Mobile Dev Strategy: Wearable Development & Strategy

Wearable App. Development and Design Strategies

Continuing our mobile development strategies section of this blog, I'd like to move into wearables.  

However, in this post, we'll only initially address wearables development.  We'll keep it brief for two reasons:

• Wearables today are pretty much developed natively on Apple and cross-platform frameworks have various levels of support for Android WearOS

 

• As the first point demonstrates, we've already covered most of the technologies involved in wearables development 

Once we've covered the necessary development issues - we will then discuss the following areas of wearables: 

• Functionality Design

• Usability 

• Future considerations

Though there is a lot more to wearables today than simply watches, since most of today's discussions revolve around watches, I'll start there.

Wearable Development Decisions:

When addressing wearable/watch development, it is important to revisit our previous cross-platform discussion.  

The impact that decision can have on your wearable development could be significant.  At the time of this writing - the support of cross-platform frameworks for wearable development is inconsistent across frameworks.

There are add-on plugins to help with wearable development that are available for some of the frameworks which have less built in support, and these plugins have had some success.  However, as your wearable demands expand, it's likely you'll get mixed levels of success as the development community for these wearable assistant plugins is somewhat disjointed.

The need for these plugins is that in order to develop an Apple Watch application, that development effort is completely reliant on the Apple development ecosystems.  Essentially, what this means is:

• Using a cross-platform framework for an Apple Watch app - you will have a separate baseline for that watch app.  

• But your Android WearOS can easily be integrated in frameworks such as Flutter, but there are other cross-platform frameworks that don't have the support Flutter has for Android WearOS

• Because of these differences, some developers have developed various plugins to help with this difference between wearable platforms. Regardless of which plugin you use, you will remain reliant on a Native Apple development baseline for Apple wearables for the foreseeable future.

To provide a direct quote from Flutter's official documentation (https://docs.flutter.dev/development/platform-integration/apple-watch): "While you cannot build an Apple Watch app with Flutter, it is possible to add a native Apple Watch extension to a Flutter app."

This means, if you're using platforms such as Flutter, you can still have an Apple Watch app and build your iOS app using Flutter, but you will have a separate baseline for Apple's wearable development.

You will notice that I have mentioned Flutter by name in several statements above.  This is because it is new and had wearables in mind when it was developed, other older cross-platform frameworks are not as good at supporting wearables - including Android WearOS.

For wearable development - keep in mind that there are other up-and-coming wearables hitting the market.  These include:  

• AR glasses coming from Apple and Google
• Various levels of smart Glasses from other companies.

• Smart jewelry

• Smart Shoes

• Contact lenses

• Medical Wearables

If wearables are on your radar, and hopefully they are or soon will be, know that developing for many of the above devices - certainly for Apple's Glasses - will likely be native.  Some may require an SDK integration which may or may-not support the cross-platform framework your team is using.

The point is, as new devices come into the market, if you choose a cross-platform approach, you may find yourself frustrated meeting a rapid deployment schedule if you already have a mature cross-platform baseline.  

Again, Flutter being a Google project you'll probably be just fine on the Android platform, but be aware of other cross-platform frameworks and know that as new wearables devices come to market, this very well may  pose unique challenges for you.

Wearable UI/UX & Functional design:

As we now move our discussion away from wearables development, let's take a step back and consider the fast paced change wearables are proving to have.

Previously, we often times looked at the wearable app as a "smaller" version of the phone app with a smaller display.  Of course, the smaller screen is still true, but engaging with wearables today is not the same as even a few years ago!

Once upon a time, there may have been ten screens to swipe though in a wearable app, but there's very little good that comes with this design thinking on wearables today.  There may be 10 screens, but 8 of them should be completely optional with only 1 or 2 being primary - and those 1 or 2 screens need to do a Lot & Do it Easily & Do it Fast!

