Rumors of an affordable Apple Watch have been floating around for several months. Today, Jon Prosser of Front Page Tech has clarified the whole situation and revealed when Apple plans to announce it.
Do take everything below with a pinch of salt, though. Prosser inaccurately claimed that Apple was going to announce an Apple Watch and iPad Air this week, although he has been correct several times in the past.
The affordable Apple Watch SE
Known simply as the ‘Apple Watch’ to hardware engineers within the company, this model is expected to sit between the popular Apple Watch Series 3 and the high-end Apple Watch Series 6.
It'll feature an improved design based on the newer Apple Watch Series 4 and a chip dubbed ‘M9.’ The latter is particularly interesting, though, because the Apple M9 already exists as a discontinued co-processor embedded within the Apple A9 and A9X chipsets.
Perhaps the Apple M9 name mentioned by Prosser is simply an internal codename for another chipset, or maybe it represents the start of an entirely new line of Apple M-series chipsets.
The Apple Watch Series 4
To keep costs down versus the existing Apple Watch Series 4 and ensure people have enough reasons to purchase more expensive models, Apple has reportedly removed the popular ECG monitor.
It has skipped the Always-On-Display feature that it introduced on the Watch Series 5 last September as well, but this one is less surprising and probably won’t be a deal-breaker.
Prosser says there are four variants in the works at the moment: 40mm GPS (codenamed N140S), 40mm Cellular (codenamed N140B), 44mm GPS (codenamed N142S), and 44mm Cellular (codenamed N142B).
The premium Apple Watch Series 6
This smartwatch is expected to act as the true successor to the existing Apple Watch Series 5. Hardware engineers within Apple refer to it as the ‘Apple Watch Pro,’ although that probably isn't the final marketing name.
Prosser didn’t provide a list of features, yet past reports suggest the biggest hardware change will be the introduction of a pulse oximeter sensor for built-in blood oxygen monitoring.
That feature should enable much better medical alerts and improve nutrition advice. It will be combined with sleep tracking, a feature that's also going to be available to users of older Apple Watch models as part of the watchOS 7 update.
The Apple Watch Series 5
The Silicon Valley-based company is expected to introduce a new chipset that will hopefully provide some bigger performance bumps this time around. Last year Apple disappointed by offering very minimal chipset revisions.
Apple Watch Series 6 & Series 6 Pro announcement and release date
The affordable Apple Watch SE will make its onternational debut later today at the 'Time Flies' event, according to several sources. The Apple Watch Series 6, or however Apple chooses to market it, will make an appearance too.
The Apple Watch Series 3 retails at $199 and Jon Prosser says the new Apple Watch SE will slot in above it at $279. The Series 6, on the other hand, is expected to retail at $399 like the existing Apple Watch Series 5.
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If announced on today, pre-orders will probably kick off this Friday, September 18, ahead of shipments late next week on Friday, September 25.
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