Rumors suggest the Apple Watch X is coming in 2024 or 2025 — and it should be a huge upgrade. Whenever it gets here, these are a few things I hope to see.
The original Apple Watch was announced in September 2014, with the actual product release in April 2015. While we’re getting the Apple Watch Series 9 next month, it’s likely to be a very iterative update. Instead, we should focus on what Apple could be doing for the 10th anniversary of the Apple Watch, similar to what the company did with the 10th anniversary of the iPhone, which gave us the iPhone X.
With this in mind, 2023 is really not the year to expect big features to come to the Apple Watch; that will come in 2024 or 2025, and rumors suggest that this anniversary smartwatch could be called the “Apple Watch X.”
Assuming the Apple Watch X is as revolutionary for the Apple Watch as the iPhone X was for the iPhone, here are a few things I’d like to see.It’s time for a new design
There have been rumors in the past about a possible refreshed design ever since the Apple Watch Series 7. Despite those rumors, the look and feel of the main Apple Watch never changed, though many people (including myself) really thought it would.
While a redesign wouldn’t have made sense back then, it makes a bit more sense with a 10th-anniversary version of the wearable. For example, the iPhone design largely remained the same throughout the years until it hit the 10-year mark, as the iPhone X eliminated the classic Home button that the iPhone was known for in the past decade. If Apple is coming out with an Apple Watch X, then a redesign should be a part of it. The Apple Watch, aside from the Apple Watch Ultra, has pretty much looked the same year after year. It’s time for a change.
What kind of redesign should the Apple Watch X have? That’s definitely an unknown. I remember when the Series 7 rumors seemed to point to an Apple Watch with flat edges, similar to the iPhone 12 style. I thought that looked kind of cool, but I know that I was probably in the minority on that one.
I think it would also be neat if Apple Watch went with a circular shape instead of a square. This would help make the Apple Watch look less like a smartwatch and more like a traditional timepiece, similar to the Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 or Google Pixel Watch. Of course, I know that would also make it harder to differentiate the Apple Watch from the competition, but let’s face it — round watches definitely look more elegant in the long run.
A more traditional round face would also bring us to my second point: the use of traditional watch bands.Give us universal watch bands …
I’ve been using an Apple Watch for almost a decade at this point. Over those years, I’ve acquired a pretty decent amount of Apple Watch bands, whether they’re from Apple or third-party ones.
However, one of the rumors about the Apple Watch X that seems to have popped up is the possibility of moving to a new mechanism for attaching bands to the watch.
