I'm pleased the pricing is so low. I did some math and if they're making 10k of these (not clear if that's each or all together), there's not a ton of money to be made.
Assuming $100 average profit, that's a $2M for 20k watches. Given the work opportunities that the founder and other employees have, that's not a lot of money for them to make in a year, and it comes with significant risk. Basically seems like this is a passion project, for which I am very grateful!
$100 profit on a $150 watch would be crazy. Rest of the post seems made up too. I don't know where these numbers are coming from. I'm genuinely confused.
MSRP of 3x COGS is a pretty common rule of thumb for hardware. Have to leave room for distribution, software, R&D, returns, SG&A, etc. End of the day, it's probably still only 30-40% gross margin -- less than half of a good SaaS company. Hardware is (indeed!) hard.
Having worked in a tiny start-up-turned-company doing hardware for medical training, my biggest takeaway was that it is very slow but that it can also be very stable.
Like, yeah our margins were/are super high, and so were/are the distributors’, but once everything was spun up and running it was also very stable and predictable.
We were located on the outskirts of a 3rd tier Eastern European city and yet we were plugged right into the same global parts supply chain and capable of doing the same global distribution you could elsewhere. If you’re on to something, it’s a good time to be doing hardware. But you’re correct - 2/3 of the entire company was distribution/sales and R&D.
Gross profit = sales or service revenue less the expenses directly related to producing that revenue (this does not include backoffice functions, R&D, rent, etc.)
Net profit, which is the total revenue of the business less all expenses of the business (so, this includes R&D, rent, and the "backoffice" like HR, finance, legal, etc.)
Larger businesses with multiple business segment may account for gross profit separately for each business segment, but the business only ever calculates one net profit item.
There's also unit profit, which is essentially gross profit but at the level of a single unit of goods or services (for services, a unit is usually a customer contract, for recurring services it would be each period of the contract). Unit profit is generally the revenue from that specific unit less the costs directly associated with producing that revenue. Most companies don't calculate unit profit as generally it's not meaningful unless you sell high-value items, like automobiles or planes.
It's absolutely essential to be able to differentiate between gross profit and net profit to establish unit economics, especially as the scale of a newly founded operation may drastically change relative to some amount of fixed capex or SG&A expense.
Of course. But here we're talking about the opportunity cost of the founders and other employees so gross profit isn't as relevant. Context matters and the context here is that the founders and employees would probably have a much higher take home split amongst all of them if they were to work in the wearables division of a large company like Google or Apple.
The difference between gross profit & net profit for companies like this is largely comprised of employee & founder salaries (SG&A and R&D). That delta is literally paying for their opportunity cost. Net profit is most relevant to shareholders.
What they call "gross profit" is not profit, by definition. It's certainly useful to track $revenue-$cost_of_goods, but you can't call that profit. People are free to use words incorrectly, but they shouldn't expect anyone else to go along with them.
Who chooses the "correct" use of words? Is it you? Wikipedia disagrees with you: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gross_margin. Maybe you should make your own encyclopedia.
Please hire an accountant asap if you ever start a business. Things don't mean what you think they mean in accounting. You are wrong and insist you are right despite multiple people pointing it out to you.
I was using a blended average of the $150 and $225 watches. Also, it sounds like some of the components for the $150 watch were literally left over from Pebble days, which means they could have gotten an amazing deal on them.
I ordered my Pebble Time during February 2015 Kickstarter for $169. Today the Core Time 2 is $225 which is the exact same price adjusted for inflation.
The DHL shipping though I remembered it was $25 and it is still $25 today
That "price rise" indicates an inflation rate of 2.9%. The average inflation rate for the last 50 years is more like 3.5%. So it totally depends on your perspective. If you've only lived through low-inflation times, then yeah 2.9% seems high.
I'm in my 50's and my reaction to the same information was "yeah, seems about right".
> Assuming $100 average profit, that's a $2M for 20k watches. Given the work opportunities that the founder and other employees have, that's not a lot of money for them to make in a year, and it comes with significant risk. Basically
Reading through the terms on the shop page, it seems they're preparing to (maybe) raise the prices at any time, and they'll ask you to pay more before shipping, if they end up raising the prices after you buy it.
Whoa didn't see this! What's the language you're referring to? I only saw the part about how either side can cancel without penalty and didn't read a threat of higher pricing into that bit.
I was excited and about to purchase one until I saw this "We might not ship the device unless you pay us more" thing. I get that the economy is very up in the air right now in the US, but sucks that seemingly ordinary businesses are losing international business because of it.
That reads to me as what they'll do if the import tariff situation changes, not if the company changes the price themselves. Which seems like a reasonable thing to say given the massive uncertainty around US economic policy at the moment.
Fair, and you're probably right. I've personally learned to be very cautious when it comes to statements like that though. There has already been additional tariffs, and since it isn't exactly defined, they could raise the price tomorrow based on that, "because it wasn't taken into account at the time" and so on.
Better to just wait until the whole drama blows over I suppose.
I think it's reasonable too, but it also means I don't want to pony up $150 now to potentially have the seller renege and (hopefully) refund me later. I can make use that $150 between then and now.
They have it very clearly written before you check out that you can receive a full refund anytime before it ships. You have to check a box saying you acknowledge this before completing your purchase.
I find what they’re doing very transparent from top to bottom. If you’re worried about it, don’t buy one. But if you’re worried they’re going to pull the rug out from under you, I don’t think you need to.
Yeah, it is transparent... that they may raise the price and undisclosed amount. There's nothing wrong with it but the terms mean I'm not interested in preordering. I'll wait until the final price is available. Why did this seem to upset people?
I don’t think they can legally raise the price and charge your card without communicating the adjusted price to you and letting you confirm. Someone correct me if I’m wrong on that but ultimately I think they still need you to agree to it explicitly.
If you wait until the final retail price is known, it's quite likely that you won't be able to place a retail order at that time, since it's a very limited run. There will probably be a few scalpers on ebay though.
By that logic the watch is a non-essential luxury good so you probably should use the $150 you have now in a more productive manner regardless of potential futures.
I am not sure I understand you. It's true, I generally prefer not to preorder as it means I'm essentially offering an interest-free loan to a company.
Sometimes I'll do it anyway for one of two reasons: to lock in a price that may increase later, or to receive an item earlier than I would otherwise, due to excessive demand.
I'm just saying that, at least to my sensibilities, the viewpoint that leads one to be concerned about maximizing the efficiency of 150 bucks over the next 4-5 months seems incompatible with the viewpoint that it would be reasonable to spend $150 on this watch at all.
But I recognize that everyone's a snowflake, so you do you.
A lot of people on HN whine “oh I’m not picking a side” and “I just want to get on with my life” and “I’m an island what others do doesn’t affect me” and other nonsense.
Sadly the damage these people are causing by their implicit support for the end of the modern world won’t fix the problem when America realises it’s making itself poorer, history shows countries double down.
It's good of them to consider this and be transparent, but I don't consider tariffs to be part of the price. The price is the amount the seller gets, not the amount they collect and remit to the government.
I think "price" is an imprecise term that could refer to the pre-tax/tariff amount or the post-tax/tariff amount. It would include shipping, if there is no other way to get the device (as is the case here).
But regardless, they're not saying they would increase the "price" (whatever that means), but just that if the tariff situation changes, then the customer will need to pay the additional tariff. This is the same as what would happen if a state increased the sales tax rate and they had to collect and remit additional sales tax. It just so happens that it's unlikely any state is going to sharply increase its sales tax in the next year, but there's a decent chance the tariff rate will jump. If the sales tax went up, I wouldn't consider that to be the company raising the price. Same for tariffs, in my book.
The difference between sales tax and a tariff is that the consumer pays the sales tax while the importer pays the tariff. In other words, I'm not presented with a "price + taxes + tariff." I'm presented with a "price + taxes" where the price is supposed to bake in the seller's costs (which may include tariffs) and a margin of profit. Likewise, if the price increases to allow for additional tariffs, I will also pay more in taxes.
And then you've got VAT, which yes it's the consumer's money that's going to paying it, but the headline price for consumers is the VAT inclusive price and the retailer (or importer, who may sometimes be a consumer) is responsible for paying.
Which means that in high-profile cases where the VAT rate is disputed, it's the retailer who is on the hook for the disputed amount. Recent examples being Greggs (a baker, who won their case, so no tax payable) and Uber (where I'm not actually sure whether it's finalised yet? But if they end up needing to pay VAT then it's going to be expensive).
Funny, aren't you USers used to not knowing what you'll pay for something because the advertised prices don't include sales taxes and administrative fees and whatever fees and service charges and tips that are not service charges?
Well in europe letting me know what the real price is only at the cash register and not when I check out the product in the store is as unusual as your problem with import duties :)
I think it may even be illegal for consumer prices. What they display or list in the contract is what you pay.
But on the other hand I'm used to paying import taxes separately when ordering something from outside the EU.
Yes, Americans don't know the exact price of the products in their cart between the 10min they put the items in their cart and when they check out. They know it will be a little more and they mentally budget for it.
But that doesn't have much to do with a price increasing weeks or months after paying for a preorder.
So you can mentally separate the price the vendor charges from taxes imposed by the state when you pick up in the store but not when ordering internationally?
Pretty much all tech purchases are implicitly international. During the last Trump administration we were madly spinning up additional manufacturing capacity in Vietnam, because the full tariffs on China, had they come into effect, would have doubled the retail price of an Oculus headset (which is a US corporation, just as in this scenario)
Haven't bought something from outside the EU in a while? They charge us at least VAT (maybe over a certain price, depending on your jurisdiction) :)
Large stores can afford to precalculate this and use a service that will handle taxes for you, small stores not so much so you may end paying it personally on receiving the package. But they can afford to precalculate it if the taxes are known in advance (usually starts at whatever your country's VAT rate is).
Now in this case, shipping to the US looks like it will be randomly taxed depending on the phase of the moon and how well Trump has slept last night, so this warning is fair. You can't expect them to absorb a 50% import tax if it's established tomorrow.
> Haven't bought something from outside the EU in a while? They charge us at least VAT (maybe over a certain price, depending on your jurisdiction) :)
Sure, and as you also seem familiar with, you know it's pretty trivial to calculate yourself when you place your order :)
So far, I've never bought something internationally, then before shipping the tax laws changed enough that the toll and/or tax payment was different than I expected.
I know that the diabetic community are extremely interested on these watches. 30 days of battery life, already working support for Android APS and xDrip with these watches. What is there not to like. Put one of these to your child's wrist and they can get alerts on the glucose level easily.
Diabetics have a sensor on their bodies that speaks Bluetooth. It talks to their phones (running eg. xDrip). The phone then communicates this to the watch.
My wife is a diabetic and this kind of stuff, while it seems minimal, makes a big difference for her quality of life.
It's all about building these things by yourself. The tools are there, and Pebble used to be the first smartwatch every open source diabetic I know used (including myself).
If you're not familiar, here's a good starting point:
Oh, and you want to avoid Apple's hardware. Some of the software can only be distributed as source code, so installing them to an iOS device is not easy.
I would definitely get the color Pebble over many competing devices. I do not need fancy sport features, steps+sleep+heart rate covers all my needs, and 30-day battery life honestly sounds like a dream.
Eric, thank you. Lurking in the forum answering questions evokes people to share their opinion for satisfaction and dissatisfaction and often neglectes to evoke praise (proportionally). I am guilty of this too.
So please have some well deserved praise for your work on this. We have gotten an open source wearable OS, purpose built hardware, R&D, a community, more pressure on Apple to be less of a gatekeeper, and something we can own in a crazy short timeframe. I hope you see this despite it being buried. Thank you, you glorious nerd.
The Nordic nRF52840[1] SoC on which these are based support not only Bluetooth 5.4 but also Thread, Zigbee, and 802.15.4. These three standards are becoming commonplace in the home automation space. Has any thought been given to how the new Pebble devices could utilize these protocols?
Is it actually open source though? The repository description may be outdated then, but it currently says this:
> This is the latest version of the internal repository from Pebble Technology providing the software to run on Pebble watches. Proprietary source code has been removed from this repository and it will not compile as-is. This is for information only.
This just hasn't been updated since it was forked from the initial OSS release from Google, I've started a discussion on the firmware Discord to update it.
Pretty sure those different radio stacks do not run very well in parallel or if they do, they'd likely start to starve the rest in terms of resources needed.
The nRF52840 is not the most performant, I would've really liked if they had chosen a SoC, like the nRF5340, with more RAM or cores for this reason amongst others.
There are similar devices (i.e. SiLabs) that allow multi-protocol use with the radio (I would expect Nordic to have a similar feature set), tho yes, you're right the resource issue would be a major limitation.
6 months from announcing rePebble (Jan '25) to shipping your first units (July '25) seems like a quick turnaround for a compact consumer electronics device. Curious to know if these first units are closer to a white label of existing hardware or more of a JDM model.
Side note - I got the first pebble through the kickstarter pre-orders in my first year out of high school. Seeing something so novel was definitely a contributor to me switch from CS to Mech E and working in the consumer electronics space now. Thanks for making cool and interesting things :)
No questions but a comment: I rarely get emotionally attached to devices, especially since I have to handle a lot of fancy hardware for work and it gets old quickly. However, there are a few pieces of technology like my Walkman or my Thinkpad X61t that I really liked and was sad to have to let go when their time had come. The Pebble is another one of those devices for me and I'm quite happy that I won't have to it let go for a lot longer that I thought thanks to your new project. Thanks. :-)
What are the dimensions (length and width) of both models? I'm trying to decide if the Time would be too big for my taste, and I'm having a hard time trying to picture what the increased screen diagonal size translates to.
Excited for this release! Have you heard from Intel yet? “Core 2 Duo” was the name of one of their processors in the early days of multicore on a single package.
Not sure if you’ll see this but I’l love to understand - why the slightly weird (to me) differentiation between the two models’ sensors? One has heart rate (which might be considered almost fundamental for smart watches today), the other has magnetic/barometric sensors (which are very nice to have when out and moving)… but neither has both? Is the core 2 duo a “geeky” watch and the other one a “premium” product? I assume the latter also doesn’t support JTAG fiddling around, is that a philosophical choice or more of an engineering time/resource constraint? Thanks in any case, these devices are definitely quite tempting!
(I’m here from 1 day after my comment) Btw I partially found an answer to the first question from the AMA on Reddit - the sensors on the duo were a kind of thanks to the person who helped design it.
I remember that my Pebble 2 (HR) over time (pun intended) would develop play around the rubber button area especially on the right side. Eventually the rubber covering the buttons would break off. This was common to the point people were making 3d-printed replacement parts.
See https://help.rebble.io/pebble-2-buttons/
What's the expected longevity of the buttons this time around, and will you have replacement parts available ?
Thank you for making this happen! My family and friends are sick of my decade-long attachment to my pebble steel by now, haha.
Any chance the particular extra color for the metal one could be an actual metal color? My pebble steel with the metal link band was a great combination of stylish and functional. I never really liked the look of any of the later models so even when I bought them I always went back to my pebble steel. I went ahead and pre-ordered the new metal one and I suppose I’ll go for black if I have to but I really hope you come out with a stainless steel or silver color.
Also what’s the watchband compatibility? Will this work with the original pebble bands or with standard watch bands or something new and proprietary?
> Also what’s the watchband compatibility? Will this work with the original pebble bands or with standard watch bands or something new and proprietary?
It says it works with standard 22mm watchbands, so it seems like you can just put on any 3rd party band you like.
You mention only producing a limited quantity, but do you have any plans to do a second batch next year? I know that knowing the future is impossible and that you thus can't make any promises, but are you at least hoping to be able to make more batches in the future?
I can't spend $225 right now, and by next month I'm guessing the pre-orders will already have blown way past your production quantity ^^
The Core Time 2 mentions heart-rate monitoring. Have you considered also adding an oximeter?
The comparison chart, under "sensors", doesn't mention the compass under the Core Time 2; does the Core Time 2 drop the compass? A 3D magnetometer seems like a useful sensor for orientation purposes.
Is there a light sensor, to allow automatically disabling the backlight when there's enough ambient light and enabling it when there isn't?
You mention "Standard Pebble charger" for both; I'm guessing that that isn't USB-C?
> This week, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit upheld the previous verdict of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board that concluded all three of AliveCor’s patents were unpatentable. This is generally the outcome when courts conclude that patents are either obvious or too generic to enforce.
The case over the oximeter functionality is still ongoing, but with luck it'll go the same way.
It looked like it was not just the oximeter but the arrangement of the sensors and the fact that they fist approached Masimo with a licensing deal but then canceled and hired engineers from Masimo instead....
Yes, it looks like Apple "won" their reciprocal patent cases against Masimo but basically got $250 for it, and no injunction. The case against Apple is still blocking them from selling watches with oximetry.
I think the article is referencing two different cases, and the ones invalidated don't seem related to oximetry, I'm not sure what happened with the oximetry one though.
Ah, when it said "standard Pebble charger" I incorrectly assumed it was a charging port, rather than something like pogo pins. What's on the back of the watch seems pretty reasonable.
Any chance to open up support and reparability for old pebbles? For example, run the newly open OS on old hardware or source parts for old pebbles, like batteries for pebble time ;)
A few, not sure HN will format this correctly so my bad if these get mushed together:
* The originals used Sharp MiP but advertised them as "e-paper" do your new models use MiP LCD (or similar) or actual "e-paper" ie "e-ink" (electrostatic capsules).
* Pebble time round 2?!?!
* The touchscreen - this is an issue I had on my Galaxy watch including the bezel rotating as well. Are there efforts to pevent the touchscreen from inadvertently doing things when I'm resting one arm against the other? For Galaxy watch I had to switch off bezel rotation/touch screen waking the watch & only allow buttons, because it would constantly wake up when I had my arms crossed/resting position.
* The backlight, is it backlit or front-lit? I suppose this more relates to if it's genuine capsule e-paper, then it would be nice to be front-lit.
I think I am not exactly the intended audience for these devices right now, so my comment will be a bit general. I don't want "a geeky alternative to apple watch" (or an apple watch, for that matter), I basically want Garmin Forerunner 955 alternative that won't keep my data hostage. There are many things I hate about Garmin watches (which I buy nevertheless), but I can forgive almost all of them except that one. I want my data to be bulk-exportable via open API, and not it some raw .fit format (because they have to comply with GDPR after all), but as a first-class feature, that tries to satisfy a customer by exporting any data it produces in any (realistic) format that customer wants. (I assume you are familiar with other wearables, since this is your domain, but just in case: GDPR forces them to make the data they record directly exportable, but they won't willingly do it for anything that is "processed data", so I can backup my HR history, but not the data they use to make these "sleep phases" graphs, and I can only manually export relatively useless .csv summaries for a given date.)
In short, I really want to stop giving my money to Garmin. But I don't want to compromise on quality of the data being recorded. What are your thoughts on that market?
I ordered one, with no experience although like the story and heard about the original.
One very frustrating concern - the warranty. This is $255+ for a device that is only good for 3 million seconds. Would it be possible to arrange replacement at cost after 2 years?
I have no reason to think that it will not work well for 2 years, but I am not prepared to guarantee that in a warranty. That would be taking on too much risk as a small company.
Your explanation is reason enough to cancel. I have experienced enough hardware fails the day after the warranty to avoid purchasing anything that I do not consider disposable. I still have my Vector watch which suffered the same fate as Pebble. I am curious about the risk of a "at cost" replacement. I have avoided buying a FitBit to replace my existing FitBit because their warranty is also limited to "one year" which is basically Wearable as a Service.
> curious about the risk of a "at cost" replacement
You can't tell consumers the raw manufacturing cost because people act weird when they are told it: they usually assume the "markup" is profits. They assume that they're getting ripped off because most people don't understand development costs or overheads and they always argue that any profit is too much. This problem can't be fixed.
Apart from the risk of scammers buying a watch to sell, saying it is broken, getting a replacement at cost and the scammer steals the markup/profit.
You can maybe think of ways to make it work, but they are likely to have excessive support costs or other hidden costs for the manufacturer or consumer.
Hey, I completely agree and I also suffer from this same bias: it's ruining me from enjoying stuff that I would like to buy but in the end I just give up because it feels that any profit is a scam.
What kind of resource can I study for me to understand and accept other people making profits?
It is so weird we talk about caring about an invisible variable that is actually irrelevant.
In theory we should only look at the price and judge whether our expected benefits are likely to exceed that price. And we get distracted by measuring things in $, when what really matters is our benefits which can't be measured in $.
We are also distracted by ideals of fairness (a foolish goal in a business transaction) and zero-sum thinking (am I getting ripped off?)
I don't mind spending money on quality. What I hate is the information gap, and the costs of having to learn how to judge quality myself (because price is no proxy measure). I am distrustful of so many biased signals, plus so many other people's opinions are either unhelpful or influenced.
Mostly we each just fall back on an A versus B heuristic. I find it absolutely mad that the world works at all.
And an answer: look at the bad buying decisions made by others, and learn from their mistakes. I watch my father with money to spare, he wastes 2 hours to save $1, or he avoids spending money on something that would benefit his life or the life of someone he cares for, or he won't buy a Toyota because he hated their adverts once, or he keeps buying a Nissan even after being burnt by a severe costly design flaw.
I think I would like to be able to answer the following two questions:
1. what percentage of this object price is net profit?
2. is that percentage a "fair" proportion?
but atm, I don't have a "scientific" way to respond to those questions so I usually go with my gut, or do whatever other people in my circle do (which is not ideal and I'd like to change)
When you set pricing for a product, profit is a goal. You don't know how many devices will be returned, whether the device or its marketing will attract lawsuits, or whether you'll be able to sell all the devices at asking price.
You only know the actual profit margins much later, after you have sold the devices and seen them last through their warranty period.
If you'd like to minimize excess profit, take note of which products seem overpriced compared to their peers. Traditionally, anything Apple makes is a prime example. For a non-tech example, look at disposable alkaline batteries. Rayovac has been owned by Energizer since 2018 and their batteries have become increasingly comparable over time, yet Rayovac batteries are much less expensive than comparable Energizer batteries. The difference? Mostly marketing and profit margin, at this point.
Maybe reframing it can help you. You want the people to make money who produce the things/content you want to use and consume. It serves you as well as them.
This is a DIY watch for enthusiasts. It gives you a head start versus building one yourself. And you can for sure use it as-is and with pre-made apps. But don't expect it to be a mass market consumer product. Look elsewhere. The website clearly highlights this too.
Personally I never found myself using my NFC payment watch. It felt like if I was venturing far enough to the store, I'm just going to bring my phone with me anyways. I wonder if this differs for areas that don't get as much suburban sprawl.
I use NFC payments on my watch all the time, even though I have my phone and card in my pocket. Tapping my watch is just easier than digging into my pockets and/or opening my wallet app on my phone.
i like you use NFC via watch way more than by Phone. I don't wanna take out my phone all the time, i'd like to look at my phone screen less and less as time goes on.
I personally don't use NFC payment at all. I just can't see the utility in it. If I leave the house I have my wallet, and I find it easier to take my card out of my wallet than to fiddle with NFC on my phone.
Sometimes I leave the house with only my phone. Why carry two things when one thing will do fine for a quick trip? Its my car keys, my credit card, my transit pass, etc.
I've been moving towards using NFC payments for activating gas pumps as those readers still have you fully insert your card exposing the full mag strip.
