Last year’s Moto 360 captured the imagination when Android Wear was announced, becoming the standard bearer of the nascent platform despite launching months after the first couple watches. Its cool circular display was certainly worth waiting for, but the design wasn’t perfect: it looked too big on some wrists, and meagre internals meant that both performance and battery life were lacking. This week, Motorola announced a new Moto 360, which aims to keep that eye-catching circular design while fixing the most obvious bugbears and adding customisation to the mix. Let’s take a closer look.
Design & customisation
Like its predecessor, the Moto 360 comes with an almost-circular display (complete with “flat tire” at the bottom); Motorola retained this as it’s the best way to maximise the screen-to-case ratio and include an ambient light sensor for automatic brightness adjustment.
The biggest change to the new Moto 360 is that it’s available in three models and two different sizes, reflecting the personal nature of a smartwatch. The collection includes a men’s version, a women’s version and a sports version, each with their own quirks.
You can buy different models straight-up from various retailers (including Mobile Fun!), but you can also customise the new Moto 360 using the Moto Maker website. This allows you to choose between different bands, colours, bezels and sizes.
All three models include a new lock button, which sits at 2 o’clock now. The men’s and women’s versions add metal lugs to the previous design, which also allows straps to be more easily changeable. The men’s version is available in 46mm and 42mm variants with a 20mm strap, while the women’s version comes with a 42mm face and 16mm strap.
Upgraded hardware
All three models come with some upgraded internal hardware, which should improve performance considerably. There’s a Snapdragon 400 processor, which is quad-core chip running at 1.2GHz. This is backed with 512MB of RAM and 4GB of internal storage (used for songs, screenshots and apps). The whole lot is powered by a 400mAh or 300mAh battery (for the 46mm and 42mm versions, respectively).
The 46mm model comes with a 1.56-inch display at a 360 x 330 resolution, while the 42mm version has a 1.37-inch display at 360 x 325. Both are covered by Gorilla Glass 3 and use LCD technology instead of the (slightly more common) OLED.
The sport version is unique, as it comes with a fixed silicone strap, an LCD display more easily readable in sunlight, and a GPS chip for tracking outdoor activities. That makes it a little thicker than the 46mm model on which it’s based.
Android Wear 1.3
The second-generation Moto 360 runs the same version of Android Wear as its predecessor; 1.3. That means you’ll be able to use the Moto 360 with iOS as well as Android, although there are some limitations that you should know about. The big difference are a few new watch faces called Live Dials, which use Wear’s new ability to have widgets on watch faces. These can be set to open certain apps or display new information, like weather conditions, steps or battery life.
Conclusion
So there we have it – a new, improved Moto 360! The new models should be hitting the UK soon. Let us know what you think in the comments below, and stay tuned for more news and accessories for the new models.