Smartwatches have low capacity batteries and any small factor can have a big impact on battery life. With this in mind, Vodafone and Google have announced that they are working on improve the autonomy of smartwatches with Wear OS by optimizing the way watches connect to the network.
Specifically, Vodafone has developed an API that an operating system like Wear OS can use to reconfigure how it connects to the internet. the key is in Intermittent internet connection instead of constant
Battery for long workouts
The Achilles heel of the smartwach remains its autonomy. The latest Wear OS smartwatches, like the Samsung Galaxy Watch 4, promise a day and a half of battery life, but that’s with typical use. Battery drains quickly during long workouts as, for example, if it is used during a marathon of several hours, with a direct connection to the network, without the mobile.
With that in mind, Vodafone and Google’s Android team are working together to optimize the battery life of Wear OS watches. An example of this collaboration cited by Santiago Tenorio, director of network architecture at Vodafone, involves changing the way the watch connects to the Internet: instead of doing it constantly, do it intermittently
According to Vodafone, changing these usable settings through its new API could extend the battery of smartwatches in a “very significant” wayin exchange for a performance cost.
This technology could coming to Wear OS smartwatches in the coming months, although it is open so that other smartwatch operating systems can implement it. Then it’s time to try out those network-focused battery life improvements that they claim take more battery drain than screen brightness and other tweaks the modes focus on. energy-saving watches.
Through | Reuters