Samsung’s round, slim Gear S2 smartwatch — an update to the definitely-less-than-conventional Gear S — has just been formally announced ahead of this week’s IFA gadget expo in Berlin. If you like your watches round, your activity tracked, and your heart rate monitored, and your operating systems Tizen, well this is the smartwatch for you.
The Gear S2 is built around a 1.2-inch, circular Super AMOLED display with a resolution of 360x360ppi — making it (at least for the time being, until the possible unveiling of the Huawei Watch, new Moto 360 and new LG smartwatch) the equal most pixel-dense smartwatch on the market alongside the Apple Watch. There are two versions available — the regular metal S2 and the darker S2 Classic.
The new dual-core 1GHz Samsung watch’s operating system is Tizen rather than Android Wear, which means it’ll likely work best with a companion Samsung smartphone like the Galaxy Note 5 or S6 Edge+. That said, it looks like it’ll sync with the Nike+ Running app which is available on the general Google Play Store. The watch is IP68 waterproof, too, and has an internal heart rate monitor.
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It’s definitely coming to Australia — we just don’t know exactly when, and how much it’ll cost. Here’s the official line from Samsung Australia:
“We are very excited to confirm that the Samsung Gear S2 smartwatch will arrive in Australia soon — the Gear S2 will provide our customers with a truly amazing smartwatch experience. We look forward to providing more details regarding local pricing and availability closer to the Australian launch.”
We’ll have an extensive hands-on with the Gear S2 and Samsung’s other high-end personal and home entertainment gear in just a couple of days, direct from the show floor at IFA 2015, so stay tuned. [Samsung]