OnePlus Watch review: Solid for starters, but not without software snags

 The OnePlus Watch seems to be a good debutant smartwatch from the Chinese smartphone maker. How does it fare vis-a-vis peers? Khalid Anzar finds out

Looking to make a toehold in the market beyond smartphones, OnePlus is gradually expanding its products line-up. Fresh in the company’s portfolio is a smart wearable, the OnePlus Watch. Labelled as a smartwatch, the OnePlus Watch covers a wide spectrum of features and services that one looks for in smartwatches. Among the most notable is the built-in storage for music, a speaker and mic set-up to attend calls, and a sensor to monitor blood oxygen saturation (SpO2). As a debutant, the OnePlus Watch seems to be a solid smartwatch. But how does it fare vis-à-vis peers? Let’s find out:

What’s good
Design: OnePlus has done a spectacular job in designing its first smartwatch. The Watch looks premium, especially the moonlight silver colour variant (review unit), which goes well with most outfits. It has a solid build, complemented by a circular case that makes it look more like a watch and less like a toy. The top side of the case is dominated by a screen with thin bezels around. It is a touch screen with curved glass on the top to aid the watch’s gesture-based navigation. At the bottom, the slightly raised centre accommodates sensors for monitoring heart rate and blood oxygen, and charging pins. While the case is made of stainless steel, there is a plastic covering at the bottom. This makes the watch comfortable to wear as the temperature effect on the stainless steel does not pass on to the skin. The case has two buttons – the top one for the menu and the other (customisable) for fitness modes.

Display: The OnePlus Watch design is accentuated by a bold-looking 1.39-inch AMOLED touchscreen of a 454 x 454 resolution. The screen supports sliding gestures; swipe down for quick settings, swipe up for notifications, swipe right to go back, and swipe left to access music player and information related to heart rate, stress, weather, steps count, etc. The screen is bright, vivid and has good sunlight legibility. It supports several watch faces, most with dark backgrounds that look dazzling on an AMOLED screen. The watch also supports custom faces, allowing you to turn any picture from your phone into a watch face