At this morning’s keynote of Google I/O developer conference, the tech search giant announced that it will be working with Samsung to create a single unified smartwatch platform.
In other words, Google’s Wear OS will be merging with Samsung’s Tizen OS to be known simply as Wear.
Mr Bjorn Kilburn, Wear’s director of product management, said: “By working together, we have been able to take strengths of each and combine them into an experience that has faster performance, longer battery life and more of the apps you love available for the watch.”
The new Wear apps will be able to start up to 30 per cent faster with smooth user interface animations and motion. The smartwatches running Wear will also enjoy better battery life.
The unified platform is said to make it easier for developers to build apps for smartwatches. In addition, other smartwatch makers will also be able to create customised user experience on top of the unified platform.
Other enhancements include Google Maps and Google Assistant being redesigned and improved. YouTube Music will also arrive on Wear later this year.
At the same time, fitness tracker and smartwatch maker Fitbit – which was acquired by Google – said it will be rolling out premium smartwatches that run on the new Wear platform in the future.
In other news, Google announced that there are currently 3 billion active Android devices around the world. And the next Android 12 operating system will see its most radical design change with more personalisation options, such as custom colour palette and redesigned widgets.
We will cover more on Android 12 when we get our hands on the beta.
