Round smartwatches are available from Motorola and LG. Samsung doesn’t have one yet but if recent reports are to be believed then the Korean company has something up its sleeve. At the Mobile World Congress 2015 in March Samsung is expected to show off its round smartwatch currently known by its purported codename Orbis. A new report published today claims that this smartwatch is going to have a rotating bezel ring and a power button that’s shaped like its crown.
Samsung isn’t new to the world of smartwatches. It already has quite a few models on the market, running both Tizen and Android Wear, however the Orbis is going to be the company’s first round smartwatch.
Sammobile has heard from its sources that the Orbis will have a crown-shaped power button. The crown on the Apple Watch is much more than a power button but it appears Samsung is not going to add any extra features. Instead the features will be accessed through the rotating bezel ring on the top.
While no detail on the features delegated to the rotating bezel ring has been provided apparently Samsung will offer a SDK to developers which would allow them to build more features around it. The power button will merely be used for waking up the screen, launching S Voice through a double press and sending a message in an emergency.
The design is something I’m looking forward to the most. It would be interesting to see Samsung’s version of a round smartwatch and how it would stack up against the likes of Moto 360 and the G Watch R.