Another brand abandons Wear OS, sticking to “essential” updates

Another company that used to manufacture Wear OS smartwatches is acting as if it may never launch another model. Without saying it directly, Mobvoi, known for its TicWatch series, doesn’t seem to plan on launching new devices.

Mobvoi may never launch Wear OS smartwatches again

Wear OS is losing another manufacturer as Mobvoi seems to be killing its TicWatch line. The company hasn’t launched a new smartwatch in over a year and delisted its older models from its website and Amazon. Answering a 9to5Google inquiry, Mobvoi didn’t explicitly say it was quitting the smartwatch market. Instead, the company stated it doesn’t have new information to share.

While launching a new TicWatch model is highly unlikely, Mobvoi committed to supporting its older smartwatches. The company said that “existing devices will continue to receive essential support.” What that means remains unknown.

Another one bites the dust

Mobvoi joins a growing number of brands that are abandoning Wear OS. Fossil, another key Wear OS brand in the past, stopped making smartwatches altogether last year. After numerous Wear OS-powered models, earlier this year, Tag Heuer launched the Connected Calibre E5 watch with an in-house software. That was the company’s first watch with “Made for iPhone” certification.

The latest TicWatch smartwatch was the Atlas. That model launched in the fall of 2024 as a promising budget-friendly alternative to the Apple Watch Ultra. One of the company’s main downsides was the inconsistent software updates that plagued all its models over the years. In fact, Mobvoi hasn’t released Wear OS 5 for many of its watches, while Wear OS 6 has already been released.

In 2021, Wear OS had a reboot with the launch of the Pixel Watch and Samsung’s switch to it with the Galaxy Watch 4. While Google and Samsung remain the main Wear OS manufacturers, OnePlus, Oppo, and Xiaomi have also launched some devices using it.

Not a big shock

Outside of the sports-focused devices, the smartwatch market is more or less dominated by smartphone brands. Most people buy a smartwatch from the same company that made their smartphones, and Mobvoi never made smartphones. As sad as it may be to lose TicWatch, I’m far from surprised that happened.