Eh. I prefer the PineTime watch. It was like 25€+shipping and customs and it does everything I need, is fully open-source – it displays weather info, time, date, heart rate (although not very well), and has timer, stopper, etc.
this post was submitted on 19 Mar 2025
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I'm still very confused about why we needed PebbleOS for this. It's been like 10 years and no one could come up with any comparable software? They whipped up the hardware design in a few months.
PebbleOS was awesome, though. Such a well thought out system for end-users, and it already has tons of apps. Developing for it (in C!) is also super easy because it has an amazing SDK.
From what I've read from Eric since this relaunch was announced, he just wants a new pebble and so do some of the userbase. This project isn't really intended as a viable, polished product. Rather it's a niche thing made for a Core audience of nerds.
Disclaimer: I'm one of the nerds this is intended for. I instantly pre-ordered a watch because it's a pebble. I7
he just wants a new pebble
I'm sure that's what he wants you to believe.
Probably. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I don't usually make dumb decisions with money, but when there's a potential pebble involved you could sell me an idea of one and I'd go for it. Especially after all this time.
What's the huge thing about it? I don't know nothing about the product and an curious as to why somebody would be that hyped about it.
It might be one of those "you had to have been there" moments. It's 2014, Obama was reelected, Uptown Funk was on the radio (there used to be this thing called FM radio), and there you are - a happy young thing reading texts on your watch in broad daylight, right the middle of a conversation. You felt like a cucumber straight from the freezer.
I know all that sounds slightly laughable now, but there is an undeniable yearning for that zeitgeist compared to where we ended up.
It's just a smartwatch that does some basic things right. The software is simple, it has buttons for control, it only does the very basics of smartwatching. There are no bells and whistles.
Most of all, to me, it just feels right. It always did. Other smartwatches I've had were all too demanding of my attention.
Fair enough. I feel the compulsion myself.
I want one, but I don't know what I'd do with it. It's hackable, it pairs with a phone/tablet/etc.
I'm just trying to figure out what it can do for me. My lack of imagination annoys me.
I still can't believe that no one else has made a smart watch with physical buttons and low energy use that has surpassed the pebble after all this time. I'm still cautious that this venture will pan out, but honestly there really hasn't been a smart watch released that matches my use case. Sleep tracking makes no sense if I have to charge the watch daily, as I'd probably charge it over night. Media control with screen buttons is awful. Fossil came close with their hybrid smart watch, but the layout of the media controls made no sense and couldn't easily be used without looking at the watch. Just let me check my calendar and texts and skip through ads in podcasts, and last over a week of battery and you will have my money.
Garmin watches come close?
My Garmin Forerunner 245 Music does all that I'd say
Genuinely considering it as I love e ink, lightweight, long battery life, and open source
IIRC, it has a reflective LCD, not epaper display.
I understand that the watch operating system is open source. However, it seems that the watch will connect to a companion smartphone app. Do you know if the app is a requirement and/or if the app will be open source?
Yeah the mobile app is open source too https://github.com/pebble-dev/mobile-app
Does it spy on us?
The hand-wavy answer is: go check the code and find out, however that's not accessible to everyone.
The helpful answer is: The code is out there, and the launch date is far enough away that those who do understand it enough to make that distinction should have the time to do so before it ships, so time will tell.
The Rebble folks probably are the closest to knowing, given they've been hacking on the current app for the past several years.
My guess is probably not. The target audience probably wouldn't be cool with it.
Also, there are 3rd party watchfaces and apps that will be available, so that code will need to be evaluated too. So, it's more complicated than a single yes or no.
Torn between this and a bangle.js 2, if I need a smarwatch at all
Having used both, personally I highly preferred the Pebble over the Bangle JS.
Pebble was solid software, good designs and it all just worked simply and did what I needed. I also thought the Pebble Time Round was near perfect in design and execution. I'm not a fan of the geeky look of the normal pebble and bangle watches (or the apple watch look).
The Bangle was fun to dev for, and I love that it exists, but it all felt like a dev project. Not a finished product. Granted it was early on in the project so I'm sure it's in a better place now.
They both have similar capabilities. I say go with whichever you think is going to fit what you need a smartwatch to do.
Does this interface with your phone at all? Tried skimming thru their website but the fact it doesn't list Bluetooth in the specs leaves me confused why you'd spend this much money on a quasi-smartwatch that doesn't have that capability.
It says they're able to extend the battery life from 7 days to a month due to how efficient the new Bluetooth chips are.
You must have skimmed pretty fast.
Yes! The best thing about Pebbles (IMHO) is how they handle notifications. In the specs, they list Nordic nRF52840 BLE chip (BLE stands for Bluetooth Low Energy)
It absolutely does, on Android at least. On iOS, given Apple's restrictions, the whole situation is a bit more complicated:
https://ericmigi.com/blog/apple-restricts-pebble-from-being-awesome-with-iphones
Follow-up question - is this the watch I've been looking for that doesn't spy on me and require a cl of us account to use?