It didn’t take long to find Android fans who were not turned on by the idea of a $700 smartwatch from Samsung. In what we assume is a potential try to match Apple’s Watch Ultra line, Samsung’s reported Galaxy Watch 7 Ultra is going to pack a massive price tag. Apple does a pretty darn good job with its marketing department at making a smartwatch seem like it should cost that much, with its diving capabilities, premium hardware and all of that jazz, but can Samsung possibly do the same with an Android-powered watch?
Premium brands, such as TAG Heuer and Montblanc are essentially given a pass to create whatever they want and charge high amounts of money, given they carry a boutique status (note that I’m being generous to TAG with that). Point being, you expect them to be expensive because you’re getting an assumed high level of quality. The same goes for Apple, even if they’re a general consumer electronics brand. They have the sort of consumer that allows them to charge $800 for a smartwatch, even though less than 1% of its buyers may ever use the device to its full potential.
Looking over the internet, it seems many of the vocal people agree that a possible $700 Galaxy Watch is a little too much. We’ve gone ahead and collected some of the initial reactions and responses. They’re worth taking a look.
Teejay Card – I had the Galaxy Watch 6, 6 Classic, Pixel Watch 2 and Ultra Watch 2. Good for Samsung switching things up and the bigger watch will definitely mean bigger battery life but, if they want people to spend 700 on one of their watches they need to fix the sluggish response time of their watches.
JiGSaW525 – Watch prices are the old cell phone prices and used as an “accessory” to the cell phone itself. Personally, I will not spend more than $250 on this type of accessory and that’s before any trade-in. – my 2 cents
BPMΩ – I wonder what (if anything) justifies that huge price tag…
A Magnet – $700 is crazy. Also this design is awful. I will happily stick with my watch 6, I’m not giving up that physical rotating bezel
drcaveman – I was actually considering one I can’t stand the awful battery life of the GW6 Classic, but at $700 no way, no thanks.
Godzilla – So here’s the thing with that price. If people are willing to pay it, so be it. Apple set that precedent so you can thank them for it. However, Samsung, as a Pixel user, for 700 bucks, you should not have any Galaxy exclusive features on the watch. All the functions of the watch should work on ANY Android phone.
This next comment, while long, belongs to what might be the most reasonable person I’ve ever come across on the internet. We should all strive to be more like bull3946.
bull3946 – I wasn’t super hot on the Watch 5 Pro renders when they first came out, but it ended up being one of my favorite watch designs in the past 5 years. So, I’ll reserve judgement until I see this thing on a wrist.
Price, you don’t buy anything Samsung close to MSRP so I’ll also reserve judgement until we see what trade-in values are. I suspect that there is only going to be an LTE sku for this much like the Apple Watch Ultra which means it’s should be compared to the $499 launch price of the LTE Watch 5 Pro.
However, unlike with the Watch 5 Pro where the only thing they did to differentiate it from the watch 5 (aside from physical design) was the battery size, they better have other enhancements on this watch over the others in the lineup to justify the $200 jump from the Watch 5 Pro.
Again, these are the vocal people on an Android blog with knee jerk reactions. I don’t think they paint a decent picture of your average or typical Android consumer. Now that this information has had a day to stew, what’s your more reasonable take? Is a $700 Galaxy watch DOA or is there a market out there for something like this? With financing and trade-in deals, the watch could essentially become affordable.
Guess we’ll be finding out pretty soon.
MB