Its also often faster for me to just tap my phone than to take my wallet out, pull out the specific card I'm wanting to use to pay, tapping/inserting that card, putting that card back, and then putting my wallet back. Instead my phone which still has a touch unlock is already unlocked before I take it out of my pocket and ready to be tapped and then put back in my pocket.
I can't say I relate - for one thing I don't have any of those things on my phone (except payment), but also I don't want them on my phone. We put way too much on them already, imo. But regardless, I always have wallet, phone and keys any time I leave the house. It doesn't really take effort to bring them, and that way I won't need them.
That's fascinating to me, because many times I've tried to do that it's an exercise in frustration. Terminals don't always have the sensor in the same spot, phones sometimes don't register the connection, and so on. Maybe things work better in the UK?
It can be a bit difficult, particularly now that some phones are getting more demanding about re-authorising before it will go through. Tap-try to get fingerprint scanner working-tap again is a much less fluid procedure than tap-go.
The position thing is just something you get used to. There's not that many reader models in active use and most of them are pretty good about marking where the nfc reader is these days.
The chip inside claims to support Bluetooth Low Energy, Bluetooth mesh, NFC, Thread and Zigbee. Maybe someone can hack together a payments app using the NFC?
You can't really, unless you get involved in the financial systems afaik. It's not just some open thing that anybody can implement; there's a chain of trust involved and for good reason.
Tbf I want a ring to do it. Samsung execs screwed up bad when they released the galaxy ring not only without nfc payments but also for that horrendous price. What a joke, now the big boy companies are proving that once you ditch engineers for suits enshittification begins.
I ordered a watch and I’m looking forward to making apps for it but I’m more excited at the prospect of making apps for a truly open phone with an eink display and 20x battery life. I think you have enough of a following now to attempt a small run of PebbleOS phones.
I know I’m not the only one and whatever gaps in applications you have aren’t as large as you think and can be filled in by the large passionate community you have fostered.
(and I wouldn’t worry about other attempts that have come
before you. Before Breaking Bad, studios told Vince Gilligan that Weeds already existed.)
I want to get a smartwatch that has enough functionalities to run a time tracker app with the purpose of not having to carry a phone most of the time. The existing ones are all WearOS or Apple watch, neither of which can be used in a freedom-preserving way. Would it be possible to write time tracking apps for these watches?
Can you tell us more about the touch screen? Is it only taps or will it support interactions using drag gestures too? How good is the accuracy, how many different simultaneous interaction surfaces can there realistically be?
Is there an emulator available somewhere where one can start prototyping an app with tap support?
This is what I'm most interested in. My only hope at the moment is for Apple to revive the iPhone mini -- even if they only refresh it every 3-5 years! I'm so bummed I'll be 'forced' to upgrade from my 12 mini later this year for mostly camera and battery reasons, but oh how I wish an iPhone 17 mini was on the horizon.
The original pebble was almost entirely dependent on it's connection with the android/ios app. Given the increase in onboard processing capabilities, are there any plans to allow for a more standalone experience?
As an iPhone+AW (S6) user, I consider the two devices married, perhaps even sharing the same mind. Almost everything that I can do with one is instantly and transparently mirrored on the other.
I can still leave my phone at home, and since I don't have a mobile connection on the watch (intentionally), it means I'm truly and fully offline - but I get to keep many features. I can listen to music (direct connection to BT headphones), tick items off the shopping list, pay for stuff, look up my schedule, etc. Some things could work offline where they currently don't (e.g. weather, maps/public transport), but the caching/syncing is overall surprisingly decent.
Unfortunately, it's all using private APIs, no third party watch has the same access, and you can't e.g. pair the AW with an iPad. But otherwise I think it should be the golden standard (perhaps DMA could get Apple to open up the APIs).
Hey, this is pretty slick! I'm not into smart wearables myself, but if I change my mind (or if I have to recommend one to family or friends) I know where to look!
Question: does either of the model have NFC capabilities, or is there any plans to add this feature in the future? I am looking specifically for a way to pay contactless with Graphene OS (which does not support NFC payments because Google does not want to).
I've preordered the Core Time 2, I'm so incredibly excited that you've resurrected Pebble like this!
My only hope is that you can bring the Time Round back in some form: Mine is unfortunately dead, and they're very difficult to purchase even second hand these days! It was the single best smartwatch I've ever owned and used
Any ideas what the screen refresh rate is going to be at this point? All the screenshots don't have time that includes seconds, and having a watch face that can update at least every second would be a requirement for me.
(I know e-ink displays can have fast refresh rates, like the 60Hz / fps Daylight computer - but that may not be cost effective / battery efficient here?)
What is the impact on battery life to have the screen update every second, versus every minute? Will it be possible to have the HR display, on faces that include it, rate-limited to achieve better battery life?
One of the nice things about Amazfit watches was that I could dial down the HR polling and get better battery life that way.
I think it's a little bit more. I don't know if I've ever measured it. You can definitely see it in battery life though. Using a watch face that only updates every minute will give you longer, better life.
Discontinued, but young for Garmin devices and still available if you're willing to pay irrational amounts of money. It doesn't make audio calls out, but can receive audio messages (to Bluetooth headphones) and send/receive "emergency" text messages either to the Garmin emergency response center (sends a helicopter to your location, if required) or by SMS with a few canned messages or tediously entered custom messages to to a predefined, pre-approved set of emergency contacts, as described here:
With the Garmin emergency contacts system, you can set up arbitrary messages to send to your emergency contacts. One of mine is "I'm OK, but need you to come pick me up".
Switch to a MIPS transflective or e-paper display as on a Pebble or Garmin, OLED and LCD displays on Apple and Samsung watches look pretty indoors (when they're not turned off to save power) but are hard to read outside (without excessive brightness) and are battery gobblers.
Just charged my Garmin Fenix for the first time in... 9 days (it was down at 18%, could get a few more days but it makes me nervous), most of the battery use went to some 11 hours of GPS activity recording and heart rate recording. Could get 30 days if I turned off the features the Pebble doesn't have.
Even Garmin has largely moved to AMOLED screens. They look great both indoors and outside and with modern technology they are not as battery hungry as they once were. Personally I find the battery life on my Apple Watch more than acceptable. I charge it while I’m showering and getting readying in the morning and have never had any issues even though I am a very heavy watch user and often use it independently of my phone.
I used to have a Pebble Time and agreed the battery life with those displays is nice, but honestly it doesn't bother me to put it on the charger every evening.
The only real benefit a longer battery life would have is not needing to bring a special charger if I go out of town for a few days, but I solved that years ago using a power bank that has qi and watch charging pads on it as my travel charger.
If anything, I'd switch back to a Pebble or similar because the Apple Watch does too much and I don't want that much gizmo on my person all the time. But the Pebble reboot products don't do it for me design-wise.
Just a tip with Apple watches: get the battery service at least once during the lifespan of your watch. It's $99 and Apple gives you a brand new watch.
With that battery service the watch should last you about 6-10 years judging by the current status of my Series 4.
Yes, a watch should be able to last a lot longer than that, but I think if you're buying Apple products you already have the expectation of a maximum 10 year lifespan just from software alone with just about the entire product lineup.
As long as it's minor scratching and not big chips or cracks, yes. Another huge plus to the battery service.
Another tip regarding scratches is that the higher tier finishes (Stainless Steel or Titanium in the Series 10) are, in my opinion, worth the price premium solely for the improved screen glass.
Apple barely mentions the spec nowadays, and I'm not sure why they don't tout it. A conspiracy theorist might say that it's because it keeps your watch looking new longer so they'd rather you be buying the cheap one frequently.
The sapphire crystal screen is the killer feature that justifies the upgraded models more than anything else: it's something like a whole extra number higher on the Mohs scale for hardness (scratch resistance).
I buy them on the refurbished store to lessen the pain of their ridiculously inflated price.
You may have an app draining your battery. Was having the same issue with my watch, I deleted a few apps and all of the sudden my watch was better. I can’t tell you what app was because it was just luck. I was creating space on my phone when it happened.
It most likely has a lot to do with the display tech.
I got 8 days out of the PineTime, which was LED (I assume). You couldn't see anything if the display wasn't turned on.
I just bought a BangleJS (quite a bit cheaper than the Core 2 Duo, but no speaker and only one button) and the estimated battery life is a month. It uses a colour LCD, making the display visible whenever there is light. For example, daylight makes the display bright. It has a light source that gets turned on by the button.
The Core 2 Duo has an e-paper display that only draws power when the display changes.
The battery on the Ultras is about double the regular series watch batteries, so that tracks. My point was that I was going to struggle with having a device that I couldn't rely on to make it through a full day including the evening— having to take it off for a charging session in the afternoon would be too disruptive for the overall package to be worth it to me.
> This thread is full of people complaining how these aren't like their preferred watches
Which is funny to me because that's explicitly the point.
> These watches are not made for everyone. We want to be upfront with you about what to expect.
It's probably the most frustrating part of smartwatches. Everyone has a different list of mandatory features, and few seem to accept that their list isn't universal. Unlike phones where just about all of them have just about all the features, the smartwatch market is a wild west. It makes finding the right one for you a lot of work, and it's understandably disappointing when a watch checks all but one or two of your "must have"s.
The thing that really frustrates me right now about this is that between the two watches, basically all of my boxes are ticked, but some of those boxes are mutually exclusive between the watches.
When a product has two price points, like this, it's usually expected that the more expensive one is strictly "better" than the cheaper one in some ways. That isn't the case here, and it makes everything more difficult. Most of us are conditioned to look at the more expensive version, and say "are these extra features worth $X extra" and decide that way. With these watches, I have to try to think about whether I would use a compass or heart rate monitor more.
>unlike phones where just about all of them have just about all the features
I knew my preferences were niche, but I didn't think they were that niche. There hasn't been a phone with even half my ideal feature list (that works in the US) in probably close to a decade, and even if I abandon my more niche "nice to haves", there are essentially no new phones, and that's even before I add in that I'd really like it to be relatively repairable. And yes, there _used_ to be phones that had my entire feature list, so it's not a completely crazy list. It's just that phone makers have converged a pretty standard feature list with not too many companies coloring outside the lines. If you want that particular feature list, then sure, everyone has "all the features", but there is a whole universe of additional features that phones could (and some did) have, that they no longer do.
Would you mind sharing what those features are? About the only things I can think of that some phones used to have, but now largely don't, is removable battery, IR blaster, headphone jack, or keyboard. I can understand missing those features, even though they don't particularly matter to me.
I'm surprised you mentioned IR blaster, which is on my list, but I consider the second most niche one after FM tuner, which my current phone actually does have. Here's my list from what I consider most reasonable to most niche:
Small size. I'm a 6'2" male, so my hands are probably pretty well above the population average. Maybe it's because I'm a lefty, but I hate how big phones have gotten. It makes one hand use almost impossible, and if it's that hard for me, I have to assume that most people have just given up on even trying. I'd really prefer a sub 5.5" phone screen (part of me wants to say even smaller, but it's been so long since I've used a phone that small, that I don't even know anymore what my ideal size/lower limit is).
Headphone jack. Relatively self explanatory, imo.
No camera cutout. I hate them. I'd literally rather give up the screen real estate and have a bigger top bezel (although, see my point 1, I obviously value screen size less than most consumers). Luckily in Android you can just turn off the screen around the cutout in developer options, but I'd prefer to just not have the screen there. At least on my current phone, it still wastes battery (this might be a non-issue on OLED screens) and will register touches, preventing proper touch recognition elsewhere (this is related to the difficulty of single handed use, would probably be mitigated on a smaller phone)
SD card slot. Maybe the easiest of this list to actually still find? It seems like a decent number of phones these days have a spot for it in in the SIM card tray. I've heard that the reason companies don't include it is that a lot of SD cards are trash and wear out pretty quickly. This could lead to consumers losing data and being mad at the phone manufacturer. In my opinion, this is understandable, but still a bad reason.
IR Blaster/FM Tuner. I consider these two together. They are both pretty niche, and are "nice to haves". Mostly because I want my phone to be as much of a general purpose communications device as possible. The times when these are helpful are infrequent, but in those rare times, extremely nice to have.
Replaceable battery actually isn't on my list, mostly because I consider it part and parcel of "repairability", which (maybe nonsensically) seems like a different category. And, for me personally, battery degradation actually hasn't been a problem for phones. The two biggest things I would want to be able to repair are charging ports (this would be mitigated with wireless charging) and screen repair. These are, for me at least, the two most likely parts to break/wear out, and in my opinion they should both be cheap and easy to repair. Of course, if it was easy to do those two, you'd get battery replacement almost by default, and I certainly wouldn't be mad about easier to swap batteries.
Yeah I took a gander at GSMarena and your feature set hasn't been made past March of 2019 or so, which is a shame. I liked my Sony Xperia Compact, so if there ever was a pixel phone of that size I'd get one.
The issue I'm seeing is many people were expecting the watch that was advertised in the old Kickstarter.
The "pebble 2" from the Kickstarter -> "core 2 time"
The "pebble 2 time" is nowhere to be found.
(The pebble 2 time was supposed to be the same underlying hardware, but a much classier case, slightly different form factor). They look much more like a normal watch, versus the pebble style feels like a geek toy.
I still get compliments on my pebble time round to this day!
It's kind of weird segmentation, but, given neither has GPS, I wonder how many people who'd seriously consider buying one of these really care about having a compass & barometer. Are those often important features to someone who doesn't care about GPS?
Having a compass and a barometer could be a "happy accident" of already having an all in one sensor that does all that things.
The compass could be easily related to an accelerometer used for detecting watch position (a function commonly used in smartwatches to power on the screen on certain positions that suggest you're looking at it) or detecting "steps".
Not so sure about where could you also get the barometric pressure sensor...
The barometer is "nice to have". The compass is non-negotiable. It is extremely useful once you get used to remembering that you have one. Example: you have arrived at a train station in a new city. You have planned your route - you need to catch a bus from a stop on the west side of the station. You alight on the platform and there are multiple exits - you are completely disoriented. Turn left or right?
I had an old Suunto from before they went to crap, by far my favourite function was vertical speed, and it relied only on the accelerometer (the watch had GPS, but turning it on killed battery life). I still tried a couple of newer models but they removed that function.
It would be nice to track elevation change/stairs climbed during hiking, even if you don't care about GPS. I'll probably hang onto my old Garmin for exercise though, so this is sorta moot for me. Mostly it was just surprising to see that the pricier one was not a superset of the cheaper one.
Personally I try to disable GPS in my smartphone when hiking unless I need to check the maps — I prefer to have my communication device not dead when I need it, and modern smartphones are terrible with battery life
For sure, barometers are useful, I'm an avid backpacker and make use of the one in my watch for sudden weather changes and altitude, but if I'm buying a $150+ smartwatch to take backpacking, I just wouldn't really consider one without GPS.
Same here. Based in the EU, I was ready to buy one on day one, but when I saw the prices listed only in USD I had to stop right there. Just the shipping alone would be $25, plus the uncertainty of duty fees. I hope to see an EU store soon — with prices in EUR, low-cost shipping, and all fees already factored in.
International shipments will not be sent from the USA; they'll be shipped directly from Asia. The comment is in reference to your own countries - they may charge tariffs.
Thanks for clarifying! It would be helpful to mention that in the FAQ — knowing that the US has no involvement when ordering from the EU would be reassuring.
I'm super happy about the revival (I backed the first Pebble Kickstarter) and the bullet list of key features you're targeting would make my dream watch, but I hope you take this as constructive criticism that you're way off right now on this one:
- Simple and beautiful design
It's ugly, and the gap with the industrial design of today's watches is wider. I suggest contracting with a good industrial design firm to redesign the case: the case material, screen and internal electronics can remain the same.
I had the same reaction. The Core Time 2 gives Vader vibes. My hope is that the third color will be metallic and will look better. I prefer the rounded edges of the Pebble Time Steel 2. [1]
it's unique, and it's not even that bad. you shouldn't compare this to the apple watches of the world when the screen itself could display 64 colours at best (monochrome at worst). the design language should line in perfectly with those from the pebble os. it's supposed to be quirky, not liking the looks of it just means you're not the target audience.
It's not the worst but the original Pebble Time Steel looks better IMO. I understand why they used a simpler case design (They don't have the resources to make anything like the PTS) but I still like the PTS design more. Maybe someone will come out with a custom case or something idk
I very much disagree. This design gives me old school Casio vibes, and I really, really like it. My father has worn an old model from Casio for decades, and I have a lot of nostalgia around it.
the option to pair with an external gps would be better all round, apart from having a separate thing to carry. i have a garmin glo 2 that i pair to my android when doing openstreetmap stuff, and its something that you would barely notice in your pocket or clipped onto a backpack
I'm curious that the $150 ones has a barometer and compass, while the $225 one doesn't in favour of a heart rate monitor.
Given that they're specifically saying you shouldn't use it as a sports watch, what use is an HRM, especially when compared to the utility of a compass and barometer/altimeter?
I think HRM is more useful than compass/barometer since HR is the only thing your phone can't do.
The https://www.whoop.com/, for example, doesn't even have GPS. All of its value comes from its HRM.
Barometer is especially niche and not something very trustworthy outside of devices made for it. To the average person, compass is only useful for showing orientation on a map.
Are you going to sell replacement parts this time? I was immensely disappointed to see the initial watches being pretty repairable in theory, but no parts being sold. It was marketed as a tinkerer‘s device after all.
I’m wearing my Pebble Time Steel right now - and quite like it. Haven’t found anything better. It could use some better activity tracking, but the worst thing about it right now is that it doesn’t really have an iOS app (AltStore is pretty flaky). Any news on that front?
For some reason there just hasn’t been a real spiritual successor, so the revival is greatly appreciated.
Searching for 'pebble core 2 duo' already comes up with a page of results only related to the watch[1] (including this very comment thread, ironically[2].) Search engines are very good these days.
And I think it's brilliant: it says "ca 2010 technology, the good parts". Technically, it's not exactly correct (according to Wikipedia Core 2 was discontinued a year before the Pebble launched), but it's one of the few lasting iconic names from that era in technology that aren't Apple. RePebble playing with that reference is exactly the same pattern as xyz-90 letter combinations reminiscent of audio cassette blanks popping up all over the music industry when the 80ies revival was in bloom.
Will it eventually end in a "we got sued by Intel!" marketing gambit? Certainly a possibility. Is assume they have played through both scenarios.
They'll be cheeky, the big dinosaur corporate will come out swinging and look bad like they always do, and they'll get a load of press in the tech websites which is their target market.
I don't think this one would necessarily work out like that - here they have (seemingly) intentionally named the watch identically to a product name that already exists, in a fairly closely related field, that they should know is most likely trademarked...
The bad press comes when it feels unfair for the big company to try and pursue action but in this case it would seem that Intel would be perfectly justified...
Perhaps a trademark lawyer can weigh in. My understanding is that a trademark is strictly limited to the areas (both in terms of geography and vertical) claimed in the application. This is why Apple didn't have to do battle with the Beatles until they got into the music business.
Yeah because "apple" is a common term that people might reasonably expect two businesses to use. The point of trademark law is to prevent consumer confusion.
I am not a trademark lawyer and I haven't even looked this up but if Apple made a "The Beatles Laptop" then I would hope that defence doesn't apply.
The main thing is if a consumer would be confused. I don't think consumers would be confused about an ancient Intel processor and a brand new smartwarch.
> it doesn’t really have an iOS app (AltStore is pretty flaky). Any news on that front?
I thought the Pebble app still worked, using Rebble. My understanding is that they are building a new app for the new watches, if that's what you were asking about.
The only way to install the old iOS Pebble app is by sideloading via something like AltStore (or doing it manually every week). Maybe you can also still re-install it if you had it installed when it was available in the App Store but I'm not sure if that still works.
I have an original backer watch and bought one when they launched. Both stopped working within maybe 6 months and support at the time suggested I just buy another...
I had an OG pebble, it was a gift from a conference. An amazing product, more Apple than Apple in terms of making clear tradeoffs to provide real utility & design quality.
Reading this press release I thought -- they perfectly read the minds of the target customer. Retaining the spirit of the product and exceeding expectations with polished improvements.
Eric, I’m interested in what you learnt picking up a 10 year old open hardware project.
I’m especially interested in the “revival” nature of this project. How did staying mostly true to the original vision guide you practically?
You mentioned briefly that some apps may have stopped working as they attempt to hit now no existent url endpoints. Least of which is likely the old official pebble endpoints.
Have you done any design work as a revival project such that the project will be more robust in future. Eg 50 years from now, if things didn’t pan out and your company is still here, such that the watches and their apps are all that bit more resilient?
Curious as to your thoughts on designing in longevity of serviceability into this reboot given you can feel that yourself.
I'm very tempted to order one, but I made a similar decision recently. I got rid of my Apple Watch and replaced it with a cheap wrist heart rate monitor that can connect to a phone, but doesn't need to (and I didn't). I wear it at the gym and that's it. That's all smart watches ever were for me, and if this isn't what Pebble is going for, it sounds like I should pass.
Though I will be keeping an eye on them incase my needs change. I hope they do well and stay true to their ethos, and avoid trying to chase or become the Apple Watch.
Just a brief note to say: loved original Pebble, always a regret that my younger poorer self didn't buy one way back when, so bit the bullet straight away yesterday and am signed up for the first batch of the black Core 2 Duo in July.
Two features which I think it would be useful to give more prominence to especially as you move from pre-order stage to general sale stage:
Strap is replaceable in both models
Both models count steps
Would be high priority things for me! Look forward to seeing how this develops and best of luck.
As someone who was a huge fan of the original Pebble series, it's hard to get excited about this offering when compared to the alternatives available today with more features and a cheaper price.
I'm currently wearing the BangleJS v2 [0] which has the following going for it, all for $90USD:
* 1.3 inch 176x176 always-on 3 bit colour LCD display (LPM013M126) with backlight
* Full touchscreen (6H hardness glass)
* GPS/Glonass receiver
* Heart rate monitor
* 3 Axis Accelerometer
* 3 Axis Magnetometer
* Air Pressure/Temperature sensor
* 175mAh battery, 4 week standby time
* Full SWD debug port on rear of watch
* The OS and every app are open source, all written in Javascript
In my experience it lasts over 2 weeks with multiple daily notifications and wearing it 24/7 for HR and sleep tracking.
The Pebble was a compelling offer when it came out, but I'll have to pass on this one.
The original blog post for the revived Pebble was very clear about the design goals and it drove home something quite clearly: this is not going to deliver a laundry list of features or support all possible lifestyles. It will be focused on doing a few things well because there's a need for a modern Pebble not met by existing watches.
I have a Bangle2 and while it's super fun, I think it perfectly illustrates the point that simply having features isn't enough. I would not say my Bangle2 is the same as my OG Pebble.
As someone who only ever cared about a handful of features (HR, sleep, steps, notifications), the BangleJS is definitely the superior offering imo.
It does everything my Pebble did, it's cheaper, and it's been open source since day one rather than first requiring an acquisition and resurrection.
Obviously different strokes for different folks, Eric is great and I wish him and the team over at Rebble (hi ishot!) all the best, but the smartwatch landscape is very different from what it was in 2014
What's the software like? One of the biggest reasons I'm still using my pebbles is Notification Center, which has the most control over watch notifications that I've ever seen, likes being able to set regex filters and get very fine green control about what notifications get sent to my watch their vibration etc)
Unfortunately it's the software that determines how good such a device is to use. What's currently considered the best firmware for the Bangle?
