Sunday Runday(Image credit score: Android Central)In this weekly column, Android Central Wearables Editor Michael Hicks talks about the world of wearables, apps, and health tech associated to working and well being, in his quest to get quicker and fitter.Google I/O 2024 arrives this Tuesday, and we count on a Wear OS 5 announcement. The final three I/Os gave us an enormous Wear OS 3 overhaul (2021), a Pixel Watch reveal (2022), and a Wear OS 4 preview (2023). After two bombshells, final 12 months’s wearable information was extra perfunctory, so I’m crossing my fingers for a bounce-back 12 months with a long-overdue health fix to Wear OS. We know that Wear OS 5 is on the I/O schedule, with a chat on “Building for the Future of Wear OS.” Google may convey up the new Hybrid Interface that offers Wear OS watches longer battery life, or maybe it’s going to announce plans to convey Wear OS watches into the new Find My community. We may see Gemini coming to Pixel and Galaxy Watches, given I/O’s probably AI focus. And maybe we’ll get a glimpse of the Pixel Watch 3, even when it will not arrive till the fall.Those all look like truthful bets in your Google I/O bingo card. What’s much less probably, however nonetheless vital, is that the Wear OS crew pronounces a correct OS-wide substitute for the dying Google Fit. Maybe that is Fitbit, possibly not; it simply must be one thing. (Image credit score: Google)The Google Fit API shuts down subsequent 12 months in favor of “Android Health,” a brand new API with common information classes like steps, distance, and energy. Designed to work with Health Connect, it’s going to seamlessly switch information between apps, with the skill to export area of interest information like blood glucose or stress as soon as watches begin monitoring them.Sounds nice, in principle! In observe, it nonetheless creates a vacuum the place Google Fit used to take a seat as an agnostic possibility. You can switch information, however you continue to want an finish vacation spot, and most health apps are designed to entice you in their ecosystem and cost you a price. Yes, the Google Fit app continues to be out there, however the writing is on the wall for the app to get the boot now that Google has turned its consideration to Fitbit. Samsung Health is the closest “common” and unpaid various, although that app is barely out there on Samsung smartwatches.One may argue that well being and health apps are a key approach Wear OS watches differentiate themselves from each other as of late, because it appears to be the large draw for the Pixel Watch. Also, these corporations promote your well being and health information to advertisers, and a common app may stop smaller manufacturers from profiting. So, with a common health app expertise, how would Wear OS watches stand out from one another?Get the newest information from Android Central, your trusted companion in the world of Android(Image credit score: Chris Wedel / Android Central)When Samsung joined Wear OS, Google did not insist that it abandon its personal apps, UI, and distinctive method; leaving Samsung Health as the default possibility is a part of that. As for different manufacturers, they won’t need their apps to should compete with Fitbit or Samsung Health. That would not change the indisputable fact that the Wear OS model suffers from this fragmentation. Every non-Samsung/Google watch has a proprietary app that is often stripped down in comparison with what devoted health watches provide, comparable to exercise suggestions and restoration occasions. The similar goes with Apple Fitness Plus, with its standard exercise movies.Instead, we noticed how OnePlus’ first Wear OS providing — the OnePlus Watch 2 — had points with well being sampling, whereas Fossil deserted Wear OS for good as a result of it could not sustain on the software program entrance with its woefully lackluster Wellness app. Without extra assist from Google, I’m not sure what number of third-party manufacturers will escape of their small niches.(Image credit score: Nick Sutrich / Android Central)What’s the resolution? My first plan is easy sufficient and would make for a splashy Google I/O announcement: Say Fitbit is coming to all Wear OS watches with Wear OS 5, both through the Play Store or as a substitute “default” possibility — the similar approach you may select between Bixby or Google Assistant on a Galaxy Watch. Yes, this makes Wear OS watches extra uniform. However, well being information is simply as important for a superb smartwatch expertise as Google Assistant or apps; Samsung prefers its customers to make use of the Galaxy Store or Bixby, however at the very least there are dependable Google alternate options. As far as how Wear OS watches would stand out, there are nonetheless different methods to distinguish between completely different fashions in their design, shows, UI, and so forth, with out leaving well being and health as this Wild West market.This transfer would additionally give the struggling Fitbit model an even bigger profile with Android customers. I’d even counsel that Google compensate companions like Mobvoi or OnePlus by slicing them in on the income for any Fitbit subscriptions purchased on their watches after the trial interval ends. (Image credit score: Nick Sutrich / Android Central)My different resolution would play into Google’s love of renaming providers that fulfill the similar goal: Just make “Android Health” an app like Google Fit. Give it some primary objectives and training, make it free, and let individuals use it as a waystation between their Wear OS watch and whichever proprietary health app they like.Eventually, I count on Google to supply one thing like “Gemini Coach AI,” which appears to be like at your well being information and provides you suggestions on sleep, coaching, and restoration. But until that is one other Fitbit unique to promote Pixel Watches, then it’s going to nonetheless want a uniform Wear OS health expertise. We’ll see if Google I/O 2024 has a health shock in retailer for us this 12 months, Fitbit-related or in any other case. All I do know is that, in some unspecified time in the future, Google’s selection to go away its Wear OS companions to fend for themselves on well being and health — the first precedence for lots of Android watch consumers — may backfire on them.
https://www.androidcentral.com/wearables/google-io-2024-needs-fitness-app-announcement-wear-os-5
