Currently there are around five smartwatches on the market: the Galaxy Gear, the Martian, the Pebble, the Sony Smart Watch 2 and the Qualcomm Toq. Each have their own capabilities, but none are perfect. Google's now has the opportunity to make the perfect smartwatch with Android Wear. Ultimately, what do we want to see from a smartwatch? This is our wishlist:
Standalone
We would like our smart watches to work on their own, please. That means installing apps directly on the device, making calls without having to pull the phone out of our pockets, and supporting a Wireless N (or AC) network. Tethering from a smartphone should only occur while outside a local network. Note that the Galaxy Gear and Martian are capable of making calls, but they still require a paired smartphone.
Local Storage
This goes along with the previous standalone concept: locally installed apps need local storage. But let's push that even further. What if the smartwatch had enough local storage to play host to movies, videos and music. Users could plug in earphones and listen to their favorite album without needing an MP3 player or phone. Of course, this would require a better, smartphone-class battery.
Video Playback
Eventually this is going to happen. Smart watches will provide support for the various types of video compression, allowing users to watch a purchased movie or one taken by the user's smartphone camera. Smart watches would also need a mini-HDMI output component, or perhaps a way to stream video to a smart TV or some other DLNA-certified device.
Internet Browser
Sure, the internet would be rather small on a smart watch face, but smartphones started with small screens and highly simple internet pages. This is also where the local storage comes into play: storing Internet cache so that the browser isn't burning up the battery charge by downloading pages over and over. This would seemingly need a screen capable of a decent resolution and ppi.
Remote Control
What if you could control a desktop or laptop simply by touching the screen of your smart watch? That would be an interesting feature, requiring users to install apps on both platforms. Roccat does something similar with its Power-Grid software, which requires both the smartphone/tablet and desktop/laptop to remain on the same wireless network. Using a smartwatch to turn a room's lights on and off would be a neat feature as well.
Activate the Teleporter
Ok maybe we're asking too much.
