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by vbezhenar 1846 days ago
Apple Watch might be the best smartwatches but for me the concept or smartwatch is still novel and I'm not sure if I want to switch. I wear ordinary watches and they're good enough for me. The only killer feature that I need is waking me up in a smart way (monitoring sleep phases and boozing on my hand between 08:00 - 09:00, for example) but Apple Watch does not have that feature. Other features are just not interesting for me. And, honestly, for most other people around me. May be I'm in a bubble, but so far I saw Apple Watch only once in my life.
2 comments

The reasons for a cellular Apple Watch.

For myself:

- Running without my phone. I can still track my speed, make phone calls and listen to streaming music and podcasts. I can even leave my wallet at home and stop by a convenience store that accepts Apple Pay.

- During the Before Times when I went to the gym (I have a home gym now), I hated carrying my phone around. With my watch, I didn’t have too.

- Even now when I am working out at home, I keep my phone in another room and just have my watch on to measure my heart rate while I’m working out and even control my AppleTV. If I do get a call, I can answer it.

- I was horrible controlling my “screen time” and would pull my phone out when I was with other people. Now, anytime I am suppose to be socializing, I leave my phone in the car. I can still be contacted. I ignore all phone calls though except from my wife, kids, or parents.

My wife:

- women often wear clothes without pockets or shallow pockets. She will often leave her phone in the car and just walk around with her watch and her AirPods on a key chain.

- she has a working hobby as a fitness instructor. It’s online and outside these days. She has her iPhone connected to her sound system and uses her watch to control the music.

While I agree that the wake-up feature you described is not available from Apple directly, I bet there's a 3rd party app out there that does what you're asking.

I use the Apple alarm now and when if I go to sleep with my watch on, it will gently buzz on my wrist and get more forceful until I turn it off. The sensors to track sleep are all on the device, but Apple doesn't seem to have any interest in building a "sleep cycle" tracker at this time for whatever reason.

A cursory search turns up the "Sleep Cycle" app[0] with a ton of reviews and even an "Editors Choice" award. Maybe Apple is holding their horses until they 100% nail the implementation, but if you can live with 90% in the meantime, it would probably be worth it to you if this is a thing you're really wanting in your morning routine.

[0] - https://apps.apple.com/us/app/sleep-cycle-sleep-tracker/id32...