Apple’s gone and made its Watch Series 7 official and, as we expected, they haven’t done a bloody thing about the battery life. You’re still looking at eighteen hours on a charge, only this time Apple’s speeded up your charge time so you can actually use it while you sleep as well. Eight minutes will net you eight hours of sleep tracking, while 45 minutes will get you to 80% of charge.
But how about the rest of the device?
The Watch Series 7 goes (kinda) big
Also as expected, Apple’s newest Watch hasn’t made many changes to the internals of its wearable hardware. There are no new sensors and you’re looking at the same functionality compared to the Watch Series 6. The big change? The screen
Apple’s boasting about its largest display ever on a Watch, with a slightly increased size as well as skinner bezels (just 1.7mm around the edges) giving users more screen space. There’s enough real estate for the company to offer a tweaked UI, with larger buttons and up to 50% more text onscreen.
The Watch Series 7 also comes with a full on-screen keyboard, that tiny-fingered users can tap or (more likely) swipe through, with an AI system predicting what you’re trying to say (so you don’t have to use the tiny keyboard quite so much).
The curved display, which integrates into its new casing rather neatly, is apparently Apple’s most durable ever, while the Watch Series 6 also has a new IP6X dustproof rating to go with the WR50 waterproof rating.
There is a range of five new colours for the aluminium version, including Green and Product RED, as well as other hues for other casing options. Apple’s seventh-gen Watch launches later this year — there’s no official date yet — starting at $400 (or about R6,000). Expect local pricing to be closer to the Series 6’s current R8,000 when it lands here.
