Series 9 or Ultra 2: Which Apple Watch to pre-order
What's the story
Apple introduced its next-generation smartwatches—Watch Series 9 and Watch Ultra 2—at the 'Wonderlust' event.
They are now up for pre-orders in India via the brand's official store, alongside the iPhone 15 series. While the Watch Series 9 starts at Rs. 41,900, the Watch Ultra 2 is priced at Rs. 89,900.
The wearables pack a new processing chip, more storage, and improved health and fitness tracking features.
Both promise upgraded performance. However, which one should you really pick? Let's find out.
Details
The Watch Ultra 2 has a programmable Action button
Apple's new smartwatches look similar to their predecessors.
The Watch Series 9 is offered in 41mm and 45mm sizes, with aluminum and stainless steel cases.
The Watch Ultra 2 comes in a 49mm size, with a titanium case.
The wearables sport a rectangular dial, with curved corners. On the right, they have a tactical crown, along with a side button and a customizable Action button, respectively.
More
The smartwatches offer 64GB of onboard storage
The Watch Series 9 gets 5ATM (50 meters) water resistance, whereas the Watch Ultra 2 model offers 10ATM (100 meters) water resistance.
Both watches come with IP6X dust protection; however, only the Ultra model is MIL-STD-810H tested.
On the front, the Series 9 and Ultra 2 feature an LTPO OLED display, boasting 2,000-nits and 3,000-nits of peak brightness, respectively.
The wearables are equipped with a custom S9 SiP, for improved performance, graphics, and power efficiency. They include 64GB of storage.
Insights
Hands-free accessibility elevates the experience
The Apple Watch Series 9 and Watch Ultra 2 bring several improvements to deliver a seamless user experience.
They include a U2 ultrawide-band chip for advanced connectivity and improved 'Find My' capabilities.
The smartwatches include new features such as on-device Siri recognition, processing requests on the watches themselves without requiring the internet.
There's also a new "Double Tap," feature to offer true hands-free operations.
While Series 9 promises an 18-hour battery life, you get twice the usage on Ultra 2.
Safety
Take a look at their safety and connectivity features
The Watch Series 9 and Watch Ultra 2 offer multiple safety features like Emergency SOS, International emergency calling, Fall Detection, Crash Detection, Noise monitoring, and Backtrack.
The Ultra model also features an 88dB emergency siren, that can be heard up to 600ft or 180 meters away.
The smartwatches support Wi-Fi 4 and Bluetooth 5.3 connectivity.
The Series 9 comes in both GPS and GPS+Cellular variants. The Ultra is available in a GPS+Cellular trim.
Verdict
Which one should you consider?
Get the Watch Series 9 if you want the latest features and have a budget of about Rs. 42,000. It is one of the most notable smartwatches in the sub-Rs. 45,000 segment, besides Samsung's Galaxy Watch6 Classic.
The Watch Ultra 2, on the other hand, is recommended to athletes, or divers, due to its more sophisticated tracking capabilities, durability, safety features, and water resistance.