LG’s Getting Superficial On Us

Mano ten Napel | @Mano10Napel

With last year’s release of the LG Watch R, the LG’s Smartwatch most likely  ended up in the top 5 of the most popular smart watches of 2014. Again, LG Electronics is showing some muscle when it comes to adding some fashion to their wearable tech device assortment. The new LG Watch Urbane is a full metal luxury Android Wear Watch that is here to do exactly this and my first impression is very positive.

As shown it looks sleek, classy and stylish enough to wear with a suit but at the same time the watch has something universal to it. When worn with feminine accessories I don’t see any reason why female fashionistas would turn away from this overall manly device.

Watch Urbane 2nd Edition
The New LG Watch Urbane 2nd Edition will be the first to run Android 6.0 Marshmallow

 

It’s quite clear that with the Urbane, LG is targeting an audience that’s a bit more demanding when it comes to the looks of their smart watch. The G watch and the G Watch R ($299 Upon release) were typically more suited for casual wear and could have easily been considered to be like a sports-watch. With the set price not yet released, I am not too confident it will be joining the arena with the Apple Watch.

It will be interesting to see what this baby will do on its overall Android Wear sales. Shipping a relatively modest 720k watches(Only 15,6 % of all wearable tech devices shipped last year) it’s clear that there is enough space for the sales numbers to grow.

LG Watch Urbane

The watch will be water/splash-proof with a 410mAh battery that could last up to 3 days. Like its predecessor, it has a heart-rate monitor under the hood. It will most likely be launched at this years Mobile Word Congress in Barcelona.

UPDATE: 18 November 2015

Peter Ludwig, Product Manager of Android Wear, confirmed the news that the first Android Wear watch with cellular support will be the LG Watch Urbane 2nd Edition LTE (Source) The new LG Watch Urbane 2nd Edition will be the first Android Wear watch to run on Android 6.0 Marshmallow. Which makes us wonder, when will the other watches running Android get this update? Google stated to their developers: “Currently, all other Android Wear watches implement API 22, and in the coming months, these will receive an OTA update for API 23 as well.”

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SOURCEPhoto Credit: LG Electronics