Samsung is reportedly 'considering' a square next-gen Galaxy Watch to take the fight to Apple
You probably don't remember this now, but Samsung's very first smartwatches looked radically different from the Galaxy Watches we've come to know and love over the last few years. Of course, it was a completely different time for the wearable industry as a whole when the Galaxy Gear was unveiled in 2013 with what now may seem like a very clunky and awkward square design.
The company that currently sits firmly in second place in global smartwatch sales appeared to quickly realize that the square shape was not the right way to consumers' hearts, shifting to an arguably more elegant circle with the Gear S2 in 2015. Fast-forward almost a decade, and in a totally unexpected turn of events, Samsung is tipped to go back to its square-shaped roots... at some point in the relatively near future.
This is obviously not etched in stone, but SamMobile is rarely wrong about these types of predictions, even when they're made with very few details and no firm timeline whatsoever. According to the publication's inside sources, Samsung is "enthusiastically" considering the idea of a non-circular Galaxy Watch "internally", which means that the project has a solid chance of materializing in 2024 or 2025.
Seeing as how the smartwatch market has greatly expanded and matured compared to 2013 or 2015, such a drastic redesign could pose a number of challenges for Samsung from an advertising standpoint. Namely, it might prove difficult to sell users on the qualities of a smartwatch design that the company has clearly considered inferior for so long, especially when the competition has insisted for so long that it's actually superior.
Of course, there's more than one way to skin a cat, so just because the Galaxy Watch 7 or Galaxy Watch 8 could stray from the Galaxy Watch 6's round face, that doesn't necessarily mean Samsung will produce an Apple Watch copy anytime soon.
Besides, even if this rumor pans out (which remains a big "if" despite SamMobile's typical reliability), something tells us Samsung will not ditch circular smartwatches altogether. Instead, our prediction is the company could move to a dual-shape release strategy similar to how Garmin, for instance, sells both circular and square Venu models. That's merely an educated guess, mind you, and instead of taking, well, anything for granted, you should probably wait for more corroboration of today's surprising report.
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