Motorola Moto 360 2015 Australian hands-on

With the launch of the Motorola Moto 360 2015 there’s new excitement for Android Wear smartwatches. Their new range is premium, uses a variety of materials and comes in multiple sizes with ‘Mens’ and ‘Womens’ options designed to keep more people happy.

We’ll start off with the bad news, there’s no release date or pricing for Australia as yet, but we have advised that Motorola needs to get this range of watches to Australia ASAP. The other bad news is something we knew already, there won’t be any Moto Maker options in Australia for the time being, but then again, 2016 is just around the corner so a new year could bring new surprises – we remain hopeful. Motorola are very committed to getting Moto Maker ‘Right’, and we’re Ok with that…for now.

Now the good news, the watches are very, very nice in person. There’s a premium look and feel that for me was missing in the first gen Moto 360, there’s touches like the inclusion of the famous Motorola ‘Batwing’ logo on the crown, which for the Moto 360 2015 has been moved to the 2 o’clock position to avoid accidental presses – all touches which show Motorola has taken feedback into account with the Moto 360 2015 series. The Moto 360 2015 is also IP67 compliant so you can definitely take it in the shower with you this time round.

There is of course three different types of watches in their standard range and then they have their ‘Sports’ range. The watches come in two different ‘Mens’ sizes 46mm or 42mm, with the 46mm using standard 22mm watch bands, while the 42mm uses a 20mm bands, the ‘Womens’ model is a 42mm watch size as well, but has an almost minuscule 16mm lug size for the band to fit more slender wrists. The bands have been re-designed to be easier to remove or replace with a quick-release pin to make it a more pleasant experience to get a watch that suits you.

While the use of ‘Womens’ and ‘Mens’ seems a bit distasteful to me, there’s a slew of different materials that will be on offer for Moto Maker customers to customise the watches. The materials will be aimed at the ‘womens’ or ‘mens’ market, but really, if you like the look, why not buy it?

The watches are about the same size as the previous model and they look great on your wrist, whether you prefer the smaller or the larger models.

The ambient display works really well and that ‘flat tyre’ is seemingly not even noticeable on the new range. The 400mAh battery will give you up to 2 days of battery life says Motorola, the 300mAh not quite there, but for the better look on a smaller wrist it’s a price you have to pay.

Chargers are interchangeable between the 1st and 2nd Gen Moto 360, but you will find the specific chargers angle the watch more perfectly. Frustratingly if you do require a second charger for your watch to keep at work or elsewhere, you still won’t be able to buy a second – again, we’ve given ample feedback to Motorola on the need for customers to be able to buy a spare charger.

The Sports model won’t be arriving in the market until after the Moto 360 range is on-sale, which is a bit of a disappointment. Motorola didn’t have any live models of the sports version, but the watch felt pretty comfortable with the rubberised bands. Motorola says there have been improvements in the heart rate monitor design, but it seems there’s been no drastic changes here.

The pricing for the Moto 360 starts at €299 in Europe, but there hasn’t been any local pricing announced for Australia. Motorola says they’re still nailing down details of when the watches will make an appearance in Australia and how much it will cost. From our brief time with the watches today we’re pretty impressed with the Moto 360 2015 and really can’t wait to see these on-sale.