Pebble sold $20 million worth of its new Time watch on Kickstarter, and now deliveries have started. Engadget has the first review that we’ve seen, and it’s pretty mixed.
The chief problem isn’t the “more geek than chic” look. It’s the $200 price tag, which is high for a watch that has what the reviewer felt is a limited set of features. There’s no touchscreen, no GPS, no heart rate monitor, and it’s more expensive than the similarly functioned Moto360. On the other hand, the Pebble Time has got a nice color e-paper display, it’s reasonably svelte, and the battery lasts a week. Also, the new Timeline interface appears to be well thought-out. And if you want something with a bit more pizzaz, the metal Pebble Time Steel is coming soon, for $300, which is starting to edge toward the lower end of the Apple Watch pricing.
Pebble’s got a tough road, steering clear of the Android Wear and Apple Watch worlds. The Time, apparently, isn’t a home run. Whether a sharp double is good enough remains to be seen, but that $20 million in pre-sales goes a long way to indicating that it might be.