A few years ago, the simple wearable mentality was somewhat differentiated by the user's duration of interactions:

• Watch - (Seconds)

• Phone - (Minutes)

• Laptop - (Hours)

However, there is so much more to wearables today. Wearables can not simply be thought of as the bare minimum capabilities with a bare minimum UI.  Instead, their expected interactions are to provide an easier, quick engagement with minimal user interaction but provide enormous usability and engagement from each interaction.   

Done properly with considerable design and thought, well beyond a mobile app's little companion or simple extension, and wearables can prove to be a significantly beneficial component of your modern mobile strategy.

Wearables aren't simple extensions of your mobile app - they're the expansion of your modern mobile strategy.  

Wearables strategy:

• UI: Big and fewer UI components for interactions (Still, only seconds of interactions with your App UI)

• UI/UX: Voice commands and single swipes for minimal interactions but maximum task performance. 

• A single swipe should accomplish a ton! For example:
• Single swipe might confirm your reservations, schedule a ride share, and sends SMS messages to those waiting.

• Single tap starts your workout, music player, timer, and turns on do-not-disturb and monitors pace

So today, big gestures and voice instead of a bunch of little buttons and a lot of watch screens.

When considering wearables - instead of trying to think how a user would want your wearable solution after using your phone app - today, with watches being more often on the user, remember that the watch can drive engagement to your app. It isn't always the other way around these days. 

Wrapping up this section; some good considerations for your wearable strategy are that they should be:

• Pin-Point & customizable monitoring devices which provide long term data usability satisfying the user's wants

• Strategically engaging

• Consider wearables as a long duration device with minimal user interaction - it's not seconds, it's continuous

We have discussed both wearable development considerations from a cross-platform perspective as well as some of today's wearable design and usability considerations.  

Taking these into consideration today, will strongly position your organization for the next generation of wearables already hitting the market.

Future Expansion of our "Wearables" definition:

As with most new technologies - they tend to see prominence in a particular market and small wearables are no different.  As the sports and health industry has been a primary talking point when it comes to:

• BlueTooth devices in shoes

• Beacons used to monitor athlete's movements

• Pace and calorie monitoring for fitness

However, now as we look at these wearables coming into our day-to-day lives, we are seeing these devices allowing interactions with our existing devices and our environment in completely new ways.

Interfacing with our devices is becoming:

• A tap on our watch makes a phone call regardless if our phone is with us, or even turned on or not

• Scrolling on a smart ring brings up a menu we can scroll through

• Glasses or contacts as our AR and digital screens   

• Displays and sensors built into our clothing's fabric

• And connected homes monitoring and securing many aspects of our lives 

While granted, some of these devices are a few years off, some of them are already here.   

Also, as connected cities, 5G, fog and edge computing, and IoT in general become more the norm, our constant connection and interaction with our digital environment will drive a fast pace of wearable innovations and ways to interact with them.

User interaction with our wearables is just one example of a pathway for new business opportunities to emerge.  

For example - walking around with AR glasses, which look as normal as any today, constantly brining your hands up to your head 10,000 times a day to tap for an interaction, isn't practical - it's annoying.  

Here is where embedded sensors in our clothing or smart rings can come into play.  A thumb swipe to scroll through your displays becomes very practical.

So why all this "future" talk?  

For 2 reasons:

• As these devices come to market - you're likely going to want to develop mobile solutions with them

• If Apple and/or Google releases solid AR Glasses and a Smart ring that fully integrate with your phone, watch, house, etc...   
• It's going to take about 5 minutes before everyone is jumping at being the next Apple or Google walking technology node wearing every single one of their devices.

However, before the major players release all these devices - this ecosystem is likely going to be quite wide ranging for some time to come. 

Thus, if this integration is on your mind, just realize that it will become increasingly unlikely you'll be able to maintain a single baseline of code to develop against a wider range of wearables. 

Conclusion:

Regardless how wearables look over the next decade, one thing is for certain - they're here and their market penetration is happening fast!  So much so, that Apple's first quarter earnings for 2021 & 2022 had wearables and home accessories outpacing the iPad. (Ref. Apple's Q2 financial statement: https://www.apple.com/newsroom/pdfs/FY22_Q2_Consolidated_Financial_Statements.pdf)