Skagen is known for its simple watch designs that still make a statement on the wrist. While the company has a line of hybrid smartwatches, it had yet to offer a full touchscreen smartwatch alternative. At CES, the fashion brand debuted the Falster, a smartwatch powered by Android Wear.
The smartwatch is officially on the market, and can be purchased through Skagen’s website as well as its retail locations. It will cost you $275 for the black case with a dark brown or black leather watch strap, and $295 for the rose gold or silver cases with matching mesh watch straps.
On the outside, the Falster features a fully-round AMOLED touchscreen display and a 42mm stainless steel case. Under the hood — as with almost all Android Wear smartwatches — the watch is powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon Wear 2100 processor, along with a 300mAh battery.
The watch runs Android Wear 2.0 — Google’s latest version of the Android Wear operating system. By connecting your smartphone to your watch via Bluetooth and allowing it to wirelessly sync, you will be able to access notifications like incoming calls, texts, along with emails straight from the watch.
Other features include activity tracking, music control through third-party apps such as Google Play, and voice commands via Google Assistant. For those who travel to destinations in different time zones, the automatic accuracy feature will adjust your smartwatch accordingly. There’s no Skagen-specific app yet, but the brand told Digital Trends a micro-app may be added later.
Skagen incorporated its minimalist design into the interface of the watch as well. With its AMOLED screen and a lineup of AMOLED watch faces, the Falster emphasizes a battery-efficient design. Using the all-black background on your watch’s default screen can save up to 20 percent of energy over lit pixels. The screen will be always-on by default, but turning it off will save even more battery life.
As for charging the device, it comes with a wireless charging puck that magnetically connects to the smartwatch.
While the operating system is functional with iOS 9.0 and beyond, it’s important to note your capabilities with the iPhone are limited. As with an Android device, you have to download the Android Wear app — but will have to keep running it in the background to ensure the smartwatch is still connected. With an iPhone, you will still be able to see almost all your notifications but you won’t be able to answer almost all of them. For instance, iMessage and SMS messages will show up but you won’t be able to reply. But you should be able to answer emails if you have a Gmail account, specifically.
In addition to the Falster, Skagen also announced the launch of the Mini Hald Hybrid Smartwatch. The new model is a mini version of its Hald Smartwatch that launched last year, and is also now available for purchase.
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