Samsung's next smartwatch - purportedly called the Galaxy Watch4 - has been rumored to be switching to Google's wearable platform, Wear OS, for a few months now. Well-known leakster Ice Universe was one of the first to mention the possibility back in February, but SamMobile is now reporting that it's been able to confirm that piece of information.
Not only that, though, but the outlet is adding some new details to that: apparently, the watch will be running a new version of One UI on top of Google's platform. Samsung already uses One UI on its Android smartphones, and even its Tizen-based smartwatches run a form of One UI, but it will be interesting to see how that translates to Wear OS. The report says this will be an "entirely new version" of the UI language designed for the platform.
SamMobile has shared a few more details of the purported Galaxy Watch4, too. It's said that the watch will come in three variants: a more classic style similar to the current Galaxy Watch3, and two more sporty styles, one of which will be an Active model, a follow-up to the Galaxy Watch Active2. Finally, there's one new feature mentioned, that being the ability to send short voice messages to other users, similar to the walkie-talkie feature on the Apple Watch.
Reports of Samsung switching to Wear OS aren't new, though, and they haven't panned out. In the lead-up to the announcement of the original Galaxy Watch, it was said that it would make the switch from Tizen to Wear OS. That ended up not happening for at least the next three years.
Google is holding its annual developer event, Google I/O, this week, and that might give us a glimpse at some of the upcoming changes to Wear OS, including Samsung's adoption of the platform. The Mountain View giant recently acquired Fitbit, signaling interest in expanding its wearable presence.
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