I will also note that backlit LCD is vastly inferior to e-paper in smartwatches. Size of the watch also matters, there are some tradeoffs you have to make.
The official one, which runs great. And since it's all open JS there's even alternative app menus and launchers if you're not happy with the stock option
I forgot to add that this LCD screen is perfectly readable in direct sunlight, I wouldn't know it was not e-ink at a casual glance. Even at extreme angles the only thing that makes it difficult is the reflectivity of the front glass, but I have a large font watchface so even that is a minimal issue.
The second version seems to have something more sunlight readable but neither Bangle 1 or 2 seem to be neither transreflective LCDs (e-paper) or e-ink, seems to be just TFT LCDs. At least according to their homepage.
As a banglejs 2 wearer as well: I think it's the closest competitor by a very large margin, but I would absolutely not call it a polished experience. I've had intermittent (and persistent) connection failures (definitely improving over time), heartrate is all over the place and is almost totally unreliable (some weeks my resting heartrate is apparently >200bps, and some I never break 100), the gadgetbridge app has loads of minor wtfs, touches are not well aligned if you have a status bar visible, the UI is kinda laggy, it's not waterproof, and I can probably write up another couple dozen more OTOH if I try for a few minutes.
I consider myself a happy customer, and will definitely recommend it with caveats, there's a lot to like about the banglejs 2. But it's targeting a FAR more hacker-oriented crowd than Pebbles did - I would absolutely not suggest one to people who are not willing to debug their watch. It's quite simple to do so (really, I like it!), but it's not something I can recommend to the normies in my life.
I looked at a few Banglejs-in-action videos and the limitations look so bad that I'm not sure what you'd even build for it. The app store only seems to confirm this.
Pebble only has to be a little better to be 2x more usable. Looking at old videos from 8 years ago, the software was much, much better than anything I'm seeing on Banglejs today.
Any chance of wireless charging? I can't imagine it being so complicated or expensive... tho most smartwatches come with custom pins so there has to be a reason.
Worst aspect of these watches are the custom charging cradles you have to lug around when travelling.
Hell, even usb-c with some cap/sliding door mechanism would be better.
While I really do like wireless charging for watches (no exposed electrical contacts == easier waterproofing and no corrosion to worry about, and the battery capacities are so low that slow charging barely matters): 2 and 4 pin magnetic charging cables are extremely common in smart watches, it's what pebble used before, and it sounds like what they're using for these as well. "Standard pebble charger" is listed in the tech-specs, which likely means the 2-pin version.
"Standard" wireless charging (Qi) requires a reciever 30x44mm, too big for a smartwatch. Custom wireless charging, like bluetooth earbuds, requires a custom charger. And we're back to the custom charging cradle. Might as well just put pins in it and call it a day. I do wish the pins were standardized though.
I understand this is a semi experiment and will not expect the warranty or certainty that an Apple will give. This is to support the possibility of making an alternative become viable.
Question for Eric, is there a way to ensure charging works with USB? Please don't make us carry yet another cable.
Maybe I skimmed too quickly, are there no size/dimensions published? Seems the display size is there, and the strap width, but no other details as far as I can tell.
I couldn't agree more on how restricted popular smartwatches are. I'm working on a project to capture the maximum physiological and health data—such as heart rate (HR), heart rate variability (HRV), stress levels, and SpO2—from a smartwatch in the shortest possible interval. So far, the best I've achieved is once per minute. Could pebble support obtaining this data (particularly HRV) at even shorter intervals?
I also tinker with health data from wearables. I've built some Whoop-like UIs for a couple cheapo wrist straps from Aliexpress, but their HR monitors are always so bad that they're useless outside of when you're sleeping.
Why was that frame choosen over the other ones?
I fee PTR and PTS where by far the most modern looking and beautiful ones.
Do you consider bringing that pebble 2 back with the same look?
PS: Pebble owner and daily user since more than 5 years here
I’d buy one! With the Bluetooth power use improvements mentioned for today’s watches, the tiny Round battery ought to be good for a week or more now, right?
My main complaint about Apple Watch is the size, so a very slim watch might get me to switch back. Have a Time in a drawer somewhere, but I assume its battery is shot by now.
I'm hesitant to order because I much preferred the designs of the PTS and PTR. And I had a PTS for years. I hope you do consider it in the future, as I am having a hard time pulling the trigger purely for design reasons, the rest is great.
I don't understand this in the slightest. There's no advantage whatsoever to a round screen, but tons of disadvantages. Why not make your phone screen round? Why not make your computer screen round? Your TV?
Please, Core, resist the temptation to enshittify yourself with another useless round screen.
The pebble time round was the stylish version of the Pebble Time, you lost battery life and a smaller display but you got a significantly thinner sleeker watch.
I daily drive the pebble time, but wear my round for dates or when I want to be a bit more stylish. I still get compliments on it to this day.
Because the larger market of watch buyers end up buying way way more round watches than square or other shapes, thus a lager market of buyers and prices are probably lower. I don't really care though. It doesn't matter for these kinds of low sales boutique devices. I ordered one ;-)
I would buy one but only if I am guaranteed to be able to compile the source code somewhat easily and flash it to the device. Anyone knows if they have made any promises around that?
Who did the product design (cad, picking components, etc) for both of these watches? Is this in house? (shout them out!) or did you work with an outside firm, and if so which one?
I was surprised at the time how cheap the original Pebbles were, they were nearly exactly what I wanted and I would have been willing to pay more for mine. In fact I ultimately paid more to replace mine with a watch I like less. When Pebble folded I wondered if having too low of price ultimately hurt them - if they didn't pick up enough customers to make up on volume what they left off the table on per-unit revenue? I hope the relaunch is successful, and I assume they have all manner of internal data that says I'm wrong, but my initial reaction to the listed prices is the same as it was to the originals - they seem too low. (I'm setting aside the caveat about a potential price change due to tariffs and assuming they launch at current list price.)
There's a big difference: it's 2025 and there are no shortage of competitors that look better and have more features than a $150 Pebble 2 or $225 Time 2. Unlike 2015 the market already has a $200 Apple Watch, $60 Amazfit Bip, $55 CMF Watch Pro, and a $220 Coros Pace which will track an ultramarathon. All these devices are made by mature companies and have multiple revisions.
I liked my Pebbles, but I won't spend $300 on one because the chance of failure (again) is so great.
I'm not sure why manufacturers would care - it's a ten year old device with limited appeal. Chinese manufacturers already make better, cheaper watches.
> I'm setting aside the caveat about a potential price change due to tariffs and assuming they launch at current list price
As you should, because if they raise the price because of tariffs they won't see a dime of it. It's less raising the price and more that they don't yet know how much tax they'll be expected to collect and remit.
As someone who has exclusively worn a pebble since it was crowd funded, I am trilled. I love purpose built devices[0] that don't attempt to do everything. I don't need a watch that does everything, just triage notification and perform time related activities and get out of the way. Pebble has always fit that niche. The fact that I can hack on it and mold it to my needs has been icing.
I have some sincere questions on the design choices. For context, I own a pebble time (everyday wear for triaging notifications) and a polar watch (for exercise tracking). Also part of a cycling community where we swap exercise watches to try out what else is out there. I have found I always sleep in my polycarb pebble time because I forget I am wearing it - it is that unnoticeable.
1) Why limit Core 2 Duo screen to BW? Feels like a step back when the Core Time 2 will have it. Sourcing parts?
2) According to the blog, I understand the Core Time 2 is your (Eric's) dream watch, so not trying to rain on your parade but trying to reason about the audience you're catering to here. The heart rate monitor suggests that it can be used to track physical activity. But... no GPS, metal (heavy) case, and protruding sensor diminish the utility of the sensor. If you've ever run with a light watch, you'll start noticing how quickly metal watches fatigue the skin. I've slept with watches on that track my sleep (optically) and the protruding sensors always causes pressure points - similar to a pebble (heh) in the shoe. Having 30 days battery life, speaker, and better vibration make for a great gadget that doesn't need to be taken off... unless it is not comfortable.
[0]: https://www.polar.com/en/science/whitepapers Purpose built devices are optimized and companies that build they have domain knowledge. You've probably never heard of polar but they publish the science behind their features where as garmin has nice looking gear but has gimmicky features, like "body battery"
1) Yes, the hardest part of building a watch is getting a display. There is only 1 vendor and we have to use what they make. Custom displays cost $1m+ and take 18 months to build.
2) It's not a running watch. I'd recommend getting garmin if you're looking for that.
> 2) It's not a running watch. I'd recommend getting garmin if you're looking for that.
I think we are on the same page but I've communicated poorly. Why even include a heart rate sensor on a watch that is not intended for exercising in when the trade-off is sacrificing comfort and raising the complexity and cost of the design?
I've used exercise as a catch all for continuous monitoring of the heart. Point being, to get more utility out of a sensor, you'd have to wear it more with less interruption. 30 days without taking off a device is... Unheard of (and wicked cool!). So comfort will be more appreciated in the long term, I suspect
I've mentioned this in the above reply but I'll repeat here: It is not common to wear watches for more than a few days at a time simply because there are not many whose battery will last that long. The effects of fatigue/pressure point from the sensor bump are less observed but not missing. Majority of consumers wear Apple/Android watches that need to be recharged every day. With 30 days on wrist, I can extrapolate that fatigue will be more pronounced - so I am calling it out.
I acknowledge this is a niche concern/complaint but this is a niche product for a niche base of folks, I'm simply curious about why. I want this to succeed and be sustainable so I asked about the utility of the sensor and provided a counter example since it's additional raises complexity.
It is not common to wear watches for more than a few days at a time simply because there are not many whose battery will last that long. The effects of fatigue/pressure point from the sensor bump are less observed but not missing. With 30 days on wrist, I can extrapolate that fatigue will be more pronounced - so I am calling it out. I understand I am a small sample size but I have 2 watches whose battery lasts 7 days and the one without the bump is more pleasant to wear for a week between charges. To the point that I always reach for the comfort option and eventually sold off the other.
I don't use my watch for running (using a 7 year old Fitbit versa). However, I do keep it on the entire day unless it is charging. I was curious what the weight of the Time 2 was going to be (I don't see it in the specs). I just wanted to compare the weight of it to my existing device. Thanks!
On my Samsung Galaxy watch, if I get a notification from my Unifi security cameras, for example, I get a little thumbnail image appear on my watch. There's no special app on my watch, just the app on my paired Galaxy phone.
Will it do this? Or would I just get a text notification? I don't understand smart watches well enough to know how much they are doing themselves vs how much of what they do is to be a mindless projection of whatever the paired phone tells them to do.
The Pebble software doesn't have support for images in notifications right now. But it definitely could/should be added. And it's open source, so you could even do it yourself!
I am not familiar with the pebble SDK or notification API it has. Smart watches usually will display whatever notification the mobile devices instructs it to display.
If you get a push notification on your mobile, I don't see a reason why pebble won't display it. The thumbnail image might be fixed but all the text content will be shown. And FWIW, the entire thing is open source so you can go in an add it, or open feature requests, etc.
Use the Android pebble app "Notification Center" and it should be able to do that for you.
(Notification Center gives you extreme amounts of control over what to send to the watch how it gets displayed, etc. It's the reason I'm still daily wearing my pebble watches)
1. IIRC the first Pebble was $99, and the one after it was $149. We're a decade on, inflation is rampant, and the new devices are evidently intended as lower volume products. $149 seems OK to me in 2025. $225 seems OK as well for the color unit, but I don't feel like waiting until December, and can't justify buying two watches. I put my money down for the $149 unit. We'll see how much it ends up being by the time it's on my wrist in Ireland. My current "smart" watch is a Mi Band 6. I'm on screen no.2, strap no.3, and shortly battery no.2: all told, I certainly have $100 invested in it by now, even though it cost me 42 Swiss Francs ($45?) to buy initially.
2. There are other hacking-friendly watches out there, but they do not have the depth of app ecosystem that Pebble did/does. I think those thousands of watchfaces and applications ready to fire on day1 are worth something. This is not a net-new smartwatch environment, it is an established if a bit aged standard that is being polished back up for the modern world.
3. I'm the target market, but I definitely don't have an Apple watch because it doesn't work with Android devices, and I absolutely detest iOS (and am increasingly frustrated with Apple's blatant cash grab-ism vis-a-vis RAM and flash prices on their computers to the point that I've pivoted back to Linux devices).
I managed to eke out a couple more years after Pebbles were discontinued by finding replacements on ebay. If this is a low volume run, I'm contemplating the opposite—whether I can justify not buying multiple while I still can.
Apple Watch doesn't work on Android, and Android Wear watches are laggy garbage with stupid round screens. There are zero good options on the Android side, so something like Pebble\Core has value.
I had an original Kickstarter Pebble, a Pebble Time, and am probably ordering this new Pebble, but I have to say you have it the other way around. Apple Watch has 10x the functionality in this comparison, but they're both delightful devices and I'm excited to have a Pebble back in my rotation!
Sorry but while I won’t argue the battery life angle, you really cannot say that the PebbleOS offers significantly more functionality than WatchOS. It just ain’t so.
Am I just out of my mind for feeling like I should wait a few months for a cheaper hardware equivalent to drop without an OS that will run Pebble?
I guess $100 average profit is "normal" in terms of production, marketing, r&d and all of that.. but this is just an old watch that someone is selling again since the OS was open sourced. The profit is just all profit.. I can't imagine a non-US manufacturer won't just start cranking out devices people can flash with a better OS.
As a Pebble fan I'm sad to say I'm a little bit disappointed. I love the pebble ethos but I think the design for the Core Time 2 is a step back in terms of style compared to the final Pebble options. I rocked an OG Pebble and it was nerdy in a way that I didn't mind at the time, but now with smartwatches being so common and having so many cheap and feature packed options with multi-day battery life I think the styling matters a lot more. Pebble in particular could have a big advantage here with the reflective display since you can show a lot of personality in the always-on watch face without it being distracting, but I think you would need a more minimal and sleek body to make that a selling feature.
As it is I find the pricing to be a hard sell given how many features you are losing compared even to cheap fitness bands e.g. lots of advanced health tracking, NFC payments. I applaud Eric on self-funding the project and I'm sure the risk and volume questions there are contributors to the cost.
All that said, I may still pick up a duo because there really isn't anything like a Pebble and I would really like this to be a success so that we can see lower prices, more styles, and an even more awesome community at some point in the future.
For what it's worth, I'm also a Pebble fan and I love the styling of these watches. I always thought that the original style looked much nicer than the later, "more stylish" designs. So I think this is just a case where they can't please everyone, and are trying to stick to what people originally liked (or perhaps their own design tastes).
I don't think that this should be trying to compete head-on with existing smartwatches on styling. And for the purposes of a hackable device, a larger screen seems like a selling point. Also, the larger screen makes touchscreen features more usable.
Agreed with respect to size and the touchscreen which I do think is a great addition. I just think something that's more of a continuation of the Time series designs would be better fitting for a $200+ option. The Time 2 body which would have had the exact same screen would be fine by me.
Pre-ordered 2 different units; really excited for these to ship.
Got a Pebble Time in highschool and it was so much fun to use and so polished. It was one of the first electronic devices to truely enamor me. I have worked with embedded syatems for the last ~3 years and I have been wondering lately just how no-one else has been able to since make a smartwatch with such good "taste" as the Pebbles...
Happy to have a fresh device to live with! Thank you Eric!
I also had a Pebble Time in high school. That was an incredible watch. Beautiful, polished, functional, but still had a nerdy charm from the display. I miss it so much and this announcement is so exciting.
I am beside myself with excitement. This has been in the back of my mind 8 years, I always believed. I have never pre-ordered anything this quickly in my life.
For those of us interested in health metrics - can we expect the precision of the heart rate sensor to be sufficient for calculating HRV (heart rate variability)? It doesn't have to be natively supported, but I'd love to see a third party app offer this some day... In fact I may work on it myself, provided the data from HR sensor is good enough.
Elimination of phantom vibrations. You always know when your phone buzzed if your wrist buzzes right afterward. Also nice to see what a notification is without having to take out your phone.
Would have been nice to see a model without a microphone. I understand I'm a minoritiy (workplace doesn't allow devices with mics), but being severely hamstrung with smartwatch choices that don't have a microphone is tough. Will still definitely buy one to support the project, and will eagerly watch (heh) for new models!
Agree with sibling, security theater largely. I suspect the logic of banning is to stop recordings of conversations, whereas Bluetooth is just a protocol for sending data. Eliminate collection sensors and mediums for transmit are fine.
I did decide to purchase a Pebble Time Steel and a new battery alongside the Core 2 Duo. I hope that with Eric back in charge, the old Pebbles will be allowed to use the new app and hopefully get modern apps.
It's great to see PebbleOS making a comeback! Regarding the questions about NFC payments and GPS, these would definitely be valuable features to consider for future models. The demand is clearly there, and it would make the watches more competitive with other smartwatches on the market.
I was worried about it using an "e-paper" display considering the originals used Sharp MiP LCDs, however from that demo video the refresh rate is insane! I guess I haven't looked at e-paper modules in a wee while!
Open source and hackable makes this a dream watch replacement for my old watch. Hopefully these new watches see great success, so much so that they motivates competition that is willing to sale in stores so that I can buy one.
> 1. Can I choose a color for Core Time 2? Yes you can! Just not yet. We are finalizing all the color options and will contact everyone prior to shipping so you can choose which color best suits you! Just make sure your contact information is correct for your pre-order
I am extremely ready to drop my FitBit since they do nothing but make the product worse. The only major watch brand with something small is Garmin with their extremely ugly vivo smart.
But I am worried about compatibility. I assume it will be possible to connect into Home Assistant eventually, but would be nice to get confirmation on how open the platform plans to be in allowing me to get my own data.
I also wonder if they will pursue partnerships. I feel safe sharing my walking data with my insurance company and can usually max out the rewards simply by getting my steps in on most days and doing normal annual things. Will Pebble work with them?
If it’s sensitive enough, a compelling skydiving altimeter app could be developed. Considering most purpose built altis used worse screens and cost 350+, could be a quite compelling use case.
Can you use the new Pebble watches without an accompanying smartphone application? I've wanted to get a smartwatch, but have always been put off by the requirement of a stupid app to synchronise data with a recent smartphone to be able to use it. They have all the necessary hardware to record and process data on board... don't see why it should require an expensive Apple or Android every few years to keep using. My Timex from 2011 cost £35 and still works perfectly.
If the goal is to make a product impossible to google, "core 2 duo" is a pretty good choice, since it'll turn up 99.9999% results related to an obsolete Intel desktop PC CPU.
Interesting as companion for a phone.
Anyone know of a hackable or privacy friendly standalone watch that can be used to make calls (e.g. for children pre smartphone age)?
As one of the watch enthusiasts with a collection of several dozen straps, it's refreshing to see the watches including quick-release straps right out of the box. That makes quick-swapping to our NATO straps easy peasy!
There's something genuinely heartwarming about seeing Eric Migicovsky remain true to his vision, finally delivering the product I dreamed of but couldn't afford a decade ago, after all.
This might be asking too much, but will there be any way to run the newer pebbleOS on the first-gen Pebbles? I love my Steel, and am currently still using it
I liked the old feature of the alarm clock vibrating when the wearer was in the good phase of sleep to wake up in, please make sure the new watches also have that.
I'd like to hack around with the HR sensor, so I pre-ordered the Time 2.
What are good resources for looking into building an app for it? I see the OS is hosted here https://github.com/pebble-dev/pebble-firmware But most pebble-related google searches bring up ancient material and I'm not sure what's still relevant.
The ancient material is relevant because nothing has changed since the company went out of business :) I'm wearing a Pebble right now and I was able to update one of my favorite watchfaces using a docker container of the old Pebble SDK. The blog post says there will be an updated SDK released with the new watches.
A newbie to smartwatches question : How are RePebbleOS watches when it comes to privacy? Do they offer complete offline, manual data download/sync experience or do they require some type of Google or Apple crapware to work?
I am mainly considering buying one to track my heart rate, but I don't want my data to leave my watch unless I copy it myself. Any budget friendly recommendations?
Vague question, as privacy means different things to different people, but its very hackable, so as long as you're running Android you should be able to make it work how you want.
By default it uses the Pebble App for sync. You can decide whether that meets your privacy needs or you want a custom app. Someone has probably shared how to do what you want.
See the other trending HN post for Apple compatibility (TL;DR it sucks because Apple makes it suck).
Thanks. Sorry if it was vague. Basically my first preference would be to not have any need to connect to a mobile phone (so no android or apple). And if that is not possible it is preferable to connect via de-googled Android. I guess I need to find out whether Pebble App sync works on GrapheneOS, and whether Pebble App sync requires internet/data permission - just trying to make sure the data doesn't leave my phone.
You need a mobile phone since they don't have internet access directly.
After that you should be totally fine, what are you hoping for your smartwatch to do? I primarily use my pebble for notifications from my phone to show up on my watch which doesn't require any sort of external access.
I need it to track my heart rate. I am actually also looking forward to something that can track my blood-pressure, but I am not sure whether the technology is there yet. A device that can do offline tracking would be ideal, ability to sync with a USB cable would be icing on the cake.
I've wanted to play around with a color ePaper watch for a while, including debating buying an old Pebble Time, so this seems like a great excuse to pull the trigger.
For people who have developed apps for them in the past, does everyone just use the embedded JavaScript engine? For maintaining apps that modify the firmware or talk to new peripherals does that require maintaining a fork or is there some module system?
Get on their discord. Bangle has the JS thing, pebble watch faces used a c-variant, I don't remember if their applets used something different.
AFAIK, if you're doing firmware replacements you're likely going to be maintaining an "out of tree fork" unless it's already well-modularized in the way you're imagining.
Is there some definite information about what kind of "e-paper" is used for those?
While I like reflective LCD more than backlit LCD/TFT a "real" e-paper (as in eInk) is far better readable in low light, so would be nice to know..
For e-paper feeling we still have the Watchy (with far less battery life and close to no available software admittedly)
The are both transflective (for sunlight readability) memory-in-pixel (for power efficiency) LCDs. The black & white one is the same display as was used in the Pebble 2, and the color one is most likely the display which was planned to be used in the Pebble Time 2 (mostly comparable to the Pebble Time display but larger).
I agree that a true electrophoretic display is a lot nicer to look at; unfortunately the refresh rate leaves a lot to be desired in a highly interactive watch. Hopefully someday we get a technology with the best of both worlds.
this is awesome news. I loved the original pebble but moved to the apple watch after pebble's demise.
I am curious what people here use their smart watches for on a daily basis and couldn't live without, other than to check the day/time. for me it's just message alerts, timer, and media controls. just those 3 features on a e-ink screen would make me super happy.
I miss having pebble watches, they hit a sweet spot of lifetime vs functionality. That said, what is this team going to do to avoid crashing and burning the way the original pebble did?
Specifically I refer to the debacle around the pebble 2 variants and the 1st round pebble core that totally got the ball dropped on it.
They're keep the team super lean and apparently self-financed some of the early development. Last time they had some venture loans that apparently did them in.
