Is a thin film tough enough to protect your Apple Watch, or should you enclose it in a rugged case?
So, does your Apple Watch really need a screen protector? If yours is stainless steel, the answer is probably no: its sapphire crystal glass is incredibly tough and very scratch-resistant. For aluminum Apple Watch models, things aren’t so clear-cut: the Ion-X glass is pretty tough, but we found our watch soon accumulated a lot of little scratches. They weren’t enough to annoy us in everyday usage, but they did affect the resale value. Scratches aren’t covered by your warranty, because they’re everyday wear and tear. Smashes are, though. If you really damage your screen and you’ve got AppleCare, Apple will replace the screen two times for a fee of $69/£49/AU$99 each time. The out-of-warranty fees are much higher, starting at just under $200/£200/AU$300 and reaching the heady heights of $800/£749/$1,199 if you have the ceramic Apple Watch 5. Even if you do have AppleCare, it’s better not to have to pay the fee: protecting your watch from damage is cheaper than fixing it after damage has occurred. Even the most expensive option here is a fraction of the price of an Apple Watch screen repair. If you want to keep your watch pristine and protected, there are three main options. There are plastic screen protectors, very similar to smartphone ones, where you peel off the backing, stick them to the screen and push out the bubbles. These are by far the cheapest screen protectors you can buy, and while they can be a little bit fiddly to fit – getting them onto your watch without leaving any bubbles requires patience and a bit of skill – they do a decent job of standing up to everyday scrapes and bumps. If you’d rather add something a bit tougher, a tempered glass protector is be a better option. These are much harder to fit as they’re not as flexible or as forgiving as plastic. Also consider that the cheaper aluminium Apple Watch is actually a lot less prone to obvious scratches than the fancier stainless steel version in terms of body (if not screen, as noted above). While you might assume the steel is harder and tougher, it’s actually softer than the aluminium used in the entry-level model.
