Google announced five Wear OS experiences for the Samsung Galaxy Watch 4 with Wear OS today. These updates are a part of the new Wear OS 3.0 and the new Samsung Watch becomes the first smartwatch to be using Google’s new unified platform.
These new experiences include:
- Navigate with Google Maps from your Galaxy Watch 4
- Stay connected with Messages by Google
- Use Google Pay in more countries
- Download an dlisten to favorite tunes with YouTube Music
- Discover new Google Play apps and Tiles
Beyond these new updates targeted at the Samsung Galaxy Watch 4, Google also announced new feature updates for existing wear OS.
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New features coming to your existing Wear OS Smartwatch
Wear OS 2.0 will now be getting the following new features:
Google Pay in additional Geographies
You can now pay in more countries with Google Pay using your Fossil or TicWatch when using the older wear OS.
Google is now expanding support for Google Pay to 16 new countries including Belgium, Brazil, Chile, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, Hong Kong, Ireland, New Zealand, Norway, Slovakia, Sweden, Taiwan, Ukraine and United Arab Emirates, with more to come.
Messages by Google comes to your existing wear OS smartwatch
With the updated Messages by Google app, you can receive messages on the go and easily reply directly from your watch without needing to take out your phone.
The Messages app on your watch syncs with your Android phone, so your conversations stay up to date.
New Apps and Tiles available from the new Google Play Store
Following recent updates to the Google Play Store, Google is now making new apps and tiles available for existing wear OS users.
In the coming weeks, Google is launching new experiences from your favorite apps for your smartwatch, including Calm, Komoot, Period Tracker, Sleep Cycle, Spotify, and Strava.
Many of these apps will also launch new third-party Tiles, so there’s a quick way to access the information and actions you care about most.
This means that most smartwatches such as the Fossil Gen 5 and the soon to come Gen 6 will have these new updates. The Unified UI will only be available on the Samsung Galaxy Watch 4 for now.
Stay on the lookout for new Wear OS updates coming to your smartwatch!
Does this Wear OS 2 update have a version number? Is there a list somewhere of which watches will get it? Thanks!
This is what Google announced yesterday. https://support.google.com/wearos/thread/120789017/new-and-updated-app-experiences-coming-to-wear-os?hl=en&msgid=120789017. They say the update is expected in the “Coming Weeks”. No list yet but we think it will apply to all wear OS watches. They may possibly roll it out to Fossil first ( since they did that with the HMR-2 update)