Well, it's officially the Day After, and many people out there are well away from the destruction left behind from discarded wrapping paper and boxes. By now you've probably already had plenty of time to adopt whatever it is you received for the holidays into your life, whether it be a new smartphone, tablet, wearable, or other piece of gadgetry.
Plans changed last minute for me last night, so instead of a lot of cooking, my family and I went out to eat. It was packed, as I figured it would be, and a lot of people were using the wait time to talk to those around them, showing off what they received as a gift, and talking about what they doled out to family and friends.
A couple of people near me were ecstatic about their new Google Pixel phones, which made me ridiculously happy, too. I wasn't able to glean from their conversation which devices they switched from, but the end result was apparently pretty fantastic.
It wasn't until we were seated, though, that I really saw the impact of getting new devices.
In the table next to me, four people were bunched together: son, daughter, father, and grandmother. Each of them was staring at a device. The daughter had a Nintendo 3DS. The son, easily in his teens, was using a case-less iPhone 7 Plus. The dad and the grandmother were both staring at their wrists as they messed around with the smart wearable wrapped around them.
The grandmother, as near as I could tell, had a Fitbit, and the dad was using an Apple Watch (no idea what Series, mind you). Each person was enamored with the device in front of them, but I was the wearables that really caught my eye.
This is a market that you don't have to look very hard to find folks talking about its demise, especially when it comes to smartwatches. Motorola has made it clear that it doesn't see a reason to make a smartwatch right now -- even as Google has confirmed it has two flagship wearables on the way. And now Pebble has gone the way of many companies before it, acquired by another larger entity -- in this case, Fitbit.
I don't see a lot of smartwatches out there in the wild, but, when I do, it's typically an Apple Watch. I will also add that, even if I saw a Moto 360 or another round smartwatch out there, I might not be able to pick it out without seeing its display activated. So, it's certainly possible that I've seen more smartwatches out there, but just mistook them for a standard watch.
That being said, I do see a lot of wearables, most of which are the "simple" kind, without a huge touchscreen display. The bands and what not, looking more like a standard accessory rather than a piece of technology.
After seeing so many people entranced by their new gadgets, I did a quick search in the iOS App Store to see which apps were at the top of the lists. In the free category? Fitbit. That's still the case, at the time of publication for this piece. It would seem Fitbit's wearables were a hot ticket this year, so that got me wondering.
Did you get a smart wearable this year for the holidays, or gift one to a friend or family member? Was it a fitness-focused device, without a touchscreen, or did you opt for a smartwatch? If so, which device did you get/gift? Let me know!
