Pebble, long thought of as the original feature-rich modern smartwatch, has many lines with many different capabilities. Among them, the relatively new Pebble Time lineup is one of the more capable product lines in Pebble’s catalog. Today’s 3.12 update to the Pebble software brings bug fixes and stability improvements for all Pebble models, as well as bringing iOS users up to speed on the text messaging features that Android users have enjoyed for a while. With the update, however, Pebble Time product lineup users get to enjoy some new features related to Pebble Health.
Pebble’s health suite already did the basics quite well, such as heart rate and step counting. The newest version of the software, however, brings a good number of new features, mostly focused on analyzing the health and fitness data gathered by the watch to provide smart features and analytics. For starters, a new smart alarm feature is on board that figures out when a user is at their lightest point in the sleep cycle when the alarm draws near and wakes them at that point, leaving them more refreshed and less groggy than if they had been woken at a fixed time. Also new with the update are fitness analytics of sorts; the watch will track a workout and give you feedback at the end of it to show things like the intensity of the workout, how much you’ve improved or backslid recently and when your best day was during the week. The software on the watch itself now shows a bit more detailed data, as well as encouraging messages.
These analytic data sets are tied in closely with the Health section in the companion app for Android and iOS, where users can find more detailed stats on their workout and overall data through a given time period, as well as customized graphs to show that data in an easy-to-digest format. Sleep data can also be analyzed and broken down in a similar manner. The goal of the new features is to help build and promote healthy habits by giving users the easiest possible way to record, view and interpret their personal health, fitness and sleep data.
