Google’s Wear OS has been facing a lot of issues lately and now one of their “standard bearers”, the Mobvoi TicWatch devices, seems to have dropped them, at least for their latest device. The new TicWatch GTX has been announced and the most notable thing at first glance is that it’s running its own proprietary operating system. The other thing that has caught attention is that since it’s not running the Wear OS, the price tag is pretty affordable as well.
The TicWatch GTX has a 1.28-inch 240 x 240 TFT display with a 48mm chassis. It is powered by a RLC8762C processor and a 160KB RAM which on paper isn’t much of course. If battery life on your wearable is a big concern for you, they have also tried to improve on this as they say regular use will give you seven days but if you put it on the Power Saving Mode, it can last up to 10 days. It doesn’t have built-in WiFi or GPS and you connect it to your phone through Bluetooth.
Even with the underwhelming specs, they say it can still do a lot of things that smartwatches can do. You still get incoming notifications, music control, heart-rate tracking, 14 workout modes, sleep tracking, torchlight, weather app, stopwatch, timer. If those are your basic needs for a smartwatch, then this should do. Oh it is also IP68 water-resistant so you can use it for swimming.
This is actually the second time that Mobvoi has realized a smartwatch in the US that is not Wear OS. The first was the TicWatch 2 back in 2017 but that didn’t last long. Now they’re trying it out again with the TicWatch GTX and their own operating system and because specs are not as high-end as that which runs Wear OS, they have been able to bring the price down to a much more affordable price range.
While of course, it is not as advanced as the Wear OS, the fact that the TicWatch GTX is just $59 should be a come-on for those looking for affordable wearables. You can even get a 10% discount if you pre-order it on their website starting today. It will be available by September 3 so we should know by then if the specs are still good enough for a basic smartwatch.
