A Galaxy of new Samsung devices made their way to the office, and we keep unpacking them. The Galaxy Watch8 is the new entry-point in Samsung’s smartwatch portfolio and we have the 40mm Silver version with us.
But first – a quick unboxing. Watch8 comes in a simple white cardboard box, which contains the watch and the same proprietary 10W wireless charging puck that ends with a USB-C cable. The inside compartment also holds the new proprietary TPU strap.
You’ll immediately notice the new cushion design, which takes inspiration from the Galaxy Watch Ultra. In short, the casing is made from two parts – a brushed aluminum squircle piece and a round AMOLED display on top. The new design allowed Samsung to make the Watch8 thinner as it now measures just 8.6 mm. It feels pretty light on the wrist too at just 30 grams.
Our 40mm version gets a 1.34-inch diagonal, but Samsung is also offering a larger 44mm size, which bumps up to 1.47 inches. Regardless of the casing size, you get Sapphire Crystal protection and a peak brightness of 3,000 nits – a big upgrade over the 2,000 nits peak on the Watch7 series.
The updated design also brings Samsung’s Dynamic Lug system, which is advertised to bring improvement in health and activity readings. There’s a bunch of new health and activity tracking features inside One UI 8 Watch, and we’re eager to see how the new Antioxidant Index fares in the real world.
Watch8 brings two side buttons on the right-hand side, while the opposite houses the speakers. There’s no physical rotating bezel like on the Classic version. Instead, the edges of the panel give off vibrations to simulate a “digital bezel”.
The 325mAh battery inside the Watch8 claims up to 40 hours with Always-on Display (AoD) off and 30 hours with AoD on. As usual, we’ll make sure to test this and all of the other key features in our detailed review.
In the meantime, feel free to check out our Galaxy Watch8 series hands-on.