Pebble Time Round is a color e-paper smartwatch with up to 2 days of battery life, capable to connect to iOS and Android devices. It can run apps, custom watch face and quickly display new timeline interface that highlights what’s important in our day. This is the latest model from Pebble, which was announced shortly after the very successful Kickstarter project of Pebble Time and Pebble Time Steel. I was a backer of Pebble Time Steel, therefore I am eligible to take an offer from Pebble: try Pebble Time Round (with $50 discount) vs Pebble Time Steel for 30 days, then I can choose which one to return (and get full refund at the price of Pebble Time Round) or I can keep them both.
It took me few weeks to decide whether I want to take up on their offer or not. Well, even though it sounds like “free” trial, I still have to pay for both products first (and could opt to get a refund for one product later), plus I need to pay for the shipping fee to return one item. Since I was quite happy with my Pebble Time Steel, I was contemplating whether this new Round model is worth the hassle. The round design does look good, but the sacrifice of battery life from up to 10 days to up to 2 days seemed like a dealbreaker to me.
After almost 4 weeks of postponing my decision near the end of limited-time offer, I finally decided to try the Pebble Time Round. Ordered the black 20mm model with black link. Turns out, the black link will be shipped separately some time in the future.
Pebble Time Round arrived to my excitement few days ago. The box is almost similar to Pebble Time Steel’s box, only in different color. Took me few seconds to figure out how to open the box, especially that I had a bit of experience with unboxing Pebble Time Steel not-too-long ago.
Hardware
My very first impression after holding Pebble Time Round is how extremely light it feels. It was noticeably different from Pebble Time Steel, which felt heavier that what I anticipated. The overall build looks strong and solid.
There are 4 buttons in Pebble Time Round, one on the left side (back button) and three on the right side (up, select and down buttons). The buttons look nice and somewhat more accessible thanks to its round design. There is a built-in mic on the bottom right side. The charging port is located at the back, equipped with magnet to allow easy snap. There is no Kickstarter engraving at the back, obviously because this is not a Kickstarter reward.
Pebble Time Round is thin. It feels really thin especially after wearing Pebble Time Steel for a while. When wearing suit, I usually could not quickly peek at my Time Steel because it is too thick. I do not have the same issue with Time Round. And thin watches have always been my favorite since many years ago before smart watch was even a thing. So it feels really really good to wear a watch so thin and lightweight, looking like a classic watch but has many useful features of a smart watch.
The color display looks nice, a bit too dim for my liking, but Pebble Time Steel has exactly the same display characteristics. A little hand movement or button press is needed to turn on the back-light. It is still a very attractive display and I can see the watch face nicely under direct sunlight.
For battery life, Pebble “only” promises up to 2 days. But I have been using this watch for 2.5 days so far with 40% remaining battery capacity. I receive a lot of notifications every day. All settings are still using default settings, meaning I didn’t change any settings of display intensity, timeout, ambient sensor or motion enabled back-light. I did not even set any quiet time (which generally will help to save battery life). So things are looking very good so far with battery life.
The leather band included as default does not look good. In fact, it looks even worse than the standard leather band from Pebble Time Steel. It does not feel comfortable and the only redeeming quality is that this band is really lightweight. If Pebble could at least provide Pebble Time Steel with a decent default band, I’m sure they can do the same with Pebble Time Round, so it’s a disappointment to get this inferior band instead. To be fair, I was never a fan of leather band, so I will wait patiently for my metal link.
Software
Pebble smart watches need an app to be installed in our iPhones or Android phones. Pebble Time, Pebble Time Steel and Pebble Time Round use the same app called “Pebble Time” different from “Pebble” app used by first-gen and second-gen Pebble.
Since I already have Pebble Time app, I did not need to install any new app. I did turn my Pebble time Steel into Airplane mode to avoid connection issues from connecting 2 Pebbles with 1 phone. Connecting the watch to our phone is very easy. Just follow the on-screen instructions and the connection will be established within few seconds. The long waiting part, was when it downloaded the latest software update and upgraded the watch’s operating system. That took a while to complete.
Pebble Time Round has round display, therefore all the previous apps and watch faces are NOT directly backward compatible with Pebble Time Round. Well, I tried some apps from my Pebble Time Steel, they CAN actually run in Pebble Time Round, but some of the display is being cut because it was not designed for round screen. The number of available watch faces is significantly less than the entire collection for other square models, but I can easily find some really good ones for Pebble Time Round. After all, we end up using only one watch face, with potential to change to few others in a while.
The round screen design gives a very nice feeling to watch faces who are smartly designed to take advantage of it. Analog watch faces give more classic and nostalgic feel, and I quite love it.
Temporary Conclusion
To my own surprise, I really like Pebble Time Round. Unless I find major issue in the next few weeks, most probably I will choose Round and return my Steel model. The significant drop in battery life promise turns out to be better than promised. Having thin and lightweight watch change the entire experience of wearing and using smart watch. Kinda sad that my Round unit does not have Kickstarter engraving though. I will write separate post after using it for few more days/weeks.
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