Why does the Core 2 Duo not have a heart rate monitor (which I think my Pebble 2 had) and why does the Core Time 2 not have the barometer and compass?
It makes it really difficult for me to decide which to get.
Also, I have a small preference for the design of the original Pebble Time 2 over the Core Time 2 ...
Very much agree. I want to go take this on a hike in the wilderness. I want a compass and a heart rate monitor. Barometer would be nice but I could take or leave.
This would be nice, but for me I'd never go hiking without my iPhone (especially since they now have satellite-based messaging). I assume there was a tradeoff here, and even if it was just a bit more battery I probably would have to agree with ditching these bits.
That's a fair point. My phone has a compass, so I can always look at a compass there. Not having it on the watch is just an inconvenience. My phone isn't a heart monitor.
Woah! So excited that Core Time 2 includes a HR sensor (since HR is something I need for health reasons more than as a full-fledged fitness tracker). Any details on what sensor is used (PPG I presume?) and how reliable/accurate it is?
Love the Pebble -- still have my first OG one in my drawer!
This sounded to me like a device I might want, but the price is offputting to me. $150 is not cheap device. It's nearly 10x the used price of the smartwatch I wearing right now.
« Honestly 5 years seems pretty good for a $150 consumer gadget. »
So, its creator feels that a $150 watch is cheap. Huh. That is interesting.
I never owned a Pebble, but I’ve had 3 smartwatches in the last 8 years: an original Amazfit Bip which I liked a lot. It lasted 5 years, its battery life was 6 weeks when new and 4 weeks when old, it was always-on and daylight-readable, and it was about $70.
When it finally died, I replaced it with a Bip 5 last year. I didn’t like it – screen is wake-on-demand, it wasn’t sensitive enough to a wrist-flip to wake it so I had to press a button, and the battery life was down to 10 days. Higher-res screen, more colours, but no additional useful functionality to me. It cost about $80.
So I sold it on for about $45, over half what I paid, and bought a used Amazfit Neo. It looks like a real watch, it was £15 used – about $20 – and it’s always-on, battery life in weeks, very visible, has a backlight, and does the essentials.
I don't think "consumer gadget" comes across particularly negatively or dismissively, and don't see this playing out at all like the Ratner's case.
Also, it seems like you might be a bit anchored to the low end of the smartwatch price spectrum from your own preferences, but I don't think it's particularly expensive among major smartwatch brands. Apple has by far the biggest market share, but I also tried to piece together how it compared to other companies with leading market share according to this chart[0]. It's a couple years out of date, but from looking at more recent data I don't think the market leaders have changed all that much. I might have made some mistakes navigating the websites of the various brands to piece together the comparison.
1) Apple - $150 is cheaper than all their models
2) Samsung - cheaper than all but one model
3) Huawei - similar to their second cheapest
4) imoo - $20 more than their cheapest model
5) amazfit - the cheaper brand you already mentioned
6) Garmin - cheaper than all their models
You're already using the cheapest smartwatch brand in those top 6 brands, so while $150 might feel expensive to you it's actually on the cheaper end of major smartwatch brands.
As a side note, this was all a bit interesting to learn about as someone dedicated to my $15 casio dumb watch.
I felt the same way, but this thread seems to be full of people primed by Apple Watch pricing. Not sure how much that will translate to purchases in the end though, in my experience these folks are likely to leave a glowing comment and then just stick to their Apple Watches.
As someone who just wanted a low-frills smartwatch and was following repebble for that, I'm disappointed and have unsubscribed from their update emails. This thread at least pointed me towards a bunch of other good options though, so it got me there in the end.
> but this thread seems to be full of people primed by Apple Watch pricing
Pebble's fans are not in general AW owners. Instead, Pebble fans go to Garmin, Amazfit, or other watches with relatively long battery life and physical buttons. In my mind, AW pricing is irrelevant, and these other devices are the closest competitors to Pebble.
This is a weird take. An avg price for a normal watch is $100-$200. This is a watch with a lot more functionalities that a quartz movement, and the production run is much smaller. I think the price is very fair not taking into account the price of an Apple Watch.
That depends on where you live (a $200 watch certainly wouldn't be considered "normal" where I live), but also: a normal watch has a lot more aesthetic value than this, even considering that this has good aesthetics for a smartwatch. It usually also has a significantly longer usable life, at least five times that of devices like this.
But I should have clarified in my original comment that the "primed by Apple watch pricing" was specifically referring to the people that seemed to think this was really cheap and that the price should be increased! I don't think the price here is unfair necessarily, but definitely disagree with the people who seem to think this is really underpriced.
I think because this is a small batch run of watches for those who are fans of Pebble. Think of it almost like we would say an FPGA device for playing retro games, or a retro upscaler. They're usually prices quite high because they're niche items with small production runs.
These watches are for people who were fans of the original Pebble and miss it, therefore they're willing to pay a bit more to get back something that they thought they'd lost.
That's my point -- such things do exist already. Amazfit is an example.
They give you the fitness-tracking functionality of a pure-play fitness band, plus they sync to your phone so you get notifications on your wrist -- answer and reject calls, read messages, reply with a thumbs-up or whatever -- and you get the fun stuff like customisable watch faces.
And they are well under $100.
It's already a product category, but many people seem unaware it exists.
Much the same as the high-end budget smartphones. I've had a couple of decent capable modern Android phones that were under $200 new. This is a thing that exists, but the folks that follow fashion don't seem to realise.
I spent years being relatively poor and in serious debt. You learn to live without luxuries, but if you're smart, you find the ways to get good stuff cheap.
A $150 smartphone can deliver 90% of the functionality of a $1000 smartphone. In the same way, a $75 smartwatch can deliver 70-80% of the functionality of a $500 watch.
And TBH, I know which I prefer. Phones and watches live hard lives, for electronics, and they are easily lost, stolen, dropped, broken, etc.
I would rather have a $200 phone in my pocket than a $1000 one, because I know the risks, and if the 4-digit-price one gets damaged or vanishes, that hurts my budget... but I can tolerate a low-3-digit loss more easily.
I agree, I'm just pointing out Pebble killer feature that later fitness band didn't adopt was just having a few extra buttons. It would be nice to have 5 buttons to do full media controls.
I don't think I've ever used any of my now 3 smartwatches to control my phone's media player. But then I mainly only listen to music on my phone when I'm on a plane.
Amazfit bip was nice, but I encountered a bug with GPS data loss too often. That is the price of the cheap Chinese product, I guess.
So, when my Bip have been damaged, I decided to buy Garmin for 250€ instead. So far, it works well.
please also bring back a version of pebble time round! it was so classy and slim that no round smartwatch since has been able to compete. my wife is still wearing it everyday! i had to learn soldering to replace the battery :)
I know this is going to sound weird, but I'd really love a stylish smartwatch without any wireless comms of any kind on board. And I think a lot of people living in and around Arlington, VA would as well.
how would it be "smart" without some kind of way to get data from your phone (or other wireless data source)? are you imagining a wired tether and periodic sync, like Palm Pilots?
I guess technically I mean more of a fitness tracker watch. Having connectivity to my phone isn't important because I can't take my phone into the places I can't take my current smart watch. I have a Garmin Vivoactive 5 that I used to wear, but having to take it off before going to certain meetings got to be such a hassle that I just got myself a Casio 593 to just not have to worry about it.
A nice bedside dock in which I could mount the watch and have it sync data at that point would round the whole thing out.
What's with all the recent posts about Pebble OS and Pebble watches? Seems like there have been several in the last couple of days. Definitely doesn't feel organic.
Google released PebbleOS as open source in January and one of the Pebble founders started an effort to produce a pair of watches using the open source software. This is his website.
I am really not being overdramatic or hyperbolic when I say this watch sounds like the exact kind of smart device I want in my life. Just ordered the b&w one. Very excited
Finally.. a hybrid amart watch, that also from Pebble! This is great, the only other hybrid smartwatch I have ever seen was from Fossil and that was quite a few years ago.
My beautiful Pebble Time Steel died of salt water damage, the prior Pebble 2 SE got disintegrated by sunscreen. I have to take ruggedness into consideration.
I own and use a Pebble Time Steel and a Pebble Time as my only watches. I'm not really missing anything and I'm very happy with my old Pebbles - yet, I'm still quite tempted to pre-order a Core Time 2 to support development and out of curiosity. I'm looking forward to seeing how the touchscreen is implemented. Intuitively, I'd consider a touch-based interface almost an anti-feature on a Pebble, but given their software/UX quality, maybe I'll be pleasantly surprised.
Quite the opposite. Pebble is great at sleep tracking. They manage to do a better job with Pebble's limited sensors than Apple can with all of their hardware. I have both, I use sleep tracking a lot, and I've compared them.
From your Reddit AMA you said there are no plans to make a more Time-style design since you prefer the original Pebble form factor. Is this just for now or is it a hard no to ever offering a different design? (I never got into the OG Pebble or Pebble 2 myself because it looks very clunky on my fairly thin wrist, but the Time was perfect)
I bought my first Pebble watch the week it was released.
Loved it! Got an Apple Watch and hated it. Got a few more Apple Watches and now the activity rings alone have me hooked. 800+ days in a row of closing my rings means I cannot switch away from apples tightly closed ecosystem :(
I wish this came out years ago and I never got to experience the Apple Watch
The demo image of getting a text message about a party on your watch is an example of everything that is wrong with wearable computing. The last thing I need is more invasive notifications.
Former Pebble and Pebble Time owner and these kinda feel, meh in 2025. The Pebble roadmap seemed like it had more potential back in the day with experimental bands that didn't really materialize.
Hoping once they actually release and we find out if the targets are hit or not with battery life and water resistance.
I just hope they don't release limited color cases again and not have any left for warranty support as happened with my Blue Pebble and all they could offer was a Black one.
Tangentially, that reminded me of my days back when I frequented a forum for Rio digital audio players. When the company got sold off, an engineer leaked an unreleased firmware without the company's permission. We all had a laugh when the engineer decided to go by the name of "Nestle tollhouse".
I'm pleased the pricing is so low. I did some math and if they're making 10k of these (not clear if that's each or all together), there's not a ton of money to be made.
Assuming $100 average profit, that's a $2M for 20k watches. Given the work opportunities that the founder and other employees have, that's not a lot of money for them to make in a year, and it comes with significant risk. Basically seems like this is a passion project, for which I am very grateful!
$100 profit on a $150 watch would be crazy. Rest of the post seems made up too. I don't know where these numbers are coming from. I'm genuinely confused.
MSRP of 3x COGS is a pretty common rule of thumb for hardware. Have to leave room for distribution, software, R&D, returns, SG&A, etc. End of the day, it's probably still only 30-40% gross margin -- less than half of a good SaaS company. Hardware is (indeed!) hard.
Having worked in a tiny start-up-turned-company doing hardware for medical training, my biggest takeaway was that it is very slow but that it can also be very stable.
Like, yeah our margins were/are super high, and so were/are the distributors’, but once everything was spun up and running it was also very stable and predictable.
We were located on the outskirts of a 3rd tier Eastern European city and yet we were plugged right into the same global parts supply chain and capable of doing the same global distribution you could elsewhere. If you’re on to something, it’s a good time to be doing hardware. But you’re correct - 2/3 of the entire company was distribution/sales and R&D.
But then how could you call that 100 profit in any way? If you made at most like 30-50?
You are conflating two different types of profit.
Gross profit = sales or service revenue less the expenses directly related to producing that revenue (this does not include backoffice functions, R&D, rent, etc.)
Net profit, which is the total revenue of the business less all expenses of the business (so, this includes R&D, rent, and the "backoffice" like HR, finance, legal, etc.)
Larger businesses with multiple business segment may account for gross profit separately for each business segment, but the business only ever calculates one net profit item.
There's also unit profit, which is essentially gross profit but at the level of a single unit of goods or services (for services, a unit is usually a customer contract, for recurring services it would be each period of the contract). Unit profit is generally the revenue from that specific unit less the costs directly associated with producing that revenue. Most companies don't calculate unit profit as generally it's not meaningful unless you sell high-value items, like automobiles or planes.
Root post is taking about an upper bound, not about a precise guess. Context is what makes 100 a more fitting number than 40.
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That makes no sense. Profit, by definition, is net. If you still have to pay costs out of some money, then it isn't profit.
It's absolutely essential to be able to differentiate between gross profit and net profit to establish unit economics, especially as the scale of a newly founded operation may drastically change relative to some amount of fixed capex or SG&A expense.
Of course. But here we're talking about the opportunity cost of the founders and other employees so gross profit isn't as relevant. Context matters and the context here is that the founders and employees would probably have a much higher take home split amongst all of them if they were to work in the wearables division of a large company like Google or Apple.
The difference between gross profit & net profit for companies like this is largely comprised of employee & founder salaries (SG&A and R&D). That delta is literally paying for their opportunity cost. Net profit is most relevant to shareholders.
Gross and net profit are each their own concept: https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/101314/what-are-dif...
What they call "gross profit" is not profit, by definition. It's certainly useful to track $revenue-$cost_of_goods, but you can't call that profit. People are free to use words incorrectly, but they shouldn't expect anyone else to go along with them.
Who chooses the "correct" use of words? Is it you? Wikipedia disagrees with you: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gross_margin. Maybe you should make your own encyclopedia.
"Gross margin" seems a suitable alternative term.
you mean some person on wikipedia disagrees with him.
And hsbc
https://www.business.hsbc.uk/en-gb/insights/starting-a-busin...
And sage
https://www.sage.com/en-us/blog/glossary/what-is-gross-profi...
And the uk education system
https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/guides/zd2fpg8/revision/1
What they call "gross profit" is an accounting standard, defined in GAAP, and a standard part of every financial statement.
If we're talking about profit from the lens of a unit sale, we're usually talking about gross profit and gross margin.
You can't run a business based on dictionary definitions.
You most certainly can, and you should.
Please hire an accountant asap if you ever start a business. Things don't mean what you think they mean in accounting. You are wrong and insist you are right despite multiple people pointing it out to you.
Chambers would like a word or several
Not crazy at all in consumer electronics, that's margin on the parts only. R&D, admin, software, etc. costs need to be recovered from that money.
I was using a blended average of the $150 and $225 watches. Also, it sounds like some of the components for the $150 watch were literally left over from Pebble days, which means they could have gotten an amazing deal on them.
Nah that's pretty typical, depending on what you mean by "profit".
Right, that is presumably gross profit per unit, not net. Net profit could easily be zero or negative.
I ordered my Pebble Time during February 2015 Kickstarter for $169. Today the Core Time 2 is $225 which is the exact same price adjusted for inflation.
The DHL shipping though I remembered it was $25 and it is still $25 today
When you put it like that... goddamn inflation has been awful.
That "price rise" indicates an inflation rate of 2.9%. The average inflation rate for the last 50 years is more like 3.5%. So it totally depends on your perspective. If you've only lived through low-inflation times, then yeah 2.9% seems high.
I'm in my 50's and my reaction to the same information was "yeah, seems about right".
> Assuming $100 average profit, that's a $2M for 20k watches. Given the work opportunities that the founder and other employees have, that's not a lot of money for them to make in a year, and it comes with significant risk. Basically
Reading through the terms on the shop page, it seems they're preparing to (maybe) raise the prices at any time, and they'll ask you to pay more before shipping, if they end up raising the prices after you buy it.
that said, the site offers full refunds up until shipping (which is going to be a while from now).
Whoa didn't see this! What's the language you're referring to? I only saw the part about how either side can cancel without penalty and didn't read a threat of higher pricing into that bit.
> If tariffs change dramatically, we will pass these costs along to you and require further payment, even for US orders.
Under the "What if the tariff situation changes?" section on https://store.repebble.com/
I was excited and about to purchase one until I saw this "We might not ship the device unless you pay us more" thing. I get that the economy is very up in the air right now in the US, but sucks that seemingly ordinary businesses are losing international business because of it.
That reads to me as what they'll do if the import tariff situation changes, not if the company changes the price themselves. Which seems like a reasonable thing to say given the massive uncertainty around US economic policy at the moment.
Fair, and you're probably right. I've personally learned to be very cautious when it comes to statements like that though. There has already been additional tariffs, and since it isn't exactly defined, they could raise the price tomorrow based on that, "because it wasn't taken into account at the time" and so on.
Better to just wait until the whole drama blows over I suppose.
I think it's reasonable too, but it also means I don't want to pony up $150 now to potentially have the seller renege and (hopefully) refund me later. I can make use that $150 between then and now.
They have it very clearly written before you check out that you can receive a full refund anytime before it ships. You have to check a box saying you acknowledge this before completing your purchase.
I find what they’re doing very transparent from top to bottom. If you’re worried about it, don’t buy one. But if you’re worried they’re going to pull the rug out from under you, I don’t think you need to.
Yeah, it is transparent... that they may raise the price and undisclosed amount. There's nothing wrong with it but the terms mean I'm not interested in preordering. I'll wait until the final price is available. Why did this seem to upset people?
I don’t think they can legally raise the price and charge your card without communicating the adjusted price to you and letting you confirm. Someone correct me if I’m wrong on that but ultimately I think they still need you to agree to it explicitly.
If you wait until the final retail price is known, it's quite likely that you won't be able to place a retail order at that time, since it's a very limited run. There will probably be a few scalpers on ebay though.
The say on the front page preordering is the only way to get one.
By that logic the watch is a non-essential luxury good so you probably should use the $150 you have now in a more productive manner regardless of potential futures.
I am not sure I understand you. It's true, I generally prefer not to preorder as it means I'm essentially offering an interest-free loan to a company.
Sometimes I'll do it anyway for one of two reasons: to lock in a price that may increase later, or to receive an item earlier than I would otherwise, due to excessive demand.
I'm just saying that, at least to my sensibilities, the viewpoint that leads one to be concerned about maximizing the efficiency of 150 bucks over the next 4-5 months seems incompatible with the viewpoint that it would be reasonable to spend $150 on this watch at all.
But I recognize that everyone's a snowflake, so you do you.
This is dumb. You could argue this for any non-essential purpose. Why even say it?
That's a problem you should take up with the US government instead of small businesses trying to survive this administration
A lot of people on HN whine “oh I’m not picking a side” and “I just want to get on with my life” and “I’m an island what others do doesn’t affect me” and other nonsense.
Sadly the damage these people are causing by their implicit support for the end of the modern world won’t fix the problem when America realises it’s making itself poorer, history shows countries double down.
Because I didn't buy a watch? Wtf lol
I'm not taking it up with a small business... I'm choosing how to spend my money...? Are you implying I'm obligated to by a watch?! Lol
Why do you think I haven't been calling my representatives to complain about tariffs? What leads you to believe I'm not on the street protesting?
It doesn't change how I choose to spend my money.
It's good of them to consider this and be transparent, but I don't consider tariffs to be part of the price. The price is the amount the seller gets, not the amount they collect and remit to the government.
As a consumer, the price is whatever I have to pay to receive the product. You seem to be confusing it with revenue.
I think "price" is an imprecise term that could refer to the pre-tax/tariff amount or the post-tax/tariff amount. It would include shipping, if there is no other way to get the device (as is the case here).
But regardless, they're not saying they would increase the "price" (whatever that means), but just that if the tariff situation changes, then the customer will need to pay the additional tariff. This is the same as what would happen if a state increased the sales tax rate and they had to collect and remit additional sales tax. It just so happens that it's unlikely any state is going to sharply increase its sales tax in the next year, but there's a decent chance the tariff rate will jump. If the sales tax went up, I wouldn't consider that to be the company raising the price. Same for tariffs, in my book.
The difference between sales tax and a tariff is that the consumer pays the sales tax while the importer pays the tariff. In other words, I'm not presented with a "price + taxes + tariff." I'm presented with a "price + taxes" where the price is supposed to bake in the seller's costs (which may include tariffs) and a margin of profit. Likewise, if the price increases to allow for additional tariffs, I will also pay more in taxes.
And then you've got VAT, which yes it's the consumer's money that's going to paying it, but the headline price for consumers is the VAT inclusive price and the retailer (or importer, who may sometimes be a consumer) is responsible for paying.
Which means that in high-profile cases where the VAT rate is disputed, it's the retailer who is on the hook for the disputed amount. Recent examples being Greggs (a baker, who won their case, so no tax payable) and Uber (where I'm not actually sure whether it's finalised yet? But if they end up needing to pay VAT then it's going to be expensive).
They have always been part of the price.
In the past tariffs were implemented or modified with a long notice period so businesses could plan ahead.
Now they are being added or changed at the whim of a tantrum with no notice, so of course prices might need to also reflect that at short notice.
Funny, aren't you USers used to not knowing what you'll pay for something because the advertised prices don't include sales taxes and administrative fees and whatever fees and service charges and tips that are not service charges?
No, those questions are answered at point of sale in the US like when you click a Checkout button or you're at the cash register.
Prices changing after a preorder is completely different and not anything US specific.
Well in europe letting me know what the real price is only at the cash register and not when I check out the product in the store is as unusual as your problem with import duties :)
I think it may even be illegal for consumer prices. What they display or list in the contract is what you pay.
But on the other hand I'm used to paying import taxes separately when ordering something from outside the EU.
Yes, Americans don't know the exact price of the products in their cart between the 10min they put the items in their cart and when they check out. They know it will be a little more and they mentally budget for it.
But that doesn't have much to do with a price increasing weeks or months after paying for a preorder.
So you can mentally separate the price the vendor charges from taxes imposed by the state when you pick up in the store but not when ordering internationally?
Not with an administration levying 250% tariffs one day and cancelling them a few hours later.
Tax policies change from the Truth Social post to the press conference.
It’s not an international purchase, though. Core Devices is a US company.
American components, russian components, all are made in Taiwan...
Pretty much all tech purchases are implicitly international. During the last Trump administration we were madly spinning up additional manufacturing capacity in Vietnam, because the full tariffs on China, had they come into effect, would have doubled the retail price of an Oculus headset (which is a US corporation, just as in this scenario)
Never a good look to assume where someone is located :)
FWIW, I'm in south-Europe, maybe that's why I got surprised I wouldn't have known the final price until the device would land in my hand?
Haven't bought something from outside the EU in a while? They charge us at least VAT (maybe over a certain price, depending on your jurisdiction) :)
Large stores can afford to precalculate this and use a service that will handle taxes for you, small stores not so much so you may end paying it personally on receiving the package. But they can afford to precalculate it if the taxes are known in advance (usually starts at whatever your country's VAT rate is).
Now in this case, shipping to the US looks like it will be randomly taxed depending on the phase of the moon and how well Trump has slept last night, so this warning is fair. You can't expect them to absorb a 50% import tax if it's established tomorrow.
> Haven't bought something from outside the EU in a while? They charge us at least VAT (maybe over a certain price, depending on your jurisdiction) :)
Sure, and as you also seem familiar with, you know it's pretty trivial to calculate yourself when you place your order :)
So far, I've never bought something internationally, then before shipping the tax laws changed enough that the toll and/or tax payment was different than I expected.
No but there's a certain jurisdiction across an ocean where that's likely to happen and that's what they are aiming at.
It’s not hard to roughly calculate tax.
Sounds reasonable considering the unpredictable worldwide trading situation
I'm highly skeptical that they will sell 20k units at that price point.
I know that the diabetic community are extremely interested on these watches. 30 days of battery life, already working support for Android APS and xDrip with these watches. What is there not to like. Put one of these to your child's wrist and they can get alerts on the glucose level easily.
