Sunday Runday
On this weekly column, Android Central Health Editor Michael Hicks talks concerning the world of wearables, apps, and health tech associated to working and well being, in his quest to get sooner and fitter.
After Samsung launches its Galaxy Ring later this yr, Apple allegedly needs to be sizzling on its heels, speeding out a competing Apple Ring. Earlier than that occurs, Samsung has one apparent technique that may assist the Galaxy Ring’s probabilities at widespread success: Make it obtainable for iOS prospects, not simply Android or Galaxy cellphone homeowners.Â
Earlier than Samsung’s pivot from Tizen to Put on OS, it frequently made its wearables work on iPhones. Its Samsung Gears, Galaxy Matches, Galaxy Watch Energetic 2, and Galaxy Watch 3 all labored with the Samsung Well being iOS app.Â
Not many individuals use Galaxy tech with iPhones, although, as a result of Apple strategically cripples non-watchOS wearables in areas like constant cellphone connectivity, voice assistant help, on-wrist replies, and notifications. As Samsung Director of World Product Planning Junho Park informed Techradar, his firm deserted iOS help as a result of it “couldn’t ship the identical degree of expertise with Android and iOS.”
However here is the factor: Apple could make good tech dumber, nevertheless it can’t restrict the well being information that an ordinary Bluetooth well being tracker can present. Good rings just like the Oura Ring Gen 3 have already change into widespread with iPhone customers who do not like carrying Apple Watches for sleep monitoring as a result of they supply exercise information and real-time well being insights with no need something extra sophisticated.Â
The Galaxy Ring might beat the Apple Ring to the punch
Digital Occasions reported a quote from an trade analyst that, based mostly on Apple’s surge of good ring patents in recent times, an “superior growth for commercialization seems to be imminent.”Â
Nevertheless, the analyst does not present a selected timeline, and the Apple Ring actually would not arrive earlier than the Galaxy Ring within the second half of 2024. Extra importantly, his hypothesis is predicated on patents, not any insider data.Â
Take into account how Apple began envisioning the Imaginative and prescient Professional in 2015 or the way it apparently needs to launch its first foldable cellphone in 2026 (per Android Authority). Apple constantly waits to launch merchandise or options effectively after its rivals, whether or not out of torpid complacency that its prospects will wait for his or her model of all the things or a need for rigorous high quality.Â
At any time when the Apple Ring does arrive, the patents themselves sound intriguing, if gimmicky. iMore writes about how the good ring might management different Apple gadgets with gestures, together with the Imaginative and prescient Professional, whereas AppleInsider says that the ring might have an outer contact panel or rotating layer.
Apple needs these ideas to work as a result of its interconnected gadget technique is the important thing to its success. However I think that most individuals care extra a few fashionable, compact good ring that provides helpful well being information, not gesture controls or a finicky ring-sized touchpad.Â
Plus, even when Apple rushes out its good ring, I think it will not arrive till 2025 on the very earliest. That provides Samsung the window it must make an actual foothold within the good ring market.
How the Galaxy Ring can succeed on an iPhone
Contemplating Samsung misplaced the highest spot in smartphone gross sales to Apple final yr, artificially slicing your self off from a rising person base is a foul concept. Samsung will even wish to goal the U.S. market specifically, the place Apple bought 64% of all smartphones final quarter in comparison with Samsung’s 18% (per Counterpoint).
Even when Samsung makes most of the greatest Android telephones and has loads of loyal prospects, many Android followers both will not see the Galaxy Ring as important or favor different manufacturers like OPPO or Pixel. Focusing on iPhone homeowners with sufficient disposable revenue to purchase each a smartwatch and a wise ring is the plain answer.Â
So, how does Samsung attain throughout the metaphorical aisle? It begins by revamping its Samsung Well being iOS app — which has solely acquired two bug-fixing updates since 2020 — to get all the methods its Android counterpart has added over the previous few years whereas additionally guaranteeing that it may possibly ship all the Galaxy Ring’s information to Apple Well being.
Since Samsung will most likely have Android customers handle their Galaxy Ring settings within the Galaxy Wearable app, it will need to supply comparable controls to iOS customers with out restrictions.
With the Galaxy Watch 6, Samsung made the irritating determination to order its ECG readings to the Samsung Well being Monitor app, reserved for Galaxy telephones. It should resist the impulse to make the Galaxy Ring higher on Android. Withholding options will persuade non-Samsung followers that the Galaxy Ring is not for them.Â
And lastly, Samsung ought to make it clear in its advertising and marketing push that the Galaxy Ring works on iOS. The advertisements can snarkily point out that it is the greatest good ring for each Android and iPhone or overtly say that it will present extra correct well being information than an Apple Watch can present. However it must make Galaxy Ring a common gadget in folks’s minds, faraway from the standard Samsung-Android affiliation.Â
Samsung could determine that the potential advantages of Galaxy Ring/ iPhone connectivity are offset by the large hurdles of creating this odd coupling work. Or the concept could not even happen to Samsung executives, who might even see the Galaxy Ring as simply one other gadget of their Galaxy “household” of gadgets, not a real standalone product.
I hope Samsung proves me unsuitable. And though there is no manner in hell Apple would do that, I might love for the Apple Ring to work on Android telephones. As a result of, not like smartwatches, good rings do not want gimmicks. They only want hyper-accurate well being information and elegance. That ought to cross the standard tech boundaries, with folks having a number of choices for which to purchase regardless of which smartphone they’ve.Â
