There are plenty of rabid fans out there of all kinds. Some love a certain tech platform while others love certain companies, and Sony is no stranger to lovers of its premium brand. Sony has been making smartwatches for quite a while now, and with the advent of Android Wear Sony has jumped fully on board the Android Wear train, now offering the third generation of its own smartwatches to Android users around the world. For the last few weeks US customers were only able to find the Sony SmartWatch 3 at a Verizon store, but now Sony has opened that up to anyone that wants to buy its latest gadget straight from Google themselves off the Google Play Store.
Up until now Sony has been using its own version of Android on its smartwatches, which gives a rather unique feel but ultimately requires hooks into Android to get things working correctly. With Android Wear these new smartwatches can integrate with your Android phone as long as you’re running Android 4.3 Jelly Bean or higher, meaning you don’t even need a Sony phone to get this working right. Sony has even included a GPS on board the SmartWatch 3, meaning even without a phone you can track your exercises, and the 4GB of storage means that you can store quite a few tracks on the watch itself and listen via Bluetooth headphones.
Sony has also packed the latest Bluetooth, version 4.1, for extra battery savings and more reliable connectivity. A 420mAh battery is the largest of any Android Wear watch and should guarantee more than a full day’s use even with the GPS on for a little while. All in all for $249 Sony is offering quite an excellent smartwatch with all the latest functionality as well as Android Wear on board, and that’s something to celebrate. Hit up the Google Play Store link below to order your very own. Don’t forget to check out our smartwatch guide (link expired) if you’re interested in other brands too!