I don't understand how the watches help with glucose levels. The specs mention step, sleep and heart rate tracking.
What am I missing?
(Vested interest as a diabetic myself.)
Diabetics have a sensor on their bodies that speaks Bluetooth. It talks to their phones (running eg. xDrip). The phone then communicates this to the watch.
My wife is a diabetic and this kind of stuff, while it seems minimal, makes a big difference for her quality of life.
So it is just a better way of accessing information collected from another device?
Correct
It's all about building these things by yourself. The tools are there, and Pebble used to be the first smartwatch every open source diabetic I know used (including myself).
If you're not familiar, here's a good starting point:
https://androidaps.readthedocs.io/en/latest/
Oh, and you want to avoid Apple's hardware. Some of the software can only be distributed as source code, so installing them to an iOS device is not easy.
Glucose levels were my first thought as well.
I would definitely get the color Pebble over many competing devices. I do not need fancy sport features, steps+sleep+heart rate covers all my needs, and 30-day battery life honestly sounds like a dream.
That's a great price point, and there's a lot of pebble fans
There are 3,500 left (18% remaining)
Do NOT forget the (optionnal) monthly subscription fees :)
Eric, thank you. Lurking in the forum answering questions evokes people to share their opinion for satisfaction and dissatisfaction and often neglectes to evoke praise (proportionally). I am guilty of this too.
So please have some well deserved praise for your work on this. We have gotten an open source wearable OS, purpose built hardware, R&D, a community, more pressure on Apple to be less of a gatekeeper, and something we can own in a crazy short timeframe. I hope you see this despite it being buried. Thank you, you glorious nerd.
Hear, hear
The "having a baby"/"having a baby bok choi party" attempt to sell me on the larger screen did not work, but it did make me laugh.
I might tolerate the larger screen if I got an invite to that baby bok choi party. Delicious.
I'll be hanging out here - happy to answer any questions you have!
The Nordic nRF52840[1] SoC on which these are based support not only Bluetooth 5.4 but also Thread, Zigbee, and 802.15.4. These three standards are becoming commonplace in the home automation space. Has any thought been given to how the new Pebble devices could utilize these protocols?
[1] https://www.nordicsemi.com/Products/nRF52840
Nope, but the OS is open source so you could try getting it to work yourself: https://github.com/pebble-dev/pebble-firmware
Is it actually open source though? The repository description may be outdated then, but it currently says this:
> This is the latest version of the internal repository from Pebble Technology providing the software to run on Pebble watches. Proprietary source code has been removed from this repository and it will not compile as-is. This is for information only.
This just hasn't been updated since it was forked from the initial OSS release from Google, I've started a discussion on the firmware Discord to update it.
Just a guess, but Nordic pushes a proprietary bluetooth stack. You don't have to use it, but it's the fastest way to get up and running.
edit: not sure they use the proprietary stack... at the very least, it looks like they're in the process of switching to a free BT stack
> Proprietary source code has been removed from this repository and it will not compile as-is. This is for information only
How are you supposed to do that?
Pretty sure those different radio stacks do not run very well in parallel or if they do, they'd likely start to starve the rest in terms of resources needed.
The nRF52840 is not the most performant, I would've really liked if they had chosen a SoC, like the nRF5340, with more RAM or cores for this reason amongst others.
There are similar devices (i.e. SiLabs) that allow multi-protocol use with the radio (I would expect Nordic to have a similar feature set), tho yes, you're right the resource issue would be a major limitation.
6 months from announcing rePebble (Jan '25) to shipping your first units (July '25) seems like a quick turnaround for a compact consumer electronics device. Curious to know if these first units are closer to a white label of existing hardware or more of a JDM model.
Side note - I got the first pebble through the kickstarter pre-orders in my first year out of high school. Seeing something so novel was definitely a contributor to me switch from CS to Mech E and working in the consumer electronics space now. Thanks for making cool and interesting things :)
Aww really glad to hear it!
It is fast - but we've done this before (many times) and know what we're doing. I've been blogging about the experience too https://ericmigi.com/blog/february-shenzhen-trip-update
No questions but a comment: I rarely get emotionally attached to devices, especially since I have to handle a lot of fancy hardware for work and it gets old quickly. However, there are a few pieces of technology like my Walkman or my Thinkpad X61t that I really liked and was sad to have to let go when their time had come. The Pebble is another one of those devices for me and I'm quite happy that I won't have to it let go for a lot longer that I thought thanks to your new project. Thanks. :-)
What are the dimensions (length and width) of both models? I'm trying to decide if the Time would be too big for my taste, and I'm having a hard time trying to picture what the increased screen diagonal size translates to.
Excited for this release! Have you heard from Intel yet? “Core 2 Duo” was the name of one of their processors in the early days of multicore on a single package.
Edit: preordered!
Today, I very literally received a vintage laptop with a Core 2 Duo sticker on it.
This comment aged me 100 years.
Yeah, that lawsuit is probably going to bankrupt them here.
Also a weird way to make your product unsearchable.
Not sure if you’ll see this but I’l love to understand - why the slightly weird (to me) differentiation between the two models’ sensors? One has heart rate (which might be considered almost fundamental for smart watches today), the other has magnetic/barometric sensors (which are very nice to have when out and moving)… but neither has both? Is the core 2 duo a “geeky” watch and the other one a “premium” product? I assume the latter also doesn’t support JTAG fiddling around, is that a philosophical choice or more of an engineering time/resource constraint? Thanks in any case, these devices are definitely quite tempting!
(I’m here from 1 day after my comment) Btw I partially found an answer to the first question from the AMA on Reddit - the sensors on the duo were a kind of thanks to the person who helped design it.
Gadgetbridge support (or open docs of the BLE interface for dyi) planned? https://gadgetbridge.org/
The new watches will use the exact same protocol as Pebble watches, so Gadgetbridge should work by default.
That is all I needed to know, preordered :D
I remember that my Pebble 2 (HR) over time (pun intended) would develop play around the rubber button area especially on the right side. Eventually the rubber covering the buttons would break off. This was common to the point people were making 3d-printed replacement parts. See https://help.rebble.io/pebble-2-buttons/ What's the expected longevity of the buttons this time around, and will you have replacement parts available ?
The post says:
More reliable buttons (up to 30% longer lifetime in testing)
doh, should have read the full post ;)
Thank you for making this happen! My family and friends are sick of my decade-long attachment to my pebble steel by now, haha.
Any chance the particular extra color for the metal one could be an actual metal color? My pebble steel with the metal link band was a great combination of stylish and functional. I never really liked the look of any of the later models so even when I bought them I always went back to my pebble steel. I went ahead and pre-ordered the new metal one and I suppose I’ll go for black if I have to but I really hope you come out with a stainless steel or silver color.
Also what’s the watchband compatibility? Will this work with the original pebble bands or with standard watch bands or something new and proprietary?
> Also what’s the watchband compatibility? Will this work with the original pebble bands or with standard watch bands or something new and proprietary?
It says it works with standard 22mm watchbands, so it seems like you can just put on any 3rd party band you like.
You mention only producing a limited quantity, but do you have any plans to do a second batch next year? I know that knowing the future is impossible and that you thus can't make any promises, but are you at least hoping to be able to make more batches in the future?
I can't spend $225 right now, and by next month I'm guessing the pre-orders will already have blown way past your production quantity ^^
The Core Time 2 mentions heart-rate monitoring. Have you considered also adding an oximeter?
The comparison chart, under "sensors", doesn't mention the compass under the Core Time 2; does the Core Time 2 drop the compass? A 3D magnetometer seems like a useful sensor for orientation purposes.
Is there a light sensor, to allow automatically disabling the backlight when there's enough ambient light and enabling it when there isn't?
You mention "Standard Pebble charger" for both; I'm guessing that that isn't USB-C?
You cannot put oximetry in a watch without getting sued by Masimo. Just ask Apple.
The heart rate sensor patents were ruled unpatentable:
https://www.tomsguide.com/wellness/smartwatches/apple-watch-...
> This week, the US Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit upheld the previous verdict of the Patent Trial and Appeal Board that concluded all three of AliveCor’s patents were unpatentable. This is generally the outcome when courts conclude that patents are either obvious or too generic to enforce.
The case over the oximeter functionality is still ongoing, but with luck it'll go the same way.
It looked like it was not just the oximeter but the arrangement of the sensors and the fact that they fist approached Masimo with a licensing deal but then canceled and hired engineers from Masimo instead....
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34360292
Interesting. So, potentially, using a different source might have helped?
That story is about heart rate sensors. The Masimo case is about oximetry, and AFAIK Apple is still blocked from selling watches with this feature.
Yes, it looks like Apple "won" their reciprocal patent cases against Masimo but basically got $250 for it, and no injunction. The case against Apple is still blocking them from selling watches with oximetry.
https://pharmaphorum.com/news/apple-wins-masimo-lawsuit-its-...
I think the article is referencing two different cases, and the ones invalidated don't seem related to oximetry, I'm not sure what happened with the oximetry one though.
The 360° view on the product page shows the charger interface on the back of the watches. Definitely not USB-C!
Ah, when it said "standard Pebble charger" I incorrectly assumed it was a charging port, rather than something like pogo pins. What's on the back of the watch seems pretty reasonable.
Hey Eric!
Any chance to open up support and reparability for old pebbles? For example, run the newly open OS on old hardware or source parts for old pebbles, like batteries for pebble time ;)
Not enough money to be made + older parts are hard to source (discontinued)
What does Intel think about that name and was it intentional?
Any plans for a more sporty model (i.e., HR, GPS?)?
Intentional?? :)
Core Time 2 has a heart rate monitor!
Will the Android companion app be open source? And/or will the watch APIs be documented such that someone could write an open source companion app?
there's an open-source companion app already, called Cobble. https://github.com/pebble-dev/mobile-app
Core Devices will publish an open source fully featured library, that anyone can use to build an open source companion app as well.
Awesome! Thanks!
A few, not sure HN will format this correctly so my bad if these get mushed together:
* The originals used Sharp MiP but advertised them as "e-paper" do your new models use MiP LCD (or similar) or actual "e-paper" ie "e-ink" (electrostatic capsules).
* Pebble time round 2?!?!
* The touchscreen - this is an issue I had on my Galaxy watch including the bezel rotating as well. Are there efforts to pevent the touchscreen from inadvertently doing things when I'm resting one arm against the other? For Galaxy watch I had to switch off bezel rotation/touch screen waking the watch & only allow buttons, because it would constantly wake up when I had my arms crossed/resting position.
* The backlight, is it backlit or front-lit? I suppose this more relates to if it's genuine capsule e-paper, then it would be nice to be front-lit.
* No compass or barometer on CT2?
Thank you! <3
I think I am not exactly the intended audience for these devices right now, so my comment will be a bit general. I don't want "a geeky alternative to apple watch" (or an apple watch, for that matter), I basically want Garmin Forerunner 955 alternative that won't keep my data hostage. There are many things I hate about Garmin watches (which I buy nevertheless), but I can forgive almost all of them except that one. I want my data to be bulk-exportable via open API, and not it some raw .fit format (because they have to comply with GDPR after all), but as a first-class feature, that tries to satisfy a customer by exporting any data it produces in any (realistic) format that customer wants. (I assume you are familiar with other wearables, since this is your domain, but just in case: GDPR forces them to make the data they record directly exportable, but they won't willingly do it for anything that is "processed data", so I can backup my HR history, but not the data they use to make these "sleep phases" graphs, and I can only manually export relatively useless .csv summaries for a given date.)
In short, I really want to stop giving my money to Garmin. But I don't want to compromise on quality of the data being recorded. What are your thoughts on that market?
I am so with you.
What's the lens material this time? The page just says "glass" which could mean a generic mineral crystal or something fancy like Gorilla Glass.
Something fancy
re: glass... please please learn from that awful shadow curvature issue on the pebble time (color).
Seems like you did as the screens look blessedly flat!
Congrats!
The post specifically addresses how they’re changing the screen curvature
I ordered one, with no experience although like the story and heard about the original.
One very frustrating concern - the warranty. This is $255+ for a device that is only good for 3 million seconds. Would it be possible to arrange replacement at cost after 2 years?
I have no reason to think that it will not work well for 2 years, but I am not prepared to guarantee that in a warranty. That would be taking on too much risk as a small company.
Your explanation is reason enough to cancel. I have experienced enough hardware fails the day after the warranty to avoid purchasing anything that I do not consider disposable. I still have my Vector watch which suffered the same fate as Pebble. I am curious about the risk of a "at cost" replacement. I have avoided buying a FitBit to replace my existing FitBit because their warranty is also limited to "one year" which is basically Wearable as a Service.
> curious about the risk of a "at cost" replacement
You can't tell consumers the raw manufacturing cost because people act weird when they are told it: they usually assume the "markup" is profits. They assume that they're getting ripped off because most people don't understand development costs or overheads and they always argue that any profit is too much. This problem can't be fixed.
Apart from the risk of scammers buying a watch to sell, saying it is broken, getting a replacement at cost and the scammer steals the markup/profit.
You can maybe think of ways to make it work, but they are likely to have excessive support costs or other hidden costs for the manufacturer or consumer.
Hey, I completely agree and I also suffer from this same bias: it's ruining me from enjoying stuff that I would like to buy but in the end I just give up because it feels that any profit is a scam. What kind of resource can I study for me to understand and accept other people making profits?
> it feels that any profit is a scam
It is so weird we talk about caring about an invisible variable that is actually irrelevant.
In theory we should only look at the price and judge whether our expected benefits are likely to exceed that price. And we get distracted by measuring things in $, when what really matters is our benefits which can't be measured in $.
We are also distracted by ideals of fairness (a foolish goal in a business transaction) and zero-sum thinking (am I getting ripped off?)
I don't mind spending money on quality. What I hate is the information gap, and the costs of having to learn how to judge quality myself (because price is no proxy measure). I am distrustful of so many biased signals, plus so many other people's opinions are either unhelpful or influenced.
Mostly we each just fall back on an A versus B heuristic. I find it absolutely mad that the world works at all.
And an answer: look at the bad buying decisions made by others, and learn from their mistakes. I watch my father with money to spare, he wastes 2 hours to save $1, or he avoids spending money on something that would benefit his life or the life of someone he cares for, or he won't buy a Toyota because he hated their adverts once, or he keeps buying a Nissan even after being burnt by a severe costly design flaw.
What do you mean? Excessive profit or _any_ profit? Haha. You'd prefer it people made things and just broke even?
I think I would like to be able to answer the following two questions:
1. what percentage of this object price is net profit? 2. is that percentage a "fair" proportion?
but atm, I don't have a "scientific" way to respond to those questions so I usually go with my gut, or do whatever other people in my circle do (which is not ideal and I'd like to change)
When you set pricing for a product, profit is a goal. You don't know how many devices will be returned, whether the device or its marketing will attract lawsuits, or whether you'll be able to sell all the devices at asking price.
You only know the actual profit margins much later, after you have sold the devices and seen them last through their warranty period.
If you'd like to minimize excess profit, take note of which products seem overpriced compared to their peers. Traditionally, anything Apple makes is a prime example. For a non-tech example, look at disposable alkaline batteries. Rayovac has been owned by Energizer since 2018 and their batteries have become increasingly comparable over time, yet Rayovac batteries are much less expensive than comparable Energizer batteries. The difference? Mostly marketing and profit margin, at this point.
Maybe reframing it can help you. You want the people to make money who produce the things/content you want to use and consume. It serves you as well as them.
This is a DIY watch for enthusiasts. It gives you a head start versus building one yourself. And you can for sure use it as-is and with pre-made apps. But don't expect it to be a mass market consumer product. Look elsewhere. The website clearly highlights this too.
This project isn't Apple or Google, lmao. I think a 2 year warranty is already a boon for what is essentially a KS project.
I was interested in NFC payments using a smartwatch. Do these watches support NFC payment? I didn't see any mention of it.
Personally I never found myself using my NFC payment watch. It felt like if I was venturing far enough to the store, I'm just going to bring my phone with me anyways. I wonder if this differs for areas that don't get as much suburban sprawl.
I use NFC payments on my watch all the time, even though I have my phone and card in my pocket. Tapping my watch is just easier than digging into my pockets and/or opening my wallet app on my phone.
i like you use NFC via watch way more than by Phone. I don't wanna take out my phone all the time, i'd like to look at my phone screen less and less as time goes on.
Yeah it's very useful if your PT system takes card (such as tube/buses in London).
I never bring my phone with me when I go running, but occasionally pick something up and pay with my watch afterwards
I personally don't use NFC payment at all. I just can't see the utility in it. If I leave the house I have my wallet, and I find it easier to take my card out of my wallet than to fiddle with NFC on my phone.
Sometimes I leave the house with only my phone. Why carry two things when one thing will do fine for a quick trip? Its my car keys, my credit card, my transit pass, etc.
I've been moving towards using NFC payments for activating gas pumps as those readers still have you fully insert your card exposing the full mag strip.
Its also often faster for me to just tap my phone than to take my wallet out, pull out the specific card I'm wanting to use to pay, tapping/inserting that card, putting that card back, and then putting my wallet back. Instead my phone which still has a touch unlock is already unlocked before I take it out of my pocket and ready to be tapped and then put back in my pocket.
I can't say I relate - for one thing I don't have any of those things on my phone (except payment), but also I don't want them on my phone. We put way too much on them already, imo. But regardless, I always have wallet, phone and keys any time I leave the house. It doesn't really take effort to bring them, and that way I won't need them.
How is that fiddling? Just put the phone to the terminal, that's it. Sometimes press finger to the fingerprint sensor.
For card, you need to get the wallet, get the card from the wallet, and then put it back.
Some people don't use wallet or put it close, because I only need wallet to pay or use loyalty card, and I can do that with my phone.
Wonder if this is a nationality thing? In the UK I'd say ~30% of sales are done via phones/watches these days.
That's fascinating to me, because many times I've tried to do that it's an exercise in frustration. Terminals don't always have the sensor in the same spot, phones sometimes don't register the connection, and so on. Maybe things work better in the UK?
It can be a bit difficult, particularly now that some phones are getting more demanding about re-authorising before it will go through. Tap-try to get fingerprint scanner working-tap again is a much less fluid procedure than tap-go.
The position thing is just something you get used to. There's not that many reader models in active use and most of them are pretty good about marking where the nfc reader is these days.
I’m in the US and in the last few years things have flipped to where I’m more surprised when a place doesn’t have tap to pay.
I use mine constantly, it’s been one of my favourite things to be able to leave the house and not having to take my wallet/phone with me.
Less to carry, less to idly distract myself with.
I use NFC for all my payments minus bars and restaurants. (NE USA) I also switched all my door locks to use Apple Home Key which is a fun party trick.
These use standard watch straps, so you could put them on one of those NFC-payment straps as a workaround.
Chameleon Ultra on the band
The deprecated Timex Pay (w/ Chase Bank) would be an option.
The chip inside claims to support Bluetooth Low Energy, Bluetooth mesh, NFC, Thread and Zigbee. Maybe someone can hack together a payments app using the NFC?
Payment is more of tamper resistance and trust problem than protocol problem. You don't want a hackable card tied to your credit.
Speak for yourself, I'd love one!
Banks probably don't want it, though.
You can't really, unless you get involved in the financial systems afaik. It's not just some open thing that anybody can implement; there's a chain of trust involved and for good reason.
Maybe you could reverse-engineer HCE from bank Android app, but that would be rather fragile.
Nope. I just use my phone.
anecdotally, NFC payment is my #1 use for Apple Watch, by far. It's so much work to pull out a phone and unlock it! :)
Tbf I want a ring to do it. Samsung execs screwed up bad when they released the galaxy ring not only without nfc payments but also for that horrendous price. What a joke, now the big boy companies are proving that once you ditch engineers for suits enshittification begins.
I ordered a watch and I’m looking forward to making apps for it but I’m more excited at the prospect of making apps for a truly open phone with an eink display and 20x battery life. I think you have enough of a following now to attempt a small run of PebbleOS phones.
I know I’m not the only one and whatever gaps in applications you have aren’t as large as you think and can be filled in by the large passionate community you have fostered.
(and I wouldn’t worry about other attempts that have come before you. Before Breaking Bad, studios told Vince Gilligan that Weeds already existed.)
How is the sleep monitoring on the base model being done without a heart rate sensor, just with stillness as measured by the accelerometer?
I want to get a smartwatch that has enough functionalities to run a time tracker app with the purpose of not having to carry a phone most of the time. The existing ones are all WearOS or Apple watch, neither of which can be used in a freedom-preserving way. Would it be possible to write time tracking apps for these watches?
Sure it would and there are existing Pebble time tracking apps. Here's a search for "Time Tracker" in the Rebble store but I'm sure you will find more with other search terms: https://store-beta.rebble.io/apps/search?query=time%20tracke...
Can you tell us more about the touch screen? Is it only taps or will it support interactions using drag gestures too? How good is the accuracy, how many different simultaneous interaction surfaces can there realistically be?
Is there an emulator available somewhere where one can start prototyping an app with tap support?
What's the status of "small android phone" is it basically just a petition atm?
https://www.theverge.com/mobile/609857/small-android-phone-b...
This is what I'm most interested in. My only hope at the moment is for Apple to revive the iPhone mini -- even if they only refresh it every 3-5 years! I'm so bummed I'll be 'forced' to upgrade from my 12 mini later this year for mostly camera and battery reasons, but oh how I wish an iPhone 17 mini was on the horizon.
The original pebble was almost entirely dependent on it's connection with the android/ios app. Given the increase in onboard processing capabilities, are there any plans to allow for a more standalone experience?
As an iPhone+AW (S6) user, I consider the two devices married, perhaps even sharing the same mind. Almost everything that I can do with one is instantly and transparently mirrored on the other.
I can still leave my phone at home, and since I don't have a mobile connection on the watch (intentionally), it means I'm truly and fully offline - but I get to keep many features. I can listen to music (direct connection to BT headphones), tick items off the shopping list, pay for stuff, look up my schedule, etc. Some things could work offline where they currently don't (e.g. weather, maps/public transport), but the caching/syncing is overall surprisingly decent.
Unfortunately, it's all using private APIs, no third party watch has the same access, and you can't e.g. pair the AW with an iPad. But otherwise I think it should be the golden standard (perhaps DMA could get Apple to open up the APIs).
Not sure how that would work. You still need connectivity, which the phone provides.
Hey, this is pretty slick! I'm not into smart wearables myself, but if I change my mind (or if I have to recommend one to family or friends) I know where to look!
Question: does either of the model have NFC capabilities, or is there any plans to add this feature in the future? I am looking specifically for a way to pay contactless with Graphene OS (which does not support NFC payments because Google does not want to).
I've preordered the Core Time 2, I'm so incredibly excited that you've resurrected Pebble like this!
My only hope is that you can bring the Time Round back in some form: Mine is unfortunately dead, and they're very difficult to purchase even second hand these days! It was the single best smartwatch I've ever owned and used
Until when will you take pre-orders?
Apple Health integration - what are your plans?
We supported it before, should be pretty straightforward to support now.
Being able to sync steps taken, heart beat, and especially sleep tracking with Apple Health would 100% push me to Core Time 2.
Presumably the same as the original Pebbles, which were able to feed step data and HR data into the Apple Health app.
