Google plans attack on Apple and Samsung with health and fitness apps for Wear OS

Google plans attack on Apple and Samsung with health and fitness apps for Wear OS

4. März 2020 0 Von Horst Buchwald

Google plans attack on Apple and Samsung with health and fitness apps for Wear OS

New York, 4.4.2020

Whether the 2.1 billion dollar takeover of Fitbit by Google makes sense has not yet been clarified, according to insiders. On the other hand, there is now more clarity about the plans for the Smartwatch operating system Wear OS .

This is the result of a recently launched customer survey by Google. According to this survey, companies want to integrate numerous health and fitness functions into their Wear OS system. The goal is obvious: This campaign is intended to bring Google back into competition with Apple and Samsung, as Google has had a hard time keeping up in this area recently.

The survey was first discovered by Droid Life and originates from the Google User Experience Research Program. It listed a wide range of future Smartwatch features and then asked participants how they would feel if the feature was included in future Wear OS products or not.

Features included sleep apnea detection, sleep monitoring and analysis, smart alarms, stress tracking and even a way to connect Wear OS products to medical devices.

Training specific features included automatic training detection and the ability to combine these devices with fitness equipment. The latter feature has been offered by Apple Watch for some time, but it’s good to see that Google is experimenting with ways to exchange training data between fitness devices and wearables.

Other features mentioned in the survey included calorie consumption measurement, breathing exercises, a stress tracking system, a compass, indoor air quality measurements and a way to notify emergency services if you had an accident.

Which is clear: This is a huge range of potential new features for Wear OS and shows that Google wants to close the gap with Apple and Samsung by turning its Smartwatch platform into a platform packed with health and fitness features.

With this survey and Google’s purchase of Fitbit, which is expected to be completed this year, it is exciting to see what the future holds for Wear OS. The system may not include all of the above mentioned features, but it is very likely that at least some of them will find their way into future wearables soon.