Asus Zenwatch

With a slim watchface body, a snap-and-go wristband, and a battery-conscious AMOLED display, the ZenWatch is an unobtrusive and stylish timepiece.

What is it?

A $200 smartwatch from Taiwanese manufacturer Asus, running Google's wearable software, Android Wear. It's not meant to replace your smartphone, but compliment it by sending notifications, step counts, weather forecasts, and other bits of info straight to your wrist.

It packs in many of the same specs we've seen in other smartwatches, primarily the AMOLED display and smartphone-grade Snapdragon processor, but it does it all with an attractive stainless steel casing and a slim body. It's one of the better looking smartwatches out there.

Who's it for?

Until recently, smartwatches have really looked like smartwatches, resembling sci-fi wrist computers rather than things you'd want to wear every day. Samsung's Gear lineup certainly doesn't do much to hide its wrist-wearable pride and bulky entrants from LG and Motorola didn't help much either. They have trouble blending into the average person's wardrobe. For some that's just fine—and for others not so much.

The ZenWatch is for the others, the people who want something that looks great and also provides great smartwatch-y capabilities.

Using it

The ZenWatch  wins with one of the more slimming watch faces available. It's almost a full 2 millimeters thinner than the Moto 360, and curved sides make it feel even more so. The body itself is made from water-resistant stainless steel with a rose-gold (basically bronze) pane sandwiched between two panels of gray steel.

Powering on the screen, you're greeted by a 320x320 AMOLED display, much the same as the LG G Watch R and the Samsung Gear Live. AMOLED is great news for battery life but can mean not-so-great news for daytime readability. The (slightly) curved ZenWatch display does look dim in comparison to the Moto 360's backlit LCD, but it also sips on battery rather than guzzling it down, and at no point did the watchface feel totally unreadable in sunlight.

The screen itself—including color, brightness, and viewing angles—are all pretty stellar. The only downside are the big bezels, those black panes of dead space that feel particularly egregious on such a small screen. The edge-to-edge display on smartwatches like the Moto 360 will spoil you in comparison. 

 The ZenWatch is as easy as it possibly gets. Buckle, then unbuckle. Done. The silver clasp unbuckles with a modicum of force or you can just pinch two small buttons on the side to release easily. As far as function goes, there isn't a better smartwatch buckle out there.

This isn't meant to be some Swiss Army watch or a wearable outfitted for double-O agents, it's a notifications screen on your wrist. You can't take pictures, make phone calls, watch movies, or type out texts. 

Asus's additional ZenWatch companion app helps set security features, watchface backgrounds, Find My Device options and is a great no-fuss way of hunting down neat smartwatch apps, specifically the ones designed by Asus like Wellness and Remote Camera.

As for Remote Camera, this app turns the ZenWatch's 1.63-inch AMOLED display into a tiny camera viewfinder. You can turn camera flash on and off or use it as a tiny spying device—whatever you're in to.

Like

Despite some impressive designs from Motorola, Samsung, LG, and Sony, Asus has delivered a smartwatch that's very much its own. It's a great-looking timepiece that you won't mind wearing, and one that effectively combines digital convenience with personal style.

Despite the bulky clasp, wearing the ZenWatch is completely comfortable.

Dislike

Android Wear still feels like a version 1.0 product. The screen is too small for the frame. Compared with the Moto 360, this thing just looks tiny in comparison. If Asus could have brought that edge-to-edge style with this watch, we'd have something amazing on our hands.