Google Health Sync as well?
And I'll be looking for Vitality integration for my employer's health program!
Just bought both. One for each arm
Will the watch ship with a JTAG clip? Or is that coming later. Not sure if I missed the option in the store
it will be an option for Core 2 Duo, coming later.
Just ordered! I saw a comment about a new app - Will that use new backend services, or will it use the rebble appstore.
Right now it uses https://apps.rebble.io/en_US/
I see you link to apps.rebble.io in the blog post - will this use Rebble's web services as well?
It's using the appstore right now
If I buy one of each will you consider adding all the sensors to an e-paper watch?
This is great. I was an OG backer in like 2012(?).
What affect are tariffs having?
Any ideas what the screen refresh rate is going to be at this point? All the screenshots don't have time that includes seconds, and having a watch face that can update at least every second would be a requirement for me.
(I know e-ink displays can have fast refresh rates, like the 60Hz / fps Daylight computer - but that may not be cost effective / battery efficient here?)
It's a sharp memory lcd (not eink, sometimes called epaper): https://sharpdevices.com/memory-lcd/#1615979030123-5695809f-...
https://www.sharpsecd.com/#/memory-in-pixel-lcds-product
The Daylight computer DC-1 isn't e-ink it's a reflective LCD by the way. Different screen technology.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40457491
TIL! Thanks for the link - all the demos / videos had me convinced this was just e-ink technology!
30fps
What is the impact on battery life to have the screen update every second, versus every minute? Will it be possible to have the HR display, on faces that include it, rate-limited to achieve better battery life?
One of the nice things about Amazfit watches was that I could dial down the HR polling and get better battery life that way.
I think it's a little bit more. I don't know if I've ever measured it. You can definitely see it in battery life though. Using a watch face that only updates every minute will give you longer, better life.
We love you
Whoa, whoa. Touch screen?!
So awesome. Ordered!
Anyway to put in even a slow LTE chip for emergency calls ?
I would pay an irrational amount of money for a watch that can make calls that has a very long battery life.
Calls? Or just emergency texts?
The closest thing to what you probably want is the Garmin Forerunner 945 LTE:
https://www.garmin.com/en-US/p/698632
Discontinued, but young for Garmin devices and still available if you're willing to pay irrational amounts of money. It doesn't make audio calls out, but can receive audio messages (to Bluetooth headphones) and send/receive "emergency" text messages either to the Garmin emergency response center (sends a helicopter to your location, if required) or by SMS with a few canned messages or tediously entered custom messages to to a predefined, pre-approved set of emergency contacts, as described here:
https://www.dcrainmaker.com/2021/06/garmin-forerunner-945-de...
I've come across this.
I really would like calling too. There's a lot of daylight between I lost my phone and need to call a cab, and send a helicopter.
Right now I have an LTE smart watch, but the battery is optimistically about 24 hours( on a good day ).
With the Garmin emergency contacts system, you can set up arbitrary messages to send to your emergency contacts. One of mine is "I'm OK, but need you to come pick me up".
> "30 day battery life"
I've done the math and according to my calculations that's approximately 30X more battery life than an Apple Watch. Impressive!
About 60 for me. I have to charge mine while working to get it to last a day :/
I have had an Apple Watch since the original and never had it that bad. I think something is wrong with your watch.
That's common for me after three or four years.
I charged my S6 last night - it’s been running 22 hours - and it has 17% charge left. That’s at about 4.5 years old.
I don’t run it at high screen brightness though.
disable hours-in-sunlight, it's a battery gobbler.
Switch to a MIPS transflective or e-paper display as on a Pebble or Garmin, OLED and LCD displays on Apple and Samsung watches look pretty indoors (when they're not turned off to save power) but are hard to read outside (without excessive brightness) and are battery gobblers.
Just charged my Garmin Fenix for the first time in... 9 days (it was down at 18%, could get a few more days but it makes me nervous), most of the battery use went to some 11 hours of GPS activity recording and heart rate recording. Could get 30 days if I turned off the features the Pebble doesn't have.
Even Garmin has largely moved to AMOLED screens. They look great both indoors and outside and with modern technology they are not as battery hungry as they once were. Personally I find the battery life on my Apple Watch more than acceptable. I charge it while I’m showering and getting readying in the morning and have never had any issues even though I am a very heavy watch user and often use it independently of my phone.
I used to have a Pebble Time and agreed the battery life with those displays is nice, but honestly it doesn't bother me to put it on the charger every evening.
The only real benefit a longer battery life would have is not needing to bring a special charger if I go out of town for a few days, but I solved that years ago using a power bank that has qi and watch charging pads on it as my travel charger.
If anything, I'd switch back to a Pebble or similar because the Apple Watch does too much and I don't want that much gizmo on my person all the time. But the Pebble reboot products don't do it for me design-wise.
Just a tip with Apple watches: get the battery service at least once during the lifespan of your watch. It's $99 and Apple gives you a brand new watch.
With that battery service the watch should last you about 6-10 years judging by the current status of my Series 4.
Yes, a watch should be able to last a lot longer than that, but I think if you're buying Apple products you already have the expectation of a maximum 10 year lifespan just from software alone with just about the entire product lineup.
> Apple gives you a brand new watch.
That seems very wasteful
What if the glass is scratched, will they still replace the watch for $99 ?
As long as it's minor scratching and not big chips or cracks, yes. Another huge plus to the battery service.
Another tip regarding scratches is that the higher tier finishes (Stainless Steel or Titanium in the Series 10) are, in my opinion, worth the price premium solely for the improved screen glass.
Apple barely mentions the spec nowadays, and I'm not sure why they don't tout it. A conspiracy theorist might say that it's because it keeps your watch looking new longer so they'd rather you be buying the cheap one frequently.
The sapphire crystal screen is the killer feature that justifies the upgraded models more than anything else: it's something like a whole extra number higher on the Mohs scale for hardness (scratch resistance).
I buy them on the refurbished store to lessen the pain of their ridiculously inflated price.
Series 4 isn't getting updates anymore, though.
You may have an app draining your battery. Was having the same issue with my watch, I deleted a few apps and all of the sudden my watch was better. I can’t tell you what app was because it was just luck. I was creating space on my phone when it happened.
It most likely has a lot to do with the display tech.
I got 8 days out of the PineTime, which was LED (I assume). You couldn't see anything if the display wasn't turned on.
I just bought a BangleJS (quite a bit cheaper than the Core 2 Duo, but no speaker and only one button) and the estimated battery life is a month. It uses a colour LCD, making the display visible whenever there is light. For example, daylight makes the display bright. It has a light source that gets turned on by the button.
The Core 2 Duo has an e-paper display that only draws power when the display changes.
My Garmin Venu 2 with an OLED display gets at least a week with a couple days of GPS usage for walks too.
I don't understand how anyone is willing to buy a watch that barely lasts a day.
I did a one week test drive of Apple Watch a year and a half ago and I could barely get a day out of it. That alone was a deal breaker for me.
I get about 2 days from my Ultra 1.
The battery on the Ultras is about double the regular series watch batteries, so that tracks. My point was that I was going to struggle with having a device that I couldn't rely on to make it through a full day including the evening— having to take it off for a charging session in the afternoon would be too disruptive for the overall package to be worth it to me.
Sure, but the Ultra is double the price of the normal Apple Watch. ($800)
Although similar battery to my miband 4. Cost me $20 a while back, still amazing.
This blog post [1] makes it seem like the cheaper model has a barometer and compass, but the more expensive one does not. Anyone know if that is true?
1: https://ericmigi.com/blog/introducing-two-new-pebbleos-watch...
Everything appears to point that way, yes.
This thread is full of people complaining how these aren't like their preferred watches, in terms of design, face shape, no GPS, etc.
I think this is a much more valid criticism in that their expensive flagship watch is not like their cheaper watch.
> This thread is full of people complaining how these aren't like their preferred watches
Which is funny to me because that's explicitly the point.
> These watches are not made for everyone. We want to be upfront with you about what to expect.
It's probably the most frustrating part of smartwatches. Everyone has a different list of mandatory features, and few seem to accept that their list isn't universal. Unlike phones where just about all of them have just about all the features, the smartwatch market is a wild west. It makes finding the right one for you a lot of work, and it's understandably disappointing when a watch checks all but one or two of your "must have"s.
The thing that really frustrates me right now about this is that between the two watches, basically all of my boxes are ticked, but some of those boxes are mutually exclusive between the watches.
When a product has two price points, like this, it's usually expected that the more expensive one is strictly "better" than the cheaper one in some ways. That isn't the case here, and it makes everything more difficult. Most of us are conditioned to look at the more expensive version, and say "are these extra features worth $X extra" and decide that way. With these watches, I have to try to think about whether I would use a compass or heart rate monitor more.
>unlike phones where just about all of them have just about all the features
I knew my preferences were niche, but I didn't think they were that niche. There hasn't been a phone with even half my ideal feature list (that works in the US) in probably close to a decade, and even if I abandon my more niche "nice to haves", there are essentially no new phones, and that's even before I add in that I'd really like it to be relatively repairable. And yes, there _used_ to be phones that had my entire feature list, so it's not a completely crazy list. It's just that phone makers have converged a pretty standard feature list with not too many companies coloring outside the lines. If you want that particular feature list, then sure, everyone has "all the features", but there is a whole universe of additional features that phones could (and some did) have, that they no longer do.
Would you mind sharing what those features are? About the only things I can think of that some phones used to have, but now largely don't, is removable battery, IR blaster, headphone jack, or keyboard. I can understand missing those features, even though they don't particularly matter to me.
I'm surprised you mentioned IR blaster, which is on my list, but I consider the second most niche one after FM tuner, which my current phone actually does have. Here's my list from what I consider most reasonable to most niche:
Small size. I'm a 6'2" male, so my hands are probably pretty well above the population average. Maybe it's because I'm a lefty, but I hate how big phones have gotten. It makes one hand use almost impossible, and if it's that hard for me, I have to assume that most people have just given up on even trying. I'd really prefer a sub 5.5" phone screen (part of me wants to say even smaller, but it's been so long since I've used a phone that small, that I don't even know anymore what my ideal size/lower limit is).
Headphone jack. Relatively self explanatory, imo.
No camera cutout. I hate them. I'd literally rather give up the screen real estate and have a bigger top bezel (although, see my point 1, I obviously value screen size less than most consumers). Luckily in Android you can just turn off the screen around the cutout in developer options, but I'd prefer to just not have the screen there. At least on my current phone, it still wastes battery (this might be a non-issue on OLED screens) and will register touches, preventing proper touch recognition elsewhere (this is related to the difficulty of single handed use, would probably be mitigated on a smaller phone)
SD card slot. Maybe the easiest of this list to actually still find? It seems like a decent number of phones these days have a spot for it in in the SIM card tray. I've heard that the reason companies don't include it is that a lot of SD cards are trash and wear out pretty quickly. This could lead to consumers losing data and being mad at the phone manufacturer. In my opinion, this is understandable, but still a bad reason.
IR Blaster/FM Tuner. I consider these two together. They are both pretty niche, and are "nice to haves". Mostly because I want my phone to be as much of a general purpose communications device as possible. The times when these are helpful are infrequent, but in those rare times, extremely nice to have.
Replaceable battery actually isn't on my list, mostly because I consider it part and parcel of "repairability", which (maybe nonsensically) seems like a different category. And, for me personally, battery degradation actually hasn't been a problem for phones. The two biggest things I would want to be able to repair are charging ports (this would be mitigated with wireless charging) and screen repair. These are, for me at least, the two most likely parts to break/wear out, and in my opinion they should both be cheap and easy to repair. Of course, if it was easy to do those two, you'd get battery replacement almost by default, and I certainly wouldn't be mad about easier to swap batteries.
Yeah I took a gander at GSMarena and your feature set hasn't been made past March of 2019 or so, which is a shame. I liked my Sony Xperia Compact, so if there ever was a pixel phone of that size I'd get one.
The issue I'm seeing is many people were expecting the watch that was advertised in the old Kickstarter.
The "pebble 2" from the Kickstarter -> "core 2 time" The "pebble 2 time" is nowhere to be found.
(The pebble 2 time was supposed to be the same underlying hardware, but a much classier case, slightly different form factor). They look much more like a normal watch, versus the pebble style feels like a geek toy.
I still get compliments on my pebble time round to this day!
I've been wearing my
It's kind of weird segmentation, but, given neither has GPS, I wonder how many people who'd seriously consider buying one of these really care about having a compass & barometer. Are those often important features to someone who doesn't care about GPS?
Having a compass and a barometer could be a "happy accident" of already having an all in one sensor that does all that things.
The compass could be easily related to an accelerometer used for detecting watch position (a function commonly used in smartwatches to power on the screen on certain positions that suggest you're looking at it) or detecting "steps".
Not so sure about where could you also get the barometric pressure sensor...
Both models have a 6-axis accelerometer, only one has compass reading.
The barometer is "nice to have". The compass is non-negotiable. It is extremely useful once you get used to remembering that you have one. Example: you have arrived at a train station in a new city. You have planned your route - you need to catch a bus from a stop on the west side of the station. You alight on the platform and there are multiple exits - you are completely disoriented. Turn left or right?
You can track elevation with barometer which is nice for casual hiking in the mountains
I had an old Suunto from before they went to crap, by far my favourite function was vertical speed, and it relied only on the accelerometer (the watch had GPS, but turning it on killed battery life). I still tried a couple of newer models but they removed that function.
The accelerometer? How can the accelerometer measure speed? It would drift to massive error very quickly.
vertical speed likely relied on the barometer rather than the accelerometer for exactly that reason.
It would be nice to track elevation change/stairs climbed during hiking, even if you don't care about GPS. I'll probably hang onto my old Garmin for exercise though, so this is sorta moot for me. Mostly it was just surprising to see that the pricier one was not a superset of the cheaper one.
In theory, you could pull GPS data from a connected smartphone, right?
Most smartphones don't come with a barometer, and the compass actually needs to be fixed to the display to make sense.
Personally I try to disable GPS in my smartphone when hiking unless I need to check the maps — I prefer to have my communication device not dead when I need it, and modern smartphones are terrible with battery life
Barometers can help predict incoming weather fronts - something I use on my phone while backpacking.
For sure, barometers are useful, I'm an avid backpacker and make use of the one in my watch for sudden weather changes and altitude, but if I'm buying a $150+ smartwatch to take backpacking, I just wouldn't really consider one without GPS.
Is there anything else lacking? I ordered the color one without much thought and only saw the barometer/compass bit afterward.
I almost bought one and I'd love to.
But then I've read in the Q&A about the tariffs and how that would affect the price at time of shipment.
This is too much uncertainty for me.
I've got no incentive to buy from the US right now, as a European.
I wish you the best of luck, as you definitely put a lot of love into it
Same here. Based in the EU, I was ready to buy one on day one, but when I saw the prices listed only in USD I had to stop right there. Just the shipping alone would be $25, plus the uncertainty of duty fees. I hope to see an EU store soon — with prices in EUR, low-cost shipping, and all fees already factored in.
International shipments will not be sent from the USA; they'll be shipped directly from Asia. The comment is in reference to your own countries - they may charge tariffs.
Thanks for clarifying! It would be helpful to mention that in the FAQ — knowing that the US has no involvement when ordering from the EU would be reassuring.
I will be visiting China later this year, any chance I can get one while I'm there via something like TaoBao to save on tax and shipping?
I'm super happy about the revival (I backed the first Pebble Kickstarter) and the bullet list of key features you're targeting would make my dream watch, but I hope you take this as constructive criticism that you're way off right now on this one:
- Simple and beautiful design
It's ugly, and the gap with the industrial design of today's watches is wider. I suggest contracting with a good industrial design firm to redesign the case: the case material, screen and internal electronics can remain the same.
I had the same reaction. The Core Time 2 gives Vader vibes. My hope is that the third color will be metallic and will look better. I prefer the rounded edges of the Pebble Time Steel 2. [1]
1: https://youtu.be/Pwq89K6RBTI?si=YTQS7wKEajlxpkBe&t=34
it's unique, and it's not even that bad. you shouldn't compare this to the apple watches of the world when the screen itself could display 64 colours at best (monochrome at worst). the design language should line in perfectly with those from the pebble os. it's supposed to be quirky, not liking the looks of it just means you're not the target audience.
It's not the worst but the original Pebble Time Steel looks better IMO. I understand why they used a simpler case design (They don't have the resources to make anything like the PTS) but I still like the PTS design more. Maybe someone will come out with a custom case or something idk
I think it looks great. I don't want a sleek expensive looking piece of jewelry,I want something fun.
It looks good. Don't confuse sleek with attractive.
I very much disagree. This design gives me old school Casio vibes, and I really, really like it. My father has worn an old model from Casio for decades, and I have a lot of nostalgia around it.
The shape of the Time 2 reminds me of the Casio calculator watch, which I love.
Frankly I'd like it if they leaned even harder into hard edges, like octagons over curved bevels.
I know battery life is impacted but I really want exactly this with GPS.
I want to be able to track my runs.
I love the banglejs because it is hackable but the GPS was very difficult to use. But it is such a fun device to hack on.
The firmware is open. You could add a GPS backpack and firmware support if you wanted.
the option to pair with an external gps would be better all round, apart from having a separate thing to carry. i have a garmin glo 2 that i pair to my android when doing openstreetmap stuff, and its something that you would barely notice in your pocket or clipped onto a backpack
I'm curious that the $150 ones has a barometer and compass, while the $225 one doesn't in favour of a heart rate monitor.
Given that they're specifically saying you shouldn't use it as a sports watch, what use is an HRM, especially when compared to the utility of a compass and barometer/altimeter?
Possibly SoC differences or space limitations.
If I recall correctly, the original Pebble had a Compass (which may not have even been used until a OS overhaul later on) but the Pebble 2 SE didn't. (https://www.reddit.com/r/pebble/comments/4kz7ch/why_pebble_i...)
I think HRM is more useful than compass/barometer since HR is the only thing your phone can't do.
The https://www.whoop.com/, for example, doesn't even have GPS. All of its value comes from its HRM.
Barometer is especially niche and not something very trustworthy outside of devices made for it. To the average person, compass is only useful for showing orientation on a map.
Yeah I just noticed that when going to preorder.
It muddies what would otherwise an easy upsell/upgrade.
[dead]
Core 2 Duo is a pretty funny name.
Are you going to sell replacement parts this time? I was immensely disappointed to see the initial watches being pretty repairable in theory, but no parts being sold. It was marketed as a tinkerer‘s device after all.
I’m wearing my Pebble Time Steel right now - and quite like it. Haven’t found anything better. It could use some better activity tracking, but the worst thing about it right now is that it doesn’t really have an iOS app (AltStore is pretty flaky). Any news on that front?
For some reason there just hasn’t been a real spiritual successor, so the revival is greatly appreciated.
I came to say Core 2 Duo is a terrible name :/
Same. It neither describes the product nor makes it easier to search for online. For that matter, it doesn't exactly roll of the tongue either...
> nor makes it easier to search for online.
Searching for 'pebble core 2 duo' already comes up with a page of results only related to the watch[1] (including this very comment thread, ironically[2].) Search engines are very good these days.
1. https://imgur.com/TE3aaGY
2. https://imgur.com/l4aBszK
They knew what they were doing.
And I think it's brilliant: it says "ca 2010 technology, the good parts". Technically, it's not exactly correct (according to Wikipedia Core 2 was discontinued a year before the Pebble launched), but it's one of the few lasting iconic names from that era in technology that aren't Apple. RePebble playing with that reference is exactly the same pattern as xyz-90 letter combinations reminiscent of audio cassette blanks popping up all over the music industry when the 80ies revival was in bloom.
Will it eventually end in a "we got sued by Intel!" marketing gambit? Certainly a possibility. Is assume they have played through both scenarios.
I'm sure they did. However, intentionality neither makes it consumer friendly nor beneficial from a marketing perspective.
for what its worth, from the website copy:
>>I think you might recognize this one It’s almost exactly a Pebble 2, upgraded with modern chips and new tricks. Duo is short for ‘Do-over’.
There's a whole second blog post about Apple support being discussed here:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43401245
> Core 2 Duo is a pretty funny name.
I remember there was also an Intel processor with the same name.
I'm guessing that is why they said it was a funny name.
There's no way it's actually shipping with that name, right?
I'm sure Intel's law firms are drafting a cease & desist as we speak. I'd bet $10 the name changes.
No such thing as bad publicity as they say.
They'll be cheeky, the big dinosaur corporate will come out swinging and look bad like they always do, and they'll get a load of press in the tech websites which is their target market.
I don't think this one would necessarily work out like that - here they have (seemingly) intentionally named the watch identically to a product name that already exists, in a fairly closely related field, that they should know is most likely trademarked...
The bad press comes when it feels unfair for the big company to try and pursue action but in this case it would seem that Intel would be perfectly justified...
When you apply for a trademark you have to say what type of products/services it involves.
Intel did make a smartwatch for a while, but I don't think it had a Core Due chipset!
Yeah but I think that's only a factor in the consideration. I doubt it cancels out identical and very distinct names.
Perhaps a trademark lawyer can weigh in. My understanding is that a trademark is strictly limited to the areas (both in terms of geography and vertical) claimed in the application. This is why Apple didn't have to do battle with the Beatles until they got into the music business.
Yeah because "apple" is a common term that people might reasonably expect two businesses to use. The point of trademark law is to prevent consumer confusion.
I am not a trademark lawyer and I haven't even looked this up but if Apple made a "The Beatles Laptop" then I would hope that defence doesn't apply.
> This is why Apple didn't have to do battle with the Beatles until they got into the music business.
That went back to the Apple IIɢꜱ. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sosumi
The more interesting Apple trademark case was "iPhone", which was in active use by Cisco for their VoIP desk phones.
The main thing is if a consumer would be confused. I don't think consumers would be confused about an ancient Intel processor and a brand new smartwarch.
Yeah, maybe... but what harm would it really do? The Core 2 line was killed off over 10 years ago in 2012.
The point of trademarks is to avoid ambiguity of origin. Pebble core 2 duo is definitely ambiguous.
Is it? I own a Fujifilm X-T5 camera and Cadillac makes a car called the XT5, but I don't see anyone getting confused.
To the average consumer? I doubt it.
I'm gonna name everything I make "Metallica"
> it doesn’t really have an iOS app (AltStore is pretty flaky). Any news on that front?
I thought the Pebble app still worked, using Rebble. My understanding is that they are building a new app for the new watches, if that's what you were asking about.
The only way to install the old iOS Pebble app is by sideloading via something like AltStore (or doing it manually every week). Maybe you can also still re-install it if you had it installed when it was available in the App Store but I'm not sure if that still works.
I have an original backer watch and bought one when they launched. Both stopped working within maybe 6 months and support at the time suggested I just buy another...
I had an OG pebble, it was a gift from a conference. An amazing product, more Apple than Apple in terms of making clear tradeoffs to provide real utility & design quality.
Reading this press release I thought -- they perfectly read the minds of the target customer. Retaining the spirit of the product and exceeding expectations with polished improvements.
Great job guys! I'm in
Eric, I’m interested in what you learnt picking up a 10 year old open hardware project.
I’m especially interested in the “revival” nature of this project. How did staying mostly true to the original vision guide you practically?
