James Pero

Design

Here's a first look at Samsung's new and improved smartwatch UI

One UI Watch is a Samsung facade built on top of Google's Wear OS.

Samsung pulled back the curtain on its newest smartwatch UI — a collaboration with Google that aims to bridge the gap between Samsung’s Tizen OS and Google’s Wear OS.

One UI Watch

One UI Watch will run on top of Google’s Wear OS and will be one facet in a larger (and still unnamed) unified platform between the companies that lets developers easily create apps for both Google’s Wear OS and Samsung’s Tizen software.

Samsung’s upcoming Galaxy Watch, which will be unveiled at its Unpacked event later this summer, will be the first watch to use One UI Watch.

While we didn’t get the full rundown on the new collaborative platform between the companies, we got a pretty good idea of what One UI Watch looks like, in addition to some information on new features, such as...

New watch faces

Samsung showed off a new watch face design tool that will allow developers to better customize downloadable watch faces. According to Samsung, the tool will be available to developers later this year.

Among the highlights of One UI Watch is greater harmony between your watch and smartphone. For instance, downloading an app on your smartphone will instantly transfer that app to your watch, and likewise with other features like blocking calls or customizing your clock.

One UI Watch will also solve for one of Tizen’s major downfalls, which is a lack of third-party app support. Samsung’s new UI will now integrate the Google Play store, allowing users to directly download all sorts of critical apps like Spotify or Google Maps.

NurPhoto/NurPhoto/Getty Images

Outside of those updates, Samsung didn’t reveal too much, though it’s likely that the company’s Unpacked event will usher in more details on its new UI in addition to the next Galaxy Smart watch. Until then, you can ride the high of not having to manually download apps on your tiny watch screen.

WANT MORE?

🕹The Arduboy FX is no quirky Playdate, but it’s still adorably dope

🎮How I built a Game Boy Macro, the greatest handheld Nintendo never created

😲How I hacked my PlayStation Classic into the console Sony wouldn't give us

oxygen/Moment/Getty Images

Thanks for reading,
head home for more!