At IFA in Berlin a couple of months ago Samsung announced their new Tizen-powered smartwatches designed to take their Gear line to the next level. At the time we wondered whether we would end up seeing both versions in Australia, suspecting that we would only see the classic version. According to the Samsung Australia website, happily it seems we were wrong.
This afternoon the Gear S3 Classic and the Gear S3 Frontier appeared on the Samsung Australia site, setting off speculation that a release of both smartwatches here in Australia is imminent.
Rumours are that the watches will launch in the US on November 18, but that timeframe isn’t confirmed for either the US or locally at this stage.
The specs of both devices are fairly impressive, as is their styling. Both have a bezel that turns around to help select the app you want to use, IP68 dust and water protection and a 1.3″ circular Super AMOLED display. Both models have built in GPS, Bluetooth, WiFi, and NFC. Of note is that the website says that both smartwatches support both MST (Magnetic Secure Transmission) and NFC (Near Field Communication) payment technologies (ie. not just Samsung Pay).
The S3 Classic is similar in looks to the S2 we reviewed late last year, a premium elegant design, while the S3 Frontier is a more rugged design that has a more outdoorsy-type appearance. As mentioned above, inside the watches appear to be the same with the promise of 3-4 days of battery life. Both watches run Tizen with a promise of over 10000 available apps.
| Samsung Gear S3 frontier | Samsung Gear S3 classic | Screen size | 1.3-inch | 1.3-inch | Screen technology | AMOLED | AMOLED | Resolution | 360 x 360 | 360 x 360 | PPI | 278 | 278 | Chipset | Exynos7270 | Exynos7270 | Core config | 1.0 GHz x 2 | 1.0 GHz x 2 | Ram | 768MB | 768MB | Storage | 4GB | 4GB | MicroSD | — | — | Battery | 380 mAh | 380 mAh | Charging method | Wireless | Wireless | Cellular | 3G/LTE | No | NFC | Yes | Yes | Speaker | Yes | Yes | Android OS | Tizen | Tizen | Dimensions | 46 x 49 x 12.9 | 46 x 49 x 12.9 | Weight | 62g | 57g | Colours | - | - | Build materials | - | - | Band colours | - | - | Band materials | - | - | Band swappable | Yes | Yes |
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At this stage the pricing and availability is unknown but if you are in the market for a new smartwatch, even though it is not Android Wear, I suggest you head over to the Samsung website to check out these stylish, impressively specced smartwatches.
We have reached out to Samsung for more information and will of course let you know more as soon as we do.