You mentioned briefly that some apps may have stopped working as they attempt to hit now no existent url endpoints. Least of which is likely the old official pebble endpoints.
Have you done any design work as a revival project such that the project will be more robust in future. Eg 50 years from now, if things didn’t pan out and your company is still here, such that the watches and their apps are all that bit more resilient?
Curious as to your thoughts on designing in longevity of serviceability into this reboot given you can feel that yourself.
I realized a long time ago that I don't actually want a smartwatch, but this _is_ making me very nostalgic
I'm very tempted to order one, but I made a similar decision recently. I got rid of my Apple Watch and replaced it with a cheap wrist heart rate monitor that can connect to a phone, but doesn't need to (and I didn't). I wear it at the gym and that's it. That's all smart watches ever were for me, and if this isn't what Pebble is going for, it sounds like I should pass.
Though I will be keeping an eye on them incase my needs change. I hope they do well and stay true to their ethos, and avoid trying to chase or become the Apple Watch.
At one point I had a Blackberry Passport and a Pebble. The future looked bright.
Just a brief note to say: loved original Pebble, always a regret that my younger poorer self didn't buy one way back when, so bit the bullet straight away yesterday and am signed up for the first batch of the black Core 2 Duo in July.
Two features which I think it would be useful to give more prominence to especially as you move from pre-order stage to general sale stage:
Strap is replaceable in both models Both models count steps
Would be high priority things for me! Look forward to seeing how this develops and best of luck.
As someone who was a huge fan of the original Pebble series, it's hard to get excited about this offering when compared to the alternatives available today with more features and a cheaper price.
I'm currently wearing the BangleJS v2 [0] which has the following going for it, all for $90USD:
* 1.3 inch 176x176 always-on 3 bit colour LCD display (LPM013M126) with backlight
* Full touchscreen (6H hardness glass)
* GPS/Glonass receiver
* Heart rate monitor
* 3 Axis Accelerometer
* 3 Axis Magnetometer
* Air Pressure/Temperature sensor
* 175mAh battery, 4 week standby time
* Full SWD debug port on rear of watch
* The OS and every app are open source, all written in Javascript
In my experience it lasts over 2 weeks with multiple daily notifications and wearing it 24/7 for HR and sleep tracking.
The Pebble was a compelling offer when it came out, but I'll have to pass on this one.
[0] https://shop.espruino.com/banglejs2
The original blog post for the revived Pebble was very clear about the design goals and it drove home something quite clearly: this is not going to deliver a laundry list of features or support all possible lifestyles. It will be focused on doing a few things well because there's a need for a modern Pebble not met by existing watches.
I have a Bangle2 and while it's super fun, I think it perfectly illustrates the point that simply having features isn't enough. I would not say my Bangle2 is the same as my OG Pebble.
As someone who only ever cared about a handful of features (HR, sleep, steps, notifications), the BangleJS is definitely the superior offering imo.
It does everything my Pebble did, it's cheaper, and it's been open source since day one rather than first requiring an acquisition and resurrection.
Obviously different strokes for different folks, Eric is great and I wish him and the team over at Rebble (hi ishot!) all the best, but the smartwatch landscape is very different from what it was in 2014
What's the software like? One of the biggest reasons I'm still using my pebbles is Notification Center, which has the most control over watch notifications that I've ever seen, likes being able to set regex filters and get very fine green control about what notifications get sent to my watch their vibration etc)
Unfortunately it's the software that determines how good such a device is to use. What's currently considered the best firmware for the Bangle?
I will also note that backlit LCD is vastly inferior to e-paper in smartwatches. Size of the watch also matters, there are some tradeoffs you have to make.
Pebble's display is also a backlit LCD. It is better than some backlit LCDs but the technology is not fundamentally different.
Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/pebble/comments/3i6mje/epaper_tech_...
It was e-paper (transreflective LCD), although it had a backlight it is vastly different to your usual backlit TFT.
Checking the datasheet for Bangle's display, it seems to also be a transflective LCD.
The official one, which runs great. And since it's all open JS there's even alternative app menus and launchers if you're not happy with the stock option
I forgot to add that this LCD screen is perfectly readable in direct sunlight, I wouldn't know it was not e-ink at a casual glance. Even at extreme angles the only thing that makes it difficult is the reflectivity of the front glass, but I have a large font watchface so even that is a minimal issue.
ohh, I always thought my Bangle had e-inc display because the clock will last several months on one charge, and the display is always on.
The second version seems to have something more sunlight readable but neither Bangle 1 or 2 seem to be neither transreflective LCDs (e-paper) or e-ink, seems to be just TFT LCDs. At least according to their homepage.
As a banglejs 2 wearer as well: I think it's the closest competitor by a very large margin, but I would absolutely not call it a polished experience. I've had intermittent (and persistent) connection failures (definitely improving over time), heartrate is all over the place and is almost totally unreliable (some weeks my resting heartrate is apparently >200bps, and some I never break 100), the gadgetbridge app has loads of minor wtfs, touches are not well aligned if you have a status bar visible, the UI is kinda laggy, it's not waterproof, and I can probably write up another couple dozen more OTOH if I try for a few minutes.
I consider myself a happy customer, and will definitely recommend it with caveats, there's a lot to like about the banglejs 2. But it's targeting a FAR more hacker-oriented crowd than Pebbles did - I would absolutely not suggest one to people who are not willing to debug their watch. It's quite simple to do so (really, I like it!), but it's not something I can recommend to the normies in my life.
I looked at a few Banglejs-in-action videos and the limitations look so bad that I'm not sure what you'd even build for it. The app store only seems to confirm this.
Here's someone showing what it's like to use the GPS system and lack of mapping: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BtEdM2w1VDM
Pebble only has to be a little better to be 2x more usable. Looking at old videos from 8 years ago, the software was much, much better than anything I'm seeing on Banglejs today.
> all written in Javascript
Pass.
All I care about is battery life and level of friction to creating an app.
2+ weeks and extremely low, so language purism is irrelevant imo
Pebble 's user created apps and watch faces are all JS.
As far as I remember it was either JS or C. cf. https://github.com/pebble-examples
Why?
Because dunking on Javascript is trendy
Any chance of wireless charging? I can't imagine it being so complicated or expensive... tho most smartwatches come with custom pins so there has to be a reason.
Worst aspect of these watches are the custom charging cradles you have to lug around when travelling.
Hell, even usb-c with some cap/sliding door mechanism would be better.
While I really do like wireless charging for watches (no exposed electrical contacts == easier waterproofing and no corrosion to worry about, and the battery capacities are so low that slow charging barely matters): 2 and 4 pin magnetic charging cables are extremely common in smart watches, it's what pebble used before, and it sounds like what they're using for these as well. "Standard pebble charger" is listed in the tech-specs, which likely means the 2-pin version.
"Standard" wireless charging (Qi) requires a reciever 30x44mm, too big for a smartwatch. Custom wireless charging, like bluetooth earbuds, requires a custom charger. And we're back to the custom charging cradle. Might as well just put pins in it and call it a day. I do wish the pins were standardized though.
> Core 2 Duo
Is that not one of Intel's trademarks from the past 20 years?
I actually checked because I thought the same thing immediately, but I think what Intel actually trademarked was "Core", as in "Intel® Core™2 Duo"
The closest mark I could find is a wordmark for INTEL CORE INSIDE DUO cancelled in 2014 due to disuse.
https://tsdr.uspto.gov/#caseNumber=78775512&caseSearchType=U...
I bought 2.
I understand this is a semi experiment and will not expect the warranty or certainty that an Apple will give. This is to support the possibility of making an alternative become viable.
Question for Eric, is there a way to ensure charging works with USB? Please don't make us carry yet another cable.
Thanks.
The month-long battery life ensures you won't have to carry another cable.
From the 360° shot on the product page, these appeare to use a proprietary cable, like almost all other smartwatches.
To be fair the Pebble "proprietary cable" is simply applying five volt voltage to the back of the watch.
I'm definitely ended up on vacation without the cable and just cut the ends off a USB cable to charge my watch.
Maybe I skimmed too quickly, are there no size/dimensions published? Seems the display size is there, and the strap width, but no other details as far as I can tell.
On the store page there are dimensions.
I think you're gonna have to be more specific, this page? https://store.repebble.com/
All I see is display size and strap width there.
I couldn't agree more on how restricted popular smartwatches are. I'm working on a project to capture the maximum physiological and health data—such as heart rate (HR), heart rate variability (HRV), stress levels, and SpO2—from a smartwatch in the shortest possible interval. So far, the best I've achieved is once per minute. Could pebble support obtaining this data (particularly HRV) at even shorter intervals?
Pebble let developers request HR data at a max frequency of 1Hz, so I'm not sure how you could calculate HRV from it (Nyquist theorem).
https://developer.rebble.io/developer.pebble.com/guides/even...
I also tinker with health data from wearables. I've built some Whoop-like UIs for a couple cheapo wrist straps from Aliexpress, but their HR monitors are always so bad that they're useless outside of when you're sleeping.
Why was that frame choosen over the other ones? I fee PTR and PTS where by far the most modern looking and beautiful ones. Do you consider bringing that pebble 2 back with the same look?
PS: Pebble owner and daily user since more than 5 years here
Are there any plans for a circular screen? I would love one of these devices, but the screen feels like it may be bulky on my wrist.
Eric has mentioned that they might later do a Pebble Time Round equivalent. Not this year though.
And I have the perfect name for it: the Second Time ‘Round.
Holy crap, I almost want to make it just so we can name it that.
I’d buy one! With the Bluetooth power use improvements mentioned for today’s watches, the tiny Round battery ought to be good for a week or more now, right?
My main complaint about Apple Watch is the size, so a very slim watch might get me to switch back. Have a Time in a drawer somewhere, but I assume its battery is shot by now.
I'm hesitant to order because I much preferred the designs of the PTS and PTR. And I had a PTS for years. I hope you do consider it in the future, as I am having a hard time pulling the trigger purely for design reasons, the rest is great.
I don't understand this in the slightest. There's no advantage whatsoever to a round screen, but tons of disadvantages. Why not make your phone screen round? Why not make your computer screen round? Your TV?
Please, Core, resist the temptation to enshittify yourself with another useless round screen.
The pebble time round was the stylish version of the Pebble Time, you lost battery life and a smaller display but you got a significantly thinner sleeker watch.
I daily drive the pebble time, but wear my round for dates or when I want to be a bit more stylish. I still get compliments on it to this day.
Because the larger market of watch buyers end up buying way way more round watches than square or other shapes, thus a lager market of buyers and prices are probably lower. I don't really care though. It doesn't matter for these kinds of low sales boutique devices. I ordered one ;-)
I would buy one but only if I am guaranteed to be able to compile the source code somewhat easily and flash it to the device. Anyone knows if they have made any promises around that?
I can't see why this wouldn't be the case, the firmware will be open source and I have to imagine a developer mode will be part of that.
Who did the product design (cad, picking components, etc) for both of these watches? Is this in house? (shout them out!) or did you work with an outside firm, and if so which one?
I was surprised at the time how cheap the original Pebbles were, they were nearly exactly what I wanted and I would have been willing to pay more for mine. In fact I ultimately paid more to replace mine with a watch I like less. When Pebble folded I wondered if having too low of price ultimately hurt them - if they didn't pick up enough customers to make up on volume what they left off the table on per-unit revenue? I hope the relaunch is successful, and I assume they have all manner of internal data that says I'm wrong, but my initial reaction to the listed prices is the same as it was to the originals - they seem too low. (I'm setting aside the caveat about a potential price change due to tariffs and assuming they launch at current list price.)
There's a big difference: it's 2025 and there are no shortage of competitors that look better and have more features than a $150 Pebble 2 or $225 Time 2. Unlike 2015 the market already has a $200 Apple Watch, $60 Amazfit Bip, $55 CMF Watch Pro, and a $220 Coros Pace which will track an ultramarathon. All these devices are made by mature companies and have multiple revisions.
I liked my Pebbles, but I won't spend $300 on one because the chance of failure (again) is so great.
I would be amazed if there aren't comparable pebbleOS watches from a Chinese manufacturer for cheap(er) coming soon.
I'm not sure why manufacturers would care - it's a ten year old device with limited appeal. Chinese manufacturers already make better, cheaper watches.
> I'm setting aside the caveat about a potential price change due to tariffs and assuming they launch at current list price
As you should, because if they raise the price because of tariffs they won't see a dime of it. It's less raising the price and more that they don't yet know how much tax they'll be expected to collect and remit.
As someone who has exclusively worn a pebble since it was crowd funded, I am trilled. I love purpose built devices[0] that don't attempt to do everything. I don't need a watch that does everything, just triage notification and perform time related activities and get out of the way. Pebble has always fit that niche. The fact that I can hack on it and mold it to my needs has been icing.
I have some sincere questions on the design choices. For context, I own a pebble time (everyday wear for triaging notifications) and a polar watch (for exercise tracking). Also part of a cycling community where we swap exercise watches to try out what else is out there. I have found I always sleep in my polycarb pebble time because I forget I am wearing it - it is that unnoticeable.
1) Why limit Core 2 Duo screen to BW? Feels like a step back when the Core Time 2 will have it. Sourcing parts?
2) According to the blog, I understand the Core Time 2 is your (Eric's) dream watch, so not trying to rain on your parade but trying to reason about the audience you're catering to here. The heart rate monitor suggests that it can be used to track physical activity. But... no GPS, metal (heavy) case, and protruding sensor diminish the utility of the sensor. If you've ever run with a light watch, you'll start noticing how quickly metal watches fatigue the skin. I've slept with watches on that track my sleep (optically) and the protruding sensors always causes pressure points - similar to a pebble (heh) in the shoe. Having 30 days battery life, speaker, and better vibration make for a great gadget that doesn't need to be taken off... unless it is not comfortable.
[0]: https://www.polar.com/en/science/whitepapers Purpose built devices are optimized and companies that build they have domain knowledge. You've probably never heard of polar but they publish the science behind their features where as garmin has nice looking gear but has gimmicky features, like "body battery"
1) Yes, the hardest part of building a watch is getting a display. There is only 1 vendor and we have to use what they make. Custom displays cost $1m+ and take 18 months to build.
2) It's not a running watch. I'd recommend getting garmin if you're looking for that.
> 2) It's not a running watch. I'd recommend getting garmin if you're looking for that.
I think we are on the same page but I've communicated poorly. Why even include a heart rate sensor on a watch that is not intended for exercising in when the trade-off is sacrificing comfort and raising the complexity and cost of the design?
Heart rate sensors have a number of uses aside from fitness tracking.
I'm guessing comfort wasn't considered because it isn't a common complaint.
I've used exercise as a catch all for continuous monitoring of the heart. Point being, to get more utility out of a sensor, you'd have to wear it more with less interruption. 30 days without taking off a device is... Unheard of (and wicked cool!). So comfort will be more appreciated in the long term, I suspect
I've mentioned this in the above reply but I'll repeat here: It is not common to wear watches for more than a few days at a time simply because there are not many whose battery will last that long. The effects of fatigue/pressure point from the sensor bump are less observed but not missing. Majority of consumers wear Apple/Android watches that need to be recharged every day. With 30 days on wrist, I can extrapolate that fatigue will be more pronounced - so I am calling it out.
1. Every watch with a sensor towards your skin has a bump. Every example I've looked at has a much larger one.
2. People already exercise in metal straps and aluminum Garmins.
These just seem like you-things. Which is fine, but you should temper your complaints/bikeshedding accordingly.
I acknowledge this is a niche concern/complaint but this is a niche product for a niche base of folks, I'm simply curious about why. I want this to succeed and be sustainable so I asked about the utility of the sensor and provided a counter example since it's additional raises complexity.
It is not common to wear watches for more than a few days at a time simply because there are not many whose battery will last that long. The effects of fatigue/pressure point from the sensor bump are less observed but not missing. With 30 days on wrist, I can extrapolate that fatigue will be more pronounced - so I am calling it out. I understand I am a small sample size but I have 2 watches whose battery lasts 7 days and the one without the bump is more pleasant to wear for a week between charges. To the point that I always reach for the comfort option and eventually sold off the other.
On a lighter note, I do hope I'm not providing a series of increasingly bizarre and nonsensical questions or scenarios ;) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8YDpvMYk5jA
I don't use my watch for running (using a 7 year old Fitbit versa). However, I do keep it on the entire day unless it is charging. I was curious what the weight of the Time 2 was going to be (I don't see it in the specs). I just wanted to compare the weight of it to my existing device. Thanks!
Why would you want a custom display? Just use the same one as any of the thousands of Chinese watches use
> Why limit screen to BW?
There's one with a color screen.
Can you tell me if the Pebble can do this...
On my Samsung Galaxy watch, if I get a notification from my Unifi security cameras, for example, I get a little thumbnail image appear on my watch. There's no special app on my watch, just the app on my paired Galaxy phone.
Will it do this? Or would I just get a text notification? I don't understand smart watches well enough to know how much they are doing themselves vs how much of what they do is to be a mindless projection of whatever the paired phone tells them to do.
The Pebble software doesn't have support for images in notifications right now. But it definitely could/should be added. And it's open source, so you could even do it yourself!
I am not familiar with the pebble SDK or notification API it has. Smart watches usually will display whatever notification the mobile devices instructs it to display.
If you get a push notification on your mobile, I don't see a reason why pebble won't display it. The thumbnail image might be fixed but all the text content will be shown. And FWIW, the entire thing is open source so you can go in an add it, or open feature requests, etc.
Use the Android pebble app "Notification Center" and it should be able to do that for you.
(Notification Center gives you extreme amounts of control over what to send to the watch how it gets displayed, etc. It's the reason I'm still daily wearing my pebble watches)
I want it, and yet I know that not only I don't need it, but I likely won't use it that much.
This is really like a cool gadget purchase impulse.
i expected the price to be cheap, like the original pebble.
it's trying to make a cheap product into a niche product with kind of premium price, 150$ and 225$ for a watch is already pretty high.
The people who can afford it, they already got apple watch.
Disagree, with the following reasoning:
1. IIRC the first Pebble was $99, and the one after it was $149. We're a decade on, inflation is rampant, and the new devices are evidently intended as lower volume products. $149 seems OK to me in 2025. $225 seems OK as well for the color unit, but I don't feel like waiting until December, and can't justify buying two watches. I put my money down for the $149 unit. We'll see how much it ends up being by the time it's on my wrist in Ireland. My current "smart" watch is a Mi Band 6. I'm on screen no.2, strap no.3, and shortly battery no.2: all told, I certainly have $100 invested in it by now, even though it cost me 42 Swiss Francs ($45?) to buy initially.
2. There are other hacking-friendly watches out there, but they do not have the depth of app ecosystem that Pebble did/does. I think those thousands of watchfaces and applications ready to fire on day1 are worth something. This is not a net-new smartwatch environment, it is an established if a bit aged standard that is being polished back up for the modern world.
3. I'm the target market, but I definitely don't have an Apple watch because it doesn't work with Android devices, and I absolutely detest iOS (and am increasingly frustrated with Apple's blatant cash grab-ism vis-a-vis RAM and flash prices on their computers to the point that I've pivoted back to Linux devices).
> can't justify buying two watches
I managed to eke out a couple more years after Pebbles were discontinued by finding replacements on ebay. If this is a low volume run, I'm contemplating the opposite—whether I can justify not buying multiple while I still can.
Fine, I ordered three.
The Pebble Time was $150 and the Time Steel was $250.
That was also 10 years of inflation ago.
Apple Watch doesn't work on Android, and Android Wear watches are laggy garbage with stupid round screens. There are zero good options on the Android side, so something like Pebble\Core has value.
Apple Watches start at $250 and up to over $1k, pebbleOS offers way more functionality and 10x battery life, they’re not overlapping audiences
I had an original Kickstarter Pebble, a Pebble Time, and am probably ordering this new Pebble, but I have to say you have it the other way around. Apple Watch has 10x the functionality in this comparison, but they're both delightful devices and I'm excited to have a Pebble back in my rotation!
Sorry but while I won’t argue the battery life angle, you really cannot say that the PebbleOS offers significantly more functionality than WatchOS. It just ain’t so.
Do Pebble watches have GPS, cellular, and almost medical-grade sleep analysis? Are they rated for 50m underwater?
It's a lot, but for the smartwatch world it's not that bad. My Garmin Instinct Crossover was $400, for example.
Am I just out of my mind for feeling like I should wait a few months for a cheaper hardware equivalent to drop without an OS that will run Pebble?
I guess $100 average profit is "normal" in terms of production, marketing, r&d and all of that.. but this is just an old watch that someone is selling again since the OS was open sourced. The profit is just all profit.. I can't imagine a non-US manufacturer won't just start cranking out devices people can flash with a better OS.
As a Pebble fan I'm sad to say I'm a little bit disappointed. I love the pebble ethos but I think the design for the Core Time 2 is a step back in terms of style compared to the final Pebble options. I rocked an OG Pebble and it was nerdy in a way that I didn't mind at the time, but now with smartwatches being so common and having so many cheap and feature packed options with multi-day battery life I think the styling matters a lot more. Pebble in particular could have a big advantage here with the reflective display since you can show a lot of personality in the always-on watch face without it being distracting, but I think you would need a more minimal and sleek body to make that a selling feature.
As it is I find the pricing to be a hard sell given how many features you are losing compared even to cheap fitness bands e.g. lots of advanced health tracking, NFC payments. I applaud Eric on self-funding the project and I'm sure the risk and volume questions there are contributors to the cost.
All that said, I may still pick up a duo because there really isn't anything like a Pebble and I would really like this to be a success so that we can see lower prices, more styles, and an even more awesome community at some point in the future.
For what it's worth, I'm also a Pebble fan and I love the styling of these watches. I always thought that the original style looked much nicer than the later, "more stylish" designs. So I think this is just a case where they can't please everyone, and are trying to stick to what people originally liked (or perhaps their own design tastes).
> more minimal and sleek body
I don't think that this should be trying to compete head-on with existing smartwatches on styling. And for the purposes of a hackable device, a larger screen seems like a selling point. Also, the larger screen makes touchscreen features more usable.
Agreed with respect to size and the touchscreen which I do think is a great addition. I just think something that's more of a continuation of the Time series designs would be better fitting for a $200+ option. The Time 2 body which would have had the exact same screen would be fine by me.
100percent - that is the single thing holding me back to preorder. The time 2 body would be an instant buy.
Pre-ordered 2 different units; really excited for these to ship.
Got a Pebble Time in highschool and it was so much fun to use and so polished. It was one of the first electronic devices to truely enamor me. I have worked with embedded syatems for the last ~3 years and I have been wondering lately just how no-one else has been able to since make a smartwatch with such good "taste" as the Pebbles...
Happy to have a fresh device to live with! Thank you Eric!
I also had a Pebble Time in high school. That was an incredible watch. Beautiful, polished, functional, but still had a nerdy charm from the display. I miss it so much and this announcement is so exciting.
I am beside myself with excitement. This has been in the back of my mind 8 years, I always believed. I have never pre-ordered anything this quickly in my life.
I'm super excited to hear this announcement!
For those of us interested in health metrics - can we expect the precision of the heart rate sensor to be sufficient for calculating HRV (heart rate variability)? It doesn't have to be natively supported, but I'd love to see a third party app offer this some day... In fact I may work on it myself, provided the data from HR sensor is good enough.
