will get OS8. Even though Apple always supports 'currently on sale devices' with OS updates they have pulled this trick before and pulled devices mid-year. I believe one of the older iPod Touch models was pulled from sale mid-year and lost iOS support at the next update.

For me the AW3 is missing too many features and faces now - it doesn't even have the handwashing countdown - and combined with the smaller faces and annoying low storage issue at updates means I would always recommend the SE as an entry point. Alternatively you should be able to pick up a 2nd hand S4 for less than the cost of a new S3 wich is what I did.
I am not complaining about my series 4. Still is fast and has plenty of disk space for apps and whatever.
 
  • Like
Reactions: max2

44267547

Cancelled
Jul 12, 2016
37,642
42,494
Apple didn’t really upgrade the Series 5 processor. The S4 and S5 are mostly the same. So in terms of processor generations, the Series 3 is only a couple back.

when you look at processor upgrades, it’s not for the speed, it’s to support the new health features that are constantly being introduced on an annual basis. I mean, even the Series 2 Apple Watch still performs fine, it just doesn’t receive the latest updates in terms of supporting health features. In general, apples SoC processors have always been decently powerful, well last the lack of support for OS updates.
 

EugW

macrumors G5
Jun 18, 2017
14,724
12,672
when you look at processor upgrades, it’s not for the speed, it’s to support the new health features that are constantly being introduced on an annual basis. I mean, even the Series 2 Apple Watch still performs fine, it just doesn’t receive the latest updates in terms of supporting health features. In general, apples SoC processors have always been decently powerful, well last the lack of support for OS updates.
I was watching a video comparison where they looked at the SE vs. the 3, and it said that while the stock apps usually perform fine on the 3, some third party apps that use up more resources were noticeably sluggish on the 3 in some situations, whereas they remained fast on the SE.

One such example was chirp.

 
  • Like
Reactions: max2

max2

macrumors 603
Original poster
May 31, 2015
6,421
2,044
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.