Apple Watch Series 8 Review – Better Than Ever

The Apple Watch Series 8 comes available in two sizes, both having cellular and non-cellular variants. The 41mm non-cellular variant costs Rs. 45,899, whereas the cellular variant costs Rs. 55,899. The 45mm non-cellular variant costs Rs. 48,899, while the cellular variant costs Rs. 58,899.

There are nine different colour/strap options available: Red, Gold, Graphite, Midnight, Silver, Starlight, Gold/Starlight, Graphite/Midnight and Silver/White. You can buy the watch directly from Apple’s official website or other online platforms like Amazon and Flipkart.

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The Apple Watch Series 8 packs the following items inside the box:

• Watch
• Band
• 1m Magnetic Charging Cable
• Documentation

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Before we talk more about the smartwatch, let’s see what on-paper specs look like:

• Display: 1.6, 1.9 Inch OLED (depending on case size)
• Connectivity: Bluetooth, GPS and Cellular (depending on variant)
• Supported OS: iOS
• Battery: 308 mAh
• Weight: 32 grams

Talking about the design and looks, there is no major change or improvement compared to last year. The new Apple Watch Series 8 looks pretty identical to the Apple Watch Series 7, which is completely fine. A similar design doesn’t mean it looks bad or something, in fact, the Series 8 looks premium and stylish, just like the Series 7.

The Series 8 is still available in 41mm and 45mm sizes, so the old bands you have will fit these as well. You can also choose from a tonne of bands, aluminium or stainless steel case build, and choose between non-cellular and cellular connectivity that allows you to leave your smartphone at home.

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The traps are soft and the watch is comfortable to wear. I did not face any issue or irritation on my skin even after continuous leave wearing it for a week. You get curved edges with rounded corners. The right side has a digital crown and a physical button below it for navigation, while the left side has a loudspeaker.

You don’t see an Action button on the Series 8 like on the Apple Watch Ultra, which is a bit disappointing. However, the build quality is top-notch and is made to be pretty solid. It comes with a crack-resistant screen, an IP6X dust resistance and can survive being underwater for 50 meters.

The Apple watch series 8 didn’t make any big improvement in terms of battery life when compared to last year. The Series 8 also promise the same 18-hour battery life as we saw on Series 7. But how much does it turns out to be in real-life usage?

I got about 20 hours of battery life with most of the features turned off. Now, of course, the battery life will vary from user to user depending on how you use the watch and what all features you have enabled.

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To be honest, the battery life is more or less the same, and it is a big problem considering that you have to charge the watch every day. Now coming over to charging, the Apple watch series 8 supports the same fast charging speed as the Series 7. It takes about an hour to fully charge the watch from 0 to 100 per cent.

The charging speed is good enough for me as I could get a whole day of battery life by putting it on charge after waking up and getting ready for the day.

The Apple Watch Series 8 comes with a 1.6-inch or 1.9-inch OLED display, depending on the case size you get. It is the same size as last year, however, it still manages to look gorgeous with the thin bezels all around with a peak brightness of 1000 nits.

The colours on the screen look vibrant and punchy. I could easily see the content on display even under direct sunlight, yep, it’s pretty bright. Technically speaking, it is even brighter than some of the smartphones out there.

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Coming on to features, you get an always-on display feature which shows the dimmed-down version of your watch. Talking about the watch face, you get tons of watch faces to choose from. You can also simply raise your wrist to see the time and weather without needing to touch the display, which is quite convenient.

Apart from features, the display is pretty solid with Ion-X glass coating which will protect it from scratches and accidental drops.

Apple has done an outstanding job of making the Series 8 health and fitness tracking feel likeable, straightforward, and comprehensive all at the same time.

Health monitoring is improved, with much more comprehensive stats while working out. For runners, Apple has added a Running Power function that helps you maintain a consistent pace, Running Form Metrics to help you understand how effectively you run, accurate maps tracking, elevation statistics, and more.

Keeping track of your medications and getting reminders when to take them can all be done with the help of the Apple Watch Series 8. The sleep tracking feature in the new Health section is my favourite because it can now display the various stages of sleep. You can now see a chart that shows how much time you spent in Core, REM, and Deep sleep, and also when you were most likely awake during the night.

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The temperature sensor, however, is the major advancement this year. Apple currently limits its use to track women’s menstrual health. The sensor measures body temperature while you sleep and uses the information to forecast both past and future ovulation dates.

Apart from all that, I tried the standard health tracking features like heart rate monitoring, ECG tracking, and Blood Oxygen saturation monitoring, all of which worked well, as expected.

The Apple Watch Series 8 runs on watchOS 9 which is the ninth generation of watchOS and is more polished than ever. The watchOS 9 is one of the major reasons why Series 8 is better than any other smartwatch. The latest watchOS brings a lot of improvements and features.

The whole UI is smooth, simple and straightforward to use. I did not face any lags of glitches while navigating through the UI. First of all, the new watch faces are just amazing. I just loved the Metropolitan watch face because of its simple layout and font.

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The watch experience is outlined not only by its watch faces but also by its seamless integration with iPhones. It not only displays incoming notifications but also allows you to reply to texts, WhatsApp messages, as well as other notifications without taking your iPhone out of your pocket. You can use your Apple Watch Series 8 to make calls, access Siri, and perform most of the iOS functions.

With watchOS 9, the Apple Watch introduces a Low Power Mode to reduce battery consumption during the night. To help minimise battery consumption, it disables features such as the always-on display mode, heart rate updates, and Start workout reminders.

The Apple Watch Series 8 also brings a new feature, Crash Detection, which is a really advanced feature available on a smartwatch. To determine whether you’ve been in a car accident, the feature uses a new three-axis gyroscope, mic, a g-force accelerometer, barometer, GPS, and a sensor-fusion algorithm.