Apple is dispatching its new Apple Watch to some lucky folks this Friday along with some neat features. Google is not going to let Apple take all the thunder, although it is rumoured Apple sold over 3m watches in the first weekend alone.

In response, Android Wear is receiving a large update which includes –

– Wrist Flicking Gestures – Flick your wrist away from you to view the next card or notification; flick towards you to go back.

– Emoji Drawing – Want to reply quickly to a notification? If an emoji or two will suffice, you can now just draw it.

– A New Interface Flow – Up until now, launching third party apps built for Android Wear has been kind of a pain — you either had to do it by voice, or by swiping and tapping through a bunch of menus. Now they’re the focus. Swiping to the left from the idle/watch screen will bring up a list of your apps. Swiping left again will show you contacts. Swiping left a third time shows a list of actions like “Take a note” or “Set a timer”, primarily meant to remind you of things you can do with your voice through the “Ok, Google” command.

– Always On Apps – Apps can now elect to keep the screen alive as long as it’s open,

– Wi-Fi Support – Android Wear watches actually have Wi-Fi built-in but the chip has just been inactive. With the update, your phone can actually be miles away — as long as your phone has data and your watch is connected to Wi-Fi, and your notifications and replies will pass between them. This feature is already present in the Samsung Gear S running Tizen OS.

If Google can get an Android Wear watch to work with iOS then this could be a decent option for a cross platform smartwatch.

Source – http://www.techcrunch.com