The Pebble smartwatch, one of the forerunners in the rapidly expanding wearables market, has been going through a transformation in software rather than hardware for quite a while now, since the introduction of more capabilities in its v2.0 update. Today, it has gotten its .1 release, a minor update to the Smartwatch’s firmware which is mostly bug fixes and a couple of new features. Also updated are the official iOS and Android apps, which have gained a minor update with bug fixes mostly. The updates are a sign of platform maturity, as big feature releases for the hardware are almost done, in our opinion, but hey, we always love surprises.
The Pebble firmware can be update via the official apps on the respective platforms, and here is the change log –
Pebble Firmware 2.1 (Release Notes)
- Notifications can be cleared via Settings » Notifications » Clear History.
- Improved consistency of battery monitoring.
- Improved Bluetooth reliability when reconnecting.
- Fixed caller ID sometimes not displaying on outgoing calls.
- Bug fixes and improvements.
And here is the changelog for the apps –
Android Pebble App 2.0.15.1 (Release Notes)
- Hotfix for a crash-on-boot issue some Android 2.0.15 users were seeing.
iOS Pebble App 2.1.3 (Release Notes)
- Enabled more new JavaScript apps to be downloadable in the Pebble appstore.
The major changes in the firmware are the addition of a clear history option for notifications. This basically lets you clear the notifications in the center if you don’t want them sticking around, although the primary purpose of the center is that. The battery monitoring and bluetooth reliability apparently were inconsistent for some, so they have gotten their fixes, although we never noticed anything substantial in that front. Same for the caller ID and other bug fixes. With Android wear announced, the Pebble software platform is threatened, as OEMs have jumped in on the Android bandwagon already and there will be a lot of smartwatches coming real soon. How will Pebble react, and is it still a worthy buy when you know watches like the Motorola Moto 360 and the LG G watch are coming? Stay tuned as we try to answer that in the coming days.