Casio has gained its fair share of popularity in the smartwatch market thanks to the Pro Trek Smart series, which is designed for outdoor use. Last year, the company introduced built-in GPS capabilities with the WSD-F20, and today it"s expanding upon that with its successor.
The Pro Trek Smart WSD-F30 will feel very familiar to those who have owned or seen the previous devices in the line. It features the same dual-layer display setup as previous entries, but the colored display is now an OLED instead of an LCD. It also has the same rugged design with MIL-STD-810 certification, but it now comes in a smaller body - 3.9mm narrower and 0.4mm thinner. It"s still a bulky device, but it should be more comfortable than last year"s model.
Casio also added some new features to the smartwatch, starting with a new Extend Mode. This essentially switches the watch to the barebones monochrome display that shows the time and measurement data, but GPS tracking still works, and users can look at the color map at any time by simply pressing a button. The watch will still log your route while in this mode, too, and the extended battery life means you can record up to three days of traveling.
If you really want to save battery, though, you can use the new and improved Timepiece mode, which the company is calling Multi Timepiece Mode. Much like before, this will disable the color display as well as smartphone communication, but now you can still access data from many of the watch"s sensors, such as atmospheric pressure and altitude, right on the monochrome display. Even with the added functionality, you"ll be able to get up to an entire month of battery life in Multi Timepiece Mode, which isn"t too bad.
The WSD-F30 is naturally running Wear OS by Google, which is due to receive some improvements in the near future. You can expect the device to launch in January 2019 in three colors: orange, blue, and black. It"s set to cost $549, which is a little more than last year"s model.