The history of the smartwatch: how we ended up wearing tiny computers on our wrists

There is something funny about the fact that we call them smartwatches. As if they suddenly became sentient and clever one random Tuesday evening in 1999. Surprisingly for some, they did not.

In 1972, the Hamilton Watch Company released the Pulsar, one of the first digital watches. Instead of hands, it had glowing red numbers. This was revolutionary, mainly because people could pretend they were in a submarine as they told the time.

By the 1980s, Seiko decided watches should do admin. The Data 2000 could store 2000 characters and came with a separate keyboard. You put your watch in the docking station. You typed your notes into it. And… you saved them on the watch for later, I guess.

The RC-1000 Wrist Terminal could connect to computers like the BBC Micro and Apple II. It had 2 KB of storage, which is about 36 times less than the Apollo 11 Guidance Computer had in 1969 and roughly enough space for a strong opinion and half an apology.

Meanwhile, Casio released Data Bank watches that let you store phone numbers. This was useful in an era when people still memorised them. Wild concept if you ask me, but somehow they could do it.

In 1994, Timex released the Datalink. It transferred appointments from your computer to your watch using flashes of light from your monitor, which, to my grandparents, sounded like alien technology, but it was in fact Microsoft Schedule Plus.

In 1998, Seiko launched the Ruputer, a wrist computer with a processor and downloadable apps. The screen was tiny, the joystick awkward and the battery life required optimism, which people, as a species, found easier to sustain in the 90s.

That same year, Samsung released the SPH-WP10 watch phone. It had a visible antenna and up to 90 minutes of talk time per charge, which is just enough to ruin one relationship and start another. You would not use it all in one go though, because back then mobile tariffs could easily cost you a kidney.

IBM revealed the WatchPad, a Linux-powered wrist device in 2000. Battery life was about six hours, which was huge considering that six hours then felt like twelve hours do now.

Just three years later, Fossil released its 108-gram Wrist PDA running Palm OS. It had a monochrome touch screen, a stylus hidden in the buckle and 2 MB of RAM, roughly a thousand times more than the computer used on Apollo 13. If you think it would have landed on the Moon with one of those on board, you would be wrong. But at least the error messages might have been clearer.

In 2008, Microsoft introduced SPOT watches that delivered news and weather via FM signals for an annual subscription. Streaming services would later perfect the concept. Microsoft had simply tested our willingness to participate.

In 2012, Pebble raised over $10 million on Kickstarter for a watch you could read it in daylight without squinting like a Victorian scholar. It connected to Android via Bluetooth. Charging through a magnetic USB cable warranted water resistance. Owning it felt almost illegal at the time, especially when the battery lasted up to seven days, and by early 2014, the Pebble app store had over 1,000 apps.

Using about the same concept, Samsung introduced the Galaxy Gear in 2013. It even had a camera, paired with 512MB RAM and 4GB internal storage. Because nothing says the 21st century like lifting your wrist to film people in secret.

In 2015, Apple Inc. launched the Apple Watch with fitness tracking capabilities. It was meant to add components to your phone rather than try replacing it. By the time the Apple Watch Series 4 introduced ECG functionality, expectations had evolved. Your watch could record your heart rhythm, export a PDF and let you present it to your GP as evidence. The verdict might still be “keep an eye on it”, but at least it now comes with graphs.

Modern smartwatches monitor heart rate, sleep stages, blood oxygen and activity trends. Some offer cellular connectivity so you can leave your phone at home and still take calls. Health features now include fall detection, irregular rhythm alerts and sleep analysis that would have seemed absurd in 1984, when people were thrilled about storing 112 digits.

A smartwatch today runs on an efficient chip, has a display you can read outdoors and lasts the day without charging. It also keeps records. Of everything. Which feels reassuring until you think about it too long.