Smartwatches can be fantastic fitness tools and health-tracking wearables, but as far as their design is concerned, many people argue that they have some growing up to do before they can rival classic watches. Some customers and avid Twitter users say smartwatches won't level up their looks until they have thinner display bezels. But although that could be a valid point, I think it's more of a double-edged sword.
As far as smartphones go, I'm not among those who support constantly-changing designs for the sake of pretend evolution. Not when a smartphone series, such as the Galaxy S22 or Galaxy S23, hits a design sweet spot. But when it comes to smartwatches, I'm afraid Samsung's wearables haven't yet reached the pinnacle of their design.
Early leaks indicate that the upcoming Galaxy Watch 6 Classic might not look overly exciting. It could look very much like the previous Classic model. However, other rumors say that Samsung will try to modernize the design of the flat Galaxy Watch 6 model by applying thinner display bezels. Personally, I'm not so sure that would be a good idea.
There's no room to sacrifice smartwatch usability
I've been using the flat, 44mm Galaxy Watch 5 model for the past few months. It sold me on the smartwatch concept, and I rarely take it off. But I must admit that the exterior design of the Galaxy Watch 5 doesn't feel polished to perfection. it's not ugly by any means, but there's room for improvement. Even so, I wouldn't claim that the best way to evolve the design of the flat Galaxy Watch is to make display bezels thinner.
See, many watch faces have interactive UI elements right at the edge of the active screen, which is bordered by the relatively thick pixel-free bezel. They include heart rate and stress meters, battery level monitors, step counters, and more. These UI elements can be tapped for additional information, and conveniently, they can be a substitute for tiles.
For the most part, I found that the touchscreen accuracy for these very small UI elements is on point. But the problem inherent to thin smartwatch bezels, I feel, is that it would take away from the usability of these watch face UI elements. I'm guessing they'd be more difficult to tap accurately if they were right at the edge of the glass, especially since smartwatch panels don't have a lot of real estate, to begin with.
To put it differently, smartwatch bezels may need to be thicker to help usability and avoid making touch-based inputs too uncomfortable. And as long as Samsung is aware of this, we may never see edge-to-edge Galaxy Watch displays unless the company is willing to sacrifice usability. Sure, Samsung could redesign its watch faces to account for an edge-to-edge bezel design, but what about all the third-party watch faces and Wear OS apps? Will they all account for minuscule bezels? I doubt it.
The reasonable way to evolve the Galaxy Watch design might be through a curved display
Having said all this about smartwatch display bezels, perhaps the only reasonable way for Samsung to evolve the design of its flat Galaxy Watch might be to give it a bit of a curve. To make the screen wrap around the edges more, similar to the circular Google Pixel Watch and rectangular Apple Watch.
On one hand, the bezel on the Pixel Watch seems too thick, but on the other, perhaps Samsung could find the correct curvature to prevent its Galaxy Watch display bezels from becoming more prominent than they already are. It would be like combining the best of two worlds, at least for users who agree that a curved smartwatch display looks superior to a completely flat one. Personally, I do, and I believe this to be the next evolutionary step Samsung should look into for improving the design of its smartwatches.
