Obligatory Apple Watch Blog Mini Review

So here we are. One week (and a bit more) after I got the Apple Watch and started wearing it daily. So what are my thoughts on it? Well, let me tell you.

1. It looks great. I wasn't sold on the silver sport editions. I suppose some people like that sort of light, fluffy look, but I don't. I personally went for the 38mm space gray sport, and man does it look great. Both the regular and black stainless steel versions look fantastic as well, but I personally like the more toned down look of the space gray sport. The only combination that I might have consider getting (if I had the money) would be the yellow gold with midnight blue leather band.

2. Speaking of the band,it's really great. The sport bands are made of fluoroelastomer, which actually feels really good. This isn't the cheap, plastic stuff you get on the dollar store Mickey Mouse watches. This stuff is the real deal. It somehow manages to feel comfortable and soft while also be clean and utilitarian at the same time.

3. It's really fantastic at notifications. The taptic engine feels really good. Much more refined than the vibration motors in other smartwatches such as the pebble and moto 360. There are times where it just feels fantastic. Like when it imitates the feel of pressing down the physical shutter on a digital camera when you're taking a picture or screeshot. There are also some other times when it can feel ok, like during map directions. You really have to learn tap patterns for maps because you won't know what the hell it's tapping out if you don't.

4. The display is absolutely fantastic. It's super high resolution and complements many of the watchfaces perfectly, especially the animated ones. The jellyfish and globe watchfaces simply look wonderful, and the the highly detailed chronometer faces just pop.

5. Apps are alright. You can tell they were somewhat of an afterthought. Since the afterl-launch-day software update, apps have been reliably launching, but this was not the case before the update. It's handy sometimes to get transit directions with the Citymapper watch app, but really I could do the same things more efficiently by pulling out my phone.

6. Developing for the watch is painful. Between iffy data serialization and general inadequacies of the dev tools, it's been a long trudge through dev swamp.

So whats my verdict? Pretty much the same as everybody else's. It's good. Don't buy it right now.