These look really appealing. What are the most common use cases for these other than telling the time? Are they gimmicky or actually useful?
Elimination of phantom vibrations. You always know when your phone buzzed if your wrist buzzes right afterward. Also nice to see what a notification is without having to take out your phone.
Pebble is still way better at sleep (and nap) tracking than Apple Watch.
I have a tendency to stay up late and get up at random times, so I need to track if I get enough sleep.
Would have been nice to see a model without a microphone. I understand I'm a minoritiy (workplace doesn't allow devices with mics), but being severely hamstrung with smartwatch choices that don't have a microphone is tough. Will still definitely buy one to support the project, and will eagerly watch (heh) for new models!
Strange - I would expect a workplace that doesn't allow mics to also disallow bluetooth
Agree with sibling, security theater largely. I suspect the logic of banning is to stop recordings of conversations, whereas Bluetooth is just a protocol for sending data. Eliminate collection sensors and mediums for transmit are fine.
I did decide to purchase a Pebble Time Steel and a new battery alongside the Core 2 Duo. I hope that with Eric back in charge, the old Pebbles will be allowed to use the new app and hopefully get modern apps.
Security theater
It's great to see PebbleOS making a comeback! Regarding the questions about NFC payments and GPS, these would definitely be valuable features to consider for future models. The demand is clearly there, and it would make the watches more competitive with other smartwatches on the market.
I was worried about it using an "e-paper" display considering the originals used Sharp MiP LCDs, however from that demo video the refresh rate is insane! I guess I haven't looked at e-paper modules in a wee while!
Open source and hackable makes this a dream watch replacement for my old watch. Hopefully these new watches see great success, so much so that they motivates competition that is willing to sale in stores so that I can buy one.
I might be missing something, but how do you specify color options for the Core Time 2?
Was wondering the same thing. I found this:
> 1. Can I choose a color for Core Time 2? Yes you can! Just not yet. We are finalizing all the color options and will contact everyone prior to shipping so you can choose which color best suits you! Just make sure your contact information is correct for your pre-order
-- https://bsky.app/profile/repebble.com/post/3lkt2yfub7s2i
I am extremely ready to drop my FitBit since they do nothing but make the product worse. The only major watch brand with something small is Garmin with their extremely ugly vivo smart.
But I am worried about compatibility. I assume it will be possible to connect into Home Assistant eventually, but would be nice to get confirmation on how open the platform plans to be in allowing me to get my own data.
I also wonder if they will pursue partnerships. I feel safe sharing my walking data with my insurance company and can usually max out the rewards simply by getting my steps in on most days and doing normal annual things. Will Pebble work with them?
Look Eric,
I had and loved Pebble in the past. You sold us and ditched us first chance you got.
Why would we trust you now?
Lovingly, Zeljko
What is the sample rate on the barometer?
If it’s sensitive enough, a compelling skydiving altimeter app could be developed. Considering most purpose built altis used worse screens and cost 350+, could be a quite compelling use case.
Can you use the new Pebble watches without an accompanying smartphone application? I've wanted to get a smartwatch, but have always been put off by the requirement of a stupid app to synchronise data with a recent smartphone to be able to use it. They have all the necessary hardware to record and process data on board... don't see why it should require an expensive Apple or Android every few years to keep using. My Timex from 2011 cost £35 and still works perfectly.
If the goal is to make a product impossible to google, "core 2 duo" is a pretty good choice, since it'll turn up 99.9999% results related to an obsolete Intel desktop PC CPU.
Interesting as companion for a phone. Anyone know of a hackable or privacy friendly standalone watch that can be used to make calls (e.g. for children pre smartphone age)?
As one of the watch enthusiasts with a collection of several dozen straps, it's refreshing to see the watches including quick-release straps right out of the box. That makes quick-swapping to our NATO straps easy peasy!
There's something genuinely heartwarming about seeing Eric Migicovsky remain true to his vision, finally delivering the product I dreamed of but couldn't afford a decade ago, after all.
Is the weight and thickness of the watches announced anywhere?
This might be asking too much, but will there be any way to run the newer pebbleOS on the first-gen Pebbles? I love my Steel, and am currently still using it
I liked the old feature of the alarm clock vibrating when the wearer was in the good phase of sleep to wake up in, please make sure the new watches also have that.
I preordered.
It'll be the same alarm app on the same OS since Google open sourced it.
Pretty cool.
I'd like to hack around with the HR sensor, so I pre-ordered the Time 2.
What are good resources for looking into building an app for it? I see the OS is hosted here https://github.com/pebble-dev/pebble-firmware But most pebble-related google searches bring up ancient material and I'm not sure what's still relevant.
We're still working on improving the documentation, but here's a good place to start https://github.com/richinfante/rebbletool and https://developer.rebble.io/developer.pebble.com/tutorials/j...
The ancient material is relevant because nothing has changed since the company went out of business :) I'm wearing a Pebble right now and I was able to update one of my favorite watchfaces using a docker container of the old Pebble SDK. The blog post says there will be an updated SDK released with the new watches.
A newbie to smartwatches question : How are RePebbleOS watches when it comes to privacy? Do they offer complete offline, manual data download/sync experience or do they require some type of Google or Apple crapware to work?
I am mainly considering buying one to track my heart rate, but I don't want my data to leave my watch unless I copy it myself. Any budget friendly recommendations?
Vague question, as privacy means different things to different people, but its very hackable, so as long as you're running Android you should be able to make it work how you want.
By default it uses the Pebble App for sync. You can decide whether that meets your privacy needs or you want a custom app. Someone has probably shared how to do what you want.
See the other trending HN post for Apple compatibility (TL;DR it sucks because Apple makes it suck).
Thanks. Sorry if it was vague. Basically my first preference would be to not have any need to connect to a mobile phone (so no android or apple). And if that is not possible it is preferable to connect via de-googled Android. I guess I need to find out whether Pebble App sync works on GrapheneOS, and whether Pebble App sync requires internet/data permission - just trying to make sure the data doesn't leave my phone.
You need a mobile phone since they don't have internet access directly.
After that you should be totally fine, what are you hoping for your smartwatch to do? I primarily use my pebble for notifications from my phone to show up on my watch which doesn't require any sort of external access.
I need it to track my heart rate. I am actually also looking forward to something that can track my blood-pressure, but I am not sure whether the technology is there yet. A device that can do offline tracking would be ideal, ability to sync with a USB cable would be icing on the cake.
I've wanted to play around with a color ePaper watch for a while, including debating buying an old Pebble Time, so this seems like a great excuse to pull the trigger.
For people who have developed apps for them in the past, does everyone just use the embedded JavaScript engine? For maintaining apps that modify the firmware or talk to new peripherals does that require maintaining a fork or is there some module system?
Get on their discord. Bangle has the JS thing, pebble watch faces used a c-variant, I don't remember if their applets used something different.
AFAIK, if you're doing firmware replacements you're likely going to be maintaining an "out of tree fork" unless it's already well-modularized in the way you're imagining.
Love it. I would absolutely love if they would consider making the Core Time 2 in a slightly more timeless outer case than this "sport" look.
Is there some definite information about what kind of "e-paper" is used for those? While I like reflective LCD more than backlit LCD/TFT a "real" e-paper (as in eInk) is far better readable in low light, so would be nice to know.. For e-paper feeling we still have the Watchy (with far less battery life and close to no available software admittedly)
The are both transflective (for sunlight readability) memory-in-pixel (for power efficiency) LCDs. The black & white one is the same display as was used in the Pebble 2, and the color one is most likely the display which was planned to be used in the Pebble Time 2 (mostly comparable to the Pebble Time display but larger).
I agree that a true electrophoretic display is a lot nicer to look at; unfortunately the refresh rate leaves a lot to be desired in a highly interactive watch. Hopefully someday we get a technology with the best of both worlds.
this is awesome news. I loved the original pebble but moved to the apple watch after pebble's demise.
I am curious what people here use their smart watches for on a daily basis and couldn't live without, other than to check the day/time. for me it's just message alerts, timer, and media controls. just those 3 features on a e-ink screen would make me super happy.
I moved from Apple Watch to Garmin, so I’m not in the market for something like a Pebble, I value the fitness features too much.
But putting that aside, I’d say the essential features for me are notifications, timer, calendar, media controls.
I love it. I loved my pebbles. The only thing that always annoyed me was the design.
My dream is that pebble eventually becomes a beautiful time piece. Maybe teenage engineering could be convinced to give the pebble a design refresh.
I miss having pebble watches, they hit a sweet spot of lifetime vs functionality. That said, what is this team going to do to avoid crashing and burning the way the original pebble did?
Specifically I refer to the debacle around the pebble 2 variants and the 1st round pebble core that totally got the ball dropped on it.
They're keep the team super lean and apparently self-financed some of the early development. Last time they had some venture loans that apparently did them in.
Why does the Core 2 Duo not have a heart rate monitor (which I think my Pebble 2 had) and why does the Core Time 2 not have the barometer and compass? It makes it really difficult for me to decide which to get. Also, I have a small preference for the design of the original Pebble Time 2 over the Core Time 2 ...
Very much agree. I want to go take this on a hike in the wilderness. I want a compass and a heart rate monitor. Barometer would be nice but I could take or leave.
This would be nice, but for me I'd never go hiking without my iPhone (especially since they now have satellite-based messaging). I assume there was a tradeoff here, and even if it was just a bit more battery I probably would have to agree with ditching these bits.
That's a fair point. My phone has a compass, so I can always look at a compass there. Not having it on the watch is just an inconvenience. My phone isn't a heart monitor.
Woah! So excited that Core Time 2 includes a HR sensor (since HR is something I need for health reasons more than as a full-fledged fitness tracker). Any details on what sensor is used (PPG I presume?) and how reliable/accurate it is?
Love the Pebble -- still have my first OG one in my drawer!
Are there headphones that can track same vitals (movement, heart rate and sleep)?
I can’t stand wearing watches and adding another fucking screen to keep track of is bonkers in 2025.
It’s kinda crazy apple haven’t added tracking in airpods yet - there are at least 2x more airpods sold.
This sounded to me like a device I might want, but the price is offputting to me. $150 is not cheap device. It's nearly 10x the used price of the smartwatch I wearing right now.
The CEO did a Reddit AMA:
https://www.reddit.com/r/pebble/comments/1jea5cc/ama_with_er...
I am surprised by his comment there:
« Honestly 5 years seems pretty good for a $150 consumer gadget. »
So, its creator feels that a $150 watch is cheap. Huh. That is interesting.
I never owned a Pebble, but I’ve had 3 smartwatches in the last 8 years: an original Amazfit Bip which I liked a lot. It lasted 5 years, its battery life was 6 weeks when new and 4 weeks when old, it was always-on and daylight-readable, and it was about $70.
https://www.cnet.com/reviews/amazfit-bip-review/
When it finally died, I replaced it with a Bip 5 last year. I didn’t like it – screen is wake-on-demand, it wasn’t sensitive enough to a wrist-flip to wake it so I had to press a button, and the battery life was down to 10 days. Higher-res screen, more colours, but no additional useful functionality to me. It cost about $80.
https://www.amazfit.com/products/amazfit-bip-5
So I sold it on for about $45, over half what I paid, and bought a used Amazfit Neo. It looks like a real watch, it was £15 used – about $20 – and it’s always-on, battery life in weeks, very visible, has a backlight, and does the essentials.
https://www.gsmarena.com/amazfit_neo_review-news-45962.php
So I’ve had three watches now and the total price of all 3 put together is about what Eric here dismisses as a consumer gadget.
Huh.
That is a potential Ratner’s moment right there.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/ratner-losses-me...
I don't think "consumer gadget" comes across particularly negatively or dismissively, and don't see this playing out at all like the Ratner's case.
Also, it seems like you might be a bit anchored to the low end of the smartwatch price spectrum from your own preferences, but I don't think it's particularly expensive among major smartwatch brands. Apple has by far the biggest market share, but I also tried to piece together how it compared to other companies with leading market share according to this chart[0]. It's a couple years out of date, but from looking at more recent data I don't think the market leaders have changed all that much. I might have made some mistakes navigating the websites of the various brands to piece together the comparison.
1) Apple - $150 is cheaper than all their models 2) Samsung - cheaper than all but one model 3) Huawei - similar to their second cheapest 4) imoo - $20 more than their cheapest model 5) amazfit - the cheaper brand you already mentioned 6) Garmin - cheaper than all their models
You're already using the cheapest smartwatch brand in those top 6 brands, so while $150 might feel expensive to you it's actually on the cheaper end of major smartwatch brands.
As a side note, this was all a bit interesting to learn about as someone dedicated to my $15 casio dumb watch.
[0]https://www.statista.com/chart/15035/worldwide-smartwatch-sh...
Interesting argument. Thanks.
It's making me re-assess what I thought were the goals of the Pebble project. Maybe it's not for me.
I felt the same way, but this thread seems to be full of people primed by Apple Watch pricing. Not sure how much that will translate to purchases in the end though, in my experience these folks are likely to leave a glowing comment and then just stick to their Apple Watches.
As someone who just wanted a low-frills smartwatch and was following repebble for that, I'm disappointed and have unsubscribed from their update emails. This thread at least pointed me towards a bunch of other good options though, so it got me there in the end.
> but this thread seems to be full of people primed by Apple Watch pricing
Pebble's fans are not in general AW owners. Instead, Pebble fans go to Garmin, Amazfit, or other watches with relatively long battery life and physical buttons. In my mind, AW pricing is irrelevant, and these other devices are the closest competitors to Pebble.
> primed by Apple Watch pricing
This is a weird take. An avg price for a normal watch is $100-$200. This is a watch with a lot more functionalities that a quartz movement, and the production run is much smaller. I think the price is very fair not taking into account the price of an Apple Watch.
> An avg price for a normal watch is $100-$200.
That depends on where you live (a $200 watch certainly wouldn't be considered "normal" where I live), but also: a normal watch has a lot more aesthetic value than this, even considering that this has good aesthetics for a smartwatch. It usually also has a significantly longer usable life, at least five times that of devices like this.
But I should have clarified in my original comment that the "primed by Apple watch pricing" was specifically referring to the people that seemed to think this was really cheap and that the price should be increased! I don't think the price here is unfair necessarily, but definitely disagree with the people who seem to think this is really underpriced.
> An avg price for a normal watch is $100-$200.
No, it really is not.
Take off a zero.
I think because this is a small batch run of watches for those who are fans of Pebble. Think of it almost like we would say an FPGA device for playing retro games, or a retro upscaler. They're usually prices quite high because they're niche items with small production runs.
These watches are for people who were fans of the original Pebble and miss it, therefore they're willing to pay a bit more to get back something that they thought they'd lost.
Yeah commodity fitness trackers with a few custom buttons would go a long way to scratch pebble itch. Make Casio F91W fitness tracker a thing.
That's my point -- such things do exist already. Amazfit is an example.
They give you the fitness-tracking functionality of a pure-play fitness band, plus they sync to your phone so you get notifications on your wrist -- answer and reject calls, read messages, reply with a thumbs-up or whatever -- and you get the fun stuff like customisable watch faces.
And they are well under $100.
It's already a product category, but many people seem unaware it exists.
Much the same as the high-end budget smartphones. I've had a couple of decent capable modern Android phones that were under $200 new. This is a thing that exists, but the folks that follow fashion don't seem to realise.
I spent years being relatively poor and in serious debt. You learn to live without luxuries, but if you're smart, you find the ways to get good stuff cheap.
A $150 smartphone can deliver 90% of the functionality of a $1000 smartphone. In the same way, a $75 smartwatch can deliver 70-80% of the functionality of a $500 watch.
And TBH, I know which I prefer. Phones and watches live hard lives, for electronics, and they are easily lost, stolen, dropped, broken, etc.
I would rather have a $200 phone in my pocket than a $1000 one, because I know the risks, and if the 4-digit-price one gets damaged or vanishes, that hurts my budget... but I can tolerate a low-3-digit loss more easily.
I agree, I'm just pointing out Pebble killer feature that later fitness band didn't adopt was just having a few extra buttons. It would be nice to have 5 buttons to do full media controls.
Bring these back on side of watches. https://www.aliexpress.com/item/1005004293400666.html
Ahh, I see.
I don't think I've ever used any of my now 3 smartwatches to control my phone's media player. But then I mainly only listen to music on my phone when I'm on a plane.
Amazfit bip was nice, but I encountered a bug with GPS data loss too often. That is the price of the cheap Chinese product, I guess. So, when my Bip have been damaged, I decided to buy Garmin for 250€ instead. So far, it works well.
Can you go running with your watch and earphones and listen to music without a phone?
please also bring back a version of pebble time round! it was so classy and slim that no round smartwatch since has been able to compete. my wife is still wearing it everyday! i had to learn soldering to replace the battery :)
I know this is going to sound weird, but I'd really love a stylish smartwatch without any wireless comms of any kind on board. And I think a lot of people living in and around Arlington, VA would as well.
how would it be "smart" without some kind of way to get data from your phone (or other wireless data source)? are you imagining a wired tether and periodic sync, like Palm Pilots?
I guess technically I mean more of a fitness tracker watch. Having connectivity to my phone isn't important because I can't take my phone into the places I can't take my current smart watch. I have a Garmin Vivoactive 5 that I used to wear, but having to take it off before going to certain meetings got to be such a hassle that I just got myself a Casio 593 to just not have to worry about it.
A nice bedside dock in which I could mount the watch and have it sync data at that point would round the whole thing out.
> Core 2 Duo has an ultra crisp black and white display, polycarbonate frame, costs $149 and starts shipping in July.
> Core Time 2 has a larger 64-colour display, metal frame, costs $225 and starts shipping in December
Pretty affordable!
What's with all the recent posts about Pebble OS and Pebble watches? Seems like there have been several in the last couple of days. Definitely doesn't feel organic.
Google released PebbleOS as open source in January and one of the Pebble founders started an effort to produce a pair of watches using the open source software. This is his website.
As a previous PTS2 backer, I knew I couldn't hesitate. I had to pre-order both watches at once.
But whenever July (and December) comes, I'm very much going to dread the import duty on these things.
I am really not being overdramatic or hyperbolic when I say this watch sounds like the exact kind of smart device I want in my life. Just ordered the b&w one. Very excited
> Core 2 Duo
Well that's a name I've not heard in a long, long time...
Finally.. a hybrid amart watch, that also from Pebble! This is great, the only other hybrid smartwatch I have ever seen was from Fossil and that was quite a few years ago.
If I get a job, I’ll buy one.
How difficult is it to add a blood pressure sensor?
My beautiful Pebble Time Steel died of salt water damage, the prior Pebble 2 SE got disintegrated by sunscreen. I have to take ruggedness into consideration.
One is named “Core 2 Duo”. I think that name is taken.
Wow, those guys are moving fast. :-)
I own and use a Pebble Time Steel and a Pebble Time as my only watches. I'm not really missing anything and I'm very happy with my old Pebbles - yet, I'm still quite tempted to pre-order a Core Time 2 to support development and out of curiosity. I'm looking forward to seeing how the touchscreen is implemented. Intuitively, I'd consider a touch-based interface almost an anti-feature on a Pebble, but given their software/UX quality, maybe I'll be pleasantly surprised.
Very nice. I love my OG Pebble (even if I now use an Apple Watch), and I dream of the day when I will go back to having an all-week battery...
I want a Pebble watch with cellular so I can use it like a Nokia 3310! In the mean time I'll dust off my yellowed Pebble Time.
I want minimal plastic in my life. its too bad the core 2 duo is made of plastic, otherwise I would buy it. I don't care for color.
Does it say the thickness or weight of them anywhere on there? They look awesome! But I really care about how it feels on the wrist
This watch might be enough reason to jump back to Android.
It’s too bad third party watches are second class citizens in iOS.
I want a smart watch where bluetooth and everything can be fully turned off. Can I do that with this one?
Is there an Athlon XP version?
The "Do you want a Pebble?" "No" button is hilarious
Definitely excited for this! Been wanting a hackable smartwatch for awhile now.
Not a great fitness tracker because it has no GPS
Poor notification integration because of the restrictions on iOS explained in their blog post.
If you want long battery life, I’d go for a Garmin. But the Apple Watch is really the best option for 90% of people.
Pebble is really cool.
But would I pay $225 for a Core Time 2 when I could get a Garmin Forerunner 55?
Probably not. But still, it's amazing that we are getting new Pebble watches.
90% of Apple users, you mean? Apple doesn't have 90% market share of the mobile market, as far as I know.
Or is Apple Watch just that good on Android as well?
I wonder how good the sleep tracking is without heart monitoring?
All i want is sleep and step tracking. Is this a good option?
Probably not if you care about accuracy. Really good sleep tracking requires more sensors than these devices have.
Quite the opposite. Pebble is great at sleep tracking. They manage to do a better job with Pebble's limited sensors than Apple can with all of their hardware. I have both, I use sleep tracking a lot, and I've compared them.
I miss my pebbles every day. Can't wait for december!!
From your Reddit AMA you said there are no plans to make a more Time-style design since you prefer the original Pebble form factor. Is this just for now or is it a hard no to ever offering a different design? (I never got into the OG Pebble or Pebble 2 myself because it looks very clunky on my fairly thin wrist, but the Time was perfect)
it doesn't have bluetooth but has speaker/mic? Am I getting that right?
I bought my first Pebble watch the week it was released.
Loved it! Got an Apple Watch and hated it. Got a few more Apple Watches and now the activity rings alone have me hooked. 800+ days in a row of closing my rings means I cannot switch away from apples tightly closed ecosystem :(
I wish this came out years ago and I never got to experience the Apple Watch
Good luck
The demo image of getting a text message about a party on your watch is an example of everything that is wrong with wearable computing. The last thing I need is more invasive notifications.
Honestly getting the Core 2 Duo just because of the funny name. I miss my old Pebble sometimes so it will be a neat tinker toy.
Will the battery be user-replaceable?
I am annoyed at the name, core 2 duo. Could have changed it to core 2 duos, just so it doesn’t confuse people who search for it.
Former Pebble and Pebble Time owner and these kinda feel, meh in 2025. The Pebble roadmap seemed like it had more potential back in the day with experimental bands that didn't really materialize.
Hoping once they actually release and we find out if the targets are hit or not with battery life and water resistance.
I just hope they don't release limited color cases again and not have any left for warranty support as happened with my Blue Pebble and all they could offer was a Black one.
Bought the Core 2 Duo, but I really wanted it to have a HR sensor. May have to buy the other one too.
Where are the ai features
Testing
this makes me depressed about american manufacturing
> Core 2 Duo
Cringe...
Why do people _do_ this? You should make it _easier_ to search for you product.
Tangentially, that reminded me of my days back when I frequented a forum for Rio digital audio players. When the company got sold off, an engineer leaked an unreleased firmware without the company's permission. We all had a laugh when the engineer decided to go by the name of "Nestle tollhouse".
Pebble Day at HN?
I guess this is fairly unrelated to repebble
Not sure what you mean? Those are the exact watches Repebble is selling https://store.repebble.com/
check the store link
Looks fun!
Shouldn't call it Core 2 Duo...
Now do the Pebble Core, with LTE service and hackable voice control and Spotify :)
Core 2 Duo is an intel trademark
https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/products/sku/33910/i...
Intel® is a registered trademark, Core™ is an unregistered trademark, 2 Duo is nothing.
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