Samsung has announced the new Watch series 5: the $279.99 (UGX 1.07m) Galaxy Watch 5 and $449.99 (UGX 1.7m) Galaxy Watch 5 Pro today at its Unpacked event. The company took criticisms about the Galaxy Watch 4’s poor battery life to heart. Both Galaxy watch series 5 devices boast bigger batteries, faster charging, and increased durability to boot.
Samsung once again is shaking up its smartwatch lineup with the Galaxy Watch 5 series. While last year’s series 4 rebranded the main Galaxy Watch and Watch Active lines from the Tizen era, this year’s event introduces a new model altogether: the Galaxy Watch 5 Pro. Whereas the basic Galaxy Watch 5 is the entry-level flagship, the Pro is meant to be a more premium version aimed at outdoor enthusiasts. The company has removed the physical rotating bezel, though they both have the more subtle touch bezel. For physical bezel fans, the Galaxy Watch 4 Classic will remain a midtier option between the Watch 5 and the Pro.
The Galaxy Watch 5 comes in 40mm and 44mm, while the Pro comes in a single 45mm size. All the watches are powered by the same 1.18GHz Exynos W920 processor, with 1.5GB of RAM and 16GB of internal storage. The Galaxy Watch 5 lineup also has an improved version of the 3-in-1 BioActive sensor first introduced on the Watch 4, which enables ECGs, heart rate, and body composition analysis. Samsung says that the improved sensor adds more advanced sleep tracking features to the Watch 5, including personalized sleep coaching. You also get built-in GPS, contactless payments, optional LTE, Bluetooth 5.2, and Wi-Fi. Both watches also feature 5ATM and IP68 dust and water resistance.
The latest feature is around is a body temperature sensor. The temperature sensor will add another data point for sleep tracking, but that’s about it for now. According to Wegener, adding the sensor was meant to give developers more options in designing new health and wellness features.
The big hardware gains this time around have to do with battery life. The Watch 5 has a 13 percent larger battery — 284mAh battery in the 40mm Watch 5 and a 410mAh battery in the 44mm. That should translate to about 40 hours on a single charge. The Pro has an even larger 590mAh battery that’s rated for 80 hours or 20 hours of continuous GPS usage on a single charge.
Aside from adding bigger batteries, Samsung also improved the charging speed for the Watch series 5. It claims that you can go from zero to 45 percent battery in just 30 minutes. For folks interested in sleep tracking, the company says you can get eight hours of battery in just eight minutes.
Truth be told, the Galaxy Watch 5 is an incremental update. The main design changes are a more durable sapphire crystal display and a curvier back so the 3-in-1 sensor makes better skin contact with the wrist. The more meaningful updates will come from software. The Watch 5 series will ship with One UI Watch 4.5, which adds a host of new accessibility features, a better typing interface, and dual-SIM support. Apps like SoundCloud and Deezer are also coming to Wear OS 3, as is the ability to use voice navigation on Google Maps directly from the wrist. And after months of waiting, Samsung Galaxy Watch owners can finally use Google Assistant on their watches. (Don’t panic, Bixby lovers. Samsung promises all five of you that Bixby’s still available on the Watch 5 and Pro.)
 Galaxy Watch 5 and $449.99 (UGX 1.7m) Galaxy Watch 5 Pro){kind=link}