On Friday 24 April, Apple will start selling the Apple Watch (you can already pre-order one now). I think this will be the start of yet another disruptive change triggered by an Apple product. Why? Not so much because of  the Apple Watch product per se, but because it will make smart watches go mainstream. And once that happens, the era of the traditional watches will be over.

The reason for this is the following: once you've started using a smart watch, there's no way you'll go back to a traditional watch. The extra functionality that a smart watch gives you offsets the hassle of having to charge it at least once a day. I've been wearing a smart watch for almost four months now, and these are the main three reasons why I like it so much:
  • When you're in a meeting, or another situation where you can't take an incoming call, it's much easier and quicker to reject the call from your smart watch than picking up your phone and rejecting it from there. (Actually, even when I'm going to pick up the phone, I find myself looking at my watch to see who it is. It's just quicker.) Also, it's much easier to notice a vibrating watch than a vibrating phone floating around in one of your pockets, and definitely less noisy than a phone vibrating on a table.
  • I read most of my notifications on my watch, and leave my phone in my pocket. Only if more action is needed, like sending a reply or if I want to read the full news article, I'll pick up my phone to do that.
  • Synchronization with the Google calendar, and in particular the display of when your next meeting is. The last hour before the meeting, my watch even tells me how many minutes I have left. That's not a big issue with meetings at the top or the bottom of the hour, but it's really handy when you have to catch a train or a bus.
I haven't used the health tracking functionality much, though it's nice to see how good (or bad) you're doing once in a while. I noticed though that it doesn't pick up shovelling snow as an activity, so there's definitely room for improvement.

Like I already mentioned, yes, you have to charge the watch every single day. In fact, you'll have to charge your phone more often too if you keep the two synchronized, but that's also a new habit you'll pick up really quick. Another downside is that the watch is a bit big and clunky, but I expect smart watches will become smaller and smaller with better battery life, just like mobile phones did.

Contrary to a lot of other people, I'm not sure there will be a lot of app development directed to the watch. To me, it seems that the basic functionality is all you really need. Maybe it's just me lacking fantasy, but I don't see why people would want to spend a lot of time on the tiny display. There may be room for more “smart tracking” in the area of health or location, but I think that will be it.