11 ms·
A programmable watch you can actually wear
- HardwareLust 5mo agoLILYGO site shows pre-orders of all 3 versions are sold out unfortunately.
- Animats 5mo agoThere's an older "Plus" model available on Amazon.[1] Surprisingly cheap, at US$66. This new model is the "Ultra". It's amazing that the market is big enough to get the price that low. [1] https://www.amazon.com/LILYGO-T-Watch-S3-Development-SX1280-2-4G/dp/B0F48KVPB6 https://www.amazon.com/LILYGO-T-Watch-S3-Development-SX1280-...
- gamerslexus 5mo agos/Watch/Smartwatch Regular DYI watches aren't big news... (I would be over the moon for a DIY smartwatch with zero AI and e-ink screen.)
- stackghost 5mo agoI would consider a DIY mechanical/analog watch to be far bigger news/more impressive than a smartwatch.
- bloggie 5mo agoTo be honest there is not much to it, you buy the movement, put it in a case, and put the hands on it. you can get everything from aliexpress. it's easier and often cheaper to just buy a normal watch if you need one.
- NooneAtAll3 5mo agobuying movement is like buying whole PCB DIY analogy would probably be about acquiring individual gears
- gamerslexus 5mo agoIs it different with a smartwatch? You buy the kit, it's not like you solder much as far as I understand.
- Avicebron 5mo agoIt's impressive you start with a lathe and make the movement yourself!
- saltcured 5mo agoNot nearly as impressive as designing and fabricating your own integrated circuits and display!
- gamerslexus 5mo agoI thought so too, but after quick research apparently there are kits. For various values of "DIY", I guess...
- stackghost 5mo agoSure but buying a movement kit is no different than buying a pcb. Writing code is not impressive any more.
- aa-jv 5mo agoWatchy fits the bill: https://watchy.sqfmi.com/ https://watchy.sqfmi.com/ I have one, its a bit bulkier than I'd thought it would be, but its a fine piece of timekeeping ..
- emilecantin 5mo agoI had one, broke 2 screens before I gave up wearing it... It's really not meant to be work in daily life, which is sad because an e-paper screen makes a lot of sense on a watch.
- aa-jv 5mo agoIMHO it just needs a better case. The watch itself is fine - the bulky case it comes with, not so great.
- ck2 5mo agohave wished for decades now there was an open-source Garmin on the level of Cyanogenmod / LineageOS for Android not sure if it will happen this decade but definitely next decade proper running/cycling metrics are hard as demonstrated by how many well-funded competitors are somewhat close but not there 100% yet (Coros, Amazfit, etc) someone once hacked and decompiled older Garmins but newer ones are encrypted/signed/locked-down
- mghackerlady 5mo agoI have a garmin from the late 90s and am saddened by the lack of FOSS software to even sync a new map onto it
- ck2 5mo agonot sure if this will help you but there is a neat website that allows you to build free maps for older Garmin models that didn't have them at first like Fenix5 https://garmin.bbbike.org/ https://garmin.bbbike.org/ 1990s is going way back though, they didn't even have mass-storage mode then, it was their proprietary "garmin mode" for usb which only things like BaseCamp can talk to
- mghackerlady 5mo agooh bud, mine doesn't even mention USB in the manual. I got the thing for like a dollar at goodwill haha
- rjsw 5mo agoHave you looked at the specs for the upcoming PineTime Pro [1]? [1] https://pine64.org/2026/03/28/pinetime_march_2026/ https://pine64.org/2026/03/28/pinetime_march_2026/
- xrd 5mo agoI'm very excited about this. GPS was the final piece of the puzzle. I love(d) my bangle.js. Such a true hacker device. Really fun to use WebUSB and push JavaScript files as apps. But the GPS on that device was a mess, honestly. I know this is a complicated problem but having to synchronize to satellites and recalibrate all the time was beyond me. I really wanted it to work because I built my own toy run tracker visualization tool. I am curious about this new lilygo device because it sounds like it has an alternative location sensor: "A u-blox MIA-M10Q GNSS module provides accurate location tracking..." I'll need to look that up. Anyone have a summary on what's the difference between that and regular GPS?
- jblezo 5mo agoThat's more a programmable watch than a DIY one :-) I build mine from scratch, including the PCB and a 3D printed case. For sure, that's not at all the same level of customability, programmability, capacity, nor quality. But It is really a DIY one. For anyone interested: https://github.com/jblezoray/hