 I'm Neelai with The Verge, and this is the Pebble Steel. The Steel is the newest version of the Pebble smartwatch, last year's Kickstarter darling. The original Pebble was the first smartwatch worth buying, mainly because it didn't try to do too much. It sent notifications to your wrist and let you control music playback on your phone, and that was about it. For $150, the only real problem with it is that it's kind of ugly. You can change the band, but it's still a chunky plastic watch. The Steel changes all of that, at least on the outside. For an extra $100, the $250 Steel takes those same Pebble internals and dresses them up in a tighter, smaller metal case with your choice of leather and metal bands. It's still not perfectly beautiful, but it's far more attractive and virtually indistinguishable from a regular watch at first glance, especially if you prefer larger, funkier timepieces like I do. Here's an Octao I bought in Paris last year, and the Pebble's a little smaller. This Nixon of mine is a little smaller than the Pebble, but it has a much thicker band. And while the Steel is heavier than the original Pebble, it's lighter than this Seiko Kinetic. All in all, the Steel is a perfectly wearable watch that draws very little attention to itself. A big victory for a device you're supposed to wear all the time. Pebble did make two changes to the case that aren't great. The power connector has been revised, so you can't use the one from the original Pebble, and the band is now proprietary. You can't just use any old watch band like the original. That's a big drawback, but at least the design is open source, so replacements should appear soon. In addition to the new case, Pebble's also completely updated the watch's software, and the Android and iOS apps that make it all work. There's now a proper app store to download and manage apps and watch faces, and Pebble's working with some big names like ESPN, Yelp, and Foursquare. I tried all these out, and the results are a little mixed. While everything works well, I wanted these apps to be more front and center, kind of like the watch faces. For example, while checking in on Foursquare from your wrist is awesome, diving eight button presses into the menus to access the check-in screen is a little more cumbersome than just pulling out my phone. These are just the first set of apps, though, and the potential is so obviously there that it's hard to knock them too much. I want to do all these things for my wrist, I just want to do them a little bit more simply. And with the new software in the app store coming to the original Pebble as well, there's going to be a lot of incentive to iterate and get some of these ideas right. Where the Pebble continues to shine, though, is the basics. Any notification that hits your lock screen appears like magic on the Steels display, and that's still so fundamentally great that it's hard to complain about these bigger ambitions. I wish there was a better way to manage which notifications get sent to the Pebble from iOS. Right now, it's just kind of everything. And there's no way to deal with a notification if you're on iOS. I'd love to send a quick reply to an iMessage from my wrist or just dismiss a notification entirely, but that just can't happen on Apple's platform. The situation is far more customizable on Android, where Pebble has a rich ecosystem of apps, but the updated Android software wasn't ready in time for this review. That's really the whole story of the Pebble Steel. It's definitely the smartwatch for Android users, but it still feels kind of incomplete on iOS. A one-way receiver of information instead of a true extension of your phone. That's the dream. The question is whether Apple will ever let it come true. The Pebble Steel is far and away the smartwatch you should buy if you're in the market. It's much more focused and useful than competitors like the Samsung, Galaxy Gear, and the MetaWatch, and actually exists unlike the rumored products from Apple and Google. That's important. It's fun and useful, and you'll probably like it. And that's important too.
 I'm Neelai with The Verge, and this is the Pebble Steel.
 The Steel is the newest version of the Pebble smartwatch, last year's Kickstarter darling.
 The original Pebble was the first smartwatch worth buying, mainly because it didn't try
 to do too much.
 It sent notifications to your wrist and let you control music playback on your phone,
 and that was about it.
 For $150, the only real problem with it is that it's kind of ugly.
 You can change the band, but it's still a chunky plastic watch.
 The Steel changes all of that, at least on the outside.
 For an extra $100, the $250 Steel takes those same Pebble internals and dresses them up
 in a tighter, smaller metal case with your choice of leather and metal bands.
 It's still not perfectly beautiful, but it's far more attractive and virtually indistinguishable
 from a regular watch at first glance, especially if you prefer larger, funkier timepieces like
 I do.
 Here's an Octao I bought in Paris last year, and the Pebble's a little smaller.
 This Nixon of mine is a little smaller than the Pebble, but it has a much thicker band.
 And while the Steel is heavier than the original Pebble, it's lighter than this Seiko Kinetic.
 All in all, the Steel is a perfectly wearable watch that draws very little attention to
 itself.
 A big victory for a device you're supposed to wear all the time.
 Pebble did make two changes to the case that aren't great.
 The power connector has been revised, so you can't use the one from the original Pebble,
 and the band is now proprietary.
 You can't just use any old watch band like the original.
 That's a big drawback, but at least the design is open source, so replacements should appear
 soon.
 In addition to the new case, Pebble's also completely updated the watch's software, and
 the Android and iOS apps that make it all work.
 There's now a proper app store to download and manage apps and watch faces, and Pebble's
 working with some big names like ESPN, Yelp, and Foursquare.
 I tried all these out, and the results are a little mixed.
 While everything works well, I wanted these apps to be more front and center, kind of
 like the watch faces.
 For example, while checking in on Foursquare from your wrist is awesome, diving eight
 button presses into the menus to access the check-in screen is a little more cumbersome
 than just pulling out my phone.
 These are just the first set of apps, though, and the potential is so obviously there that
 it's hard to knock them too much.
 I want to do all these things for my wrist, I just want to do them a little bit more simply.
 And with the new software in the app store coming to the original Pebble as well, there's
 going to be a lot of incentive to iterate and get some of these ideas right.
 Where the Pebble continues to shine, though, is the basics.
 Any notification that hits your lock screen appears like magic on the Steels display,
 and that's still so fundamentally great that it's hard to complain about these bigger ambitions.
 I wish there was a better way to manage which notifications get sent to the Pebble from
 iOS.
 Right now, it's just kind of everything.
 And there's no way to deal with a notification if you're on iOS.
 I'd love to send a quick reply to an iMessage from my wrist or just dismiss a notification
 entirely, but that just can't happen on Apple's platform.
 The situation is far more customizable on Android, where Pebble has a rich ecosystem
 of apps, but the updated Android software wasn't ready in time for this review.
 That's really the whole story of the Pebble Steel.
 It's definitely the smartwatch for Android users, but it still feels kind of incomplete
 on iOS.
 A one-way receiver of information instead of a true extension of your phone.
 That's the dream.
 The question is whether Apple will ever let it come true.
 The Pebble Steel is far and away the smartwatch you should buy if you're in the market.
 It's much more focused and useful than competitors like the Samsung, Galaxy Gear, and the MetaWatch,
 and actually exists unlike the rumored products from Apple and Google.
 That's important.
 It's fun and useful, and you'll probably like it.
 And that's important too.