Buy an expensive companion for your phone, and that'll lead you to use your phone less? It sounds like an oxymoron. But after over a month of using my Google Pixel Watch, it seems to be true!

So, yeah. I've been dealing with spending more time on my phone than I'd like. And I try stuff like time tracking apps, blocking, etc. but nothing works. Quite simply, if my phone was there, I would be on it, such as before going to bed and then immediately waking up.

The problem is, I rely on my phone for certain things. Mainly, getting texts from my parents. This is the thing about smartphones - they're all-in-one almost to a fault at times.

After all, a common solution for this is to simply keep your phone out of your room when you sleep. But now I can't receive texts from my parents. And now I don't have an alarm clock either!

Introducing the smartwatch

Smartwatches seem to be equally good for 3 different things:

  • Health and fitness tracking
  • A remote control and display for your phone's media player and driving navigations
  • A replacement for your phone at times (e.g. going out for a walk)

All of these are useful, but it's that 3rd thing that's super helpful in this situation. Thanks to my watch being tethered to my phone, I can send and receive text messages and voice calls.

Plus, it's the best alarm clock I've ever owned. Seriously! It being directly pressing and buzzing against your wrist is super effective at waking me up - no audio needed, so I don't have to annoy anyone with a loud alarm.

About price

Smartwatches can be expensive though. My reasoning probably sounds unnecessary to most. But just know it's not impossible to get great deals on a smartwatch if you really want one.

Officially, the Apple Watch SE seems like a crazy low price for the value - 249 for Wi-Fi only or 299 for LTE.

On the Android side, the Google Pixel Watch 2 released recently, so Google is marking the first generation decently low - 280 Wi-Fi and 330 LTE.

Other manufacturers are probably doing stuff too, mainly Samsung. I wasn't really paying attention to those because I wanted the strongest integration with my Google Pixel phone.

But of course, the best place to get one is used.

I got my LTE Pixel Watch from eBay for $160 by making an offer on a buy-it-now listing, but they seem to go anywhere from $100-200 on both eBay and Facebook Marketplace. So be vigilant on both platforms for a good deal. I hunted for maybe a week or two.

Note

The Pixel Watch also comes with 6 months of Fitbit Premium. Weirdly, when I set up my Watch, it *did* give me the offer. Maybe I got lucky and bought it from someone who never used it? Or does Google just offer it to any Google account who sets up a Pixel Watch? Not sure.

Scams are rare but possible, plus you don't get warranty buying second-hand. Not like Google repairs the Pixel Watch, though.

End

Maybe I'll write a daily note specifically about my experiences about the Pixel Watch, but I'll leave it at that for now.

Basically, it's a pretty nice pager for your phone. 📟