OK Apple, can we now have always on?

[Night Spring]

I think the Apple Watch is quite bland looking when the screen is off.

Would you prefer an always on display like the OP's idea if the battery easily lasted a day?

I'm torn about this. I actually quite like the blank display -- I think it looks rather simple and elegant -- and as at least one other poster mentioned, the glow from the LCD can be distracting if it is on when you don't particularly want to know the time. So if Apple does implement always on, I'd want it to be dim enough to be not distracting, and have it be optional, so those of us who like the blank dark screen can have that if we want.

 

[OllyW]

I'm torn about this. I actually quite like the blank display -- I think it looks rather simple and elegant -- and as at least one other poster mentioned, the glow from the LCD can be distracting if it is on when you don't particularly want to know the time. So if Apple does implement always on, I'd want it to be dim enough to be not distracting, and have it be optional, so those of us who like the blank dark screen can have that if we want.

I'm pretty confident Apple won't make a bad job of it.

 

[lordofthereef]

I have to imagine Apple has tested the feature and have ultimately decided against it for whatever reason.

I'd actually love a feature like this. Something like a simple analog time (or something like that). In unfamiliar how other watches treat raising your wrist that also have always in display. Is the info displayed different in any way?

The way I imagine it is something very simple on the screen always in and the information updating when you raise the Wrist to see the Watch. It's not something in begging for but I could see it improving the overall look of the device.

 

[anthonymoody]

Keep in mind that Battery issues are only one of the things Apple has to keep in mind.
OLED displays also loose brightness with use and can have burn-in problems.

Samsung moves the image around on their phones to reduce the impact, but the phone also has a larger display with ALOT more pixels to work with. (1440 x 2560 = 3'686'400 versus the 312×390 = 121'680 on the apple watch)


And samsung expects the always-on feature to use ~10% battery per day. (at least that's what i read about the S7) But the s7 phone has a 3000 mAh battery.

Talking about the Android watches though. I had one for months, the Huawei watch. The always on feature - an option - worked great. Keeps the clock itself dim but readable. I tested battery with and without it and at the end of a day the difference in remaining battery was small enough (1-2%) that I couldn't necessarily ascribe the difference to the face being always on. IOW, no real impact on battery life.

 

[BarracksSi]

There was a company that claimed to be working on an analog watch which had a smart display built into its crystal. It was supposed to behave like a traditional three-hand watch and only used smart features when you wanted them. I think it was going to be a mechanical watch, too.

I'm more convinced it was a ruse to get hopeful-yet-technologically-ignorant customers to give up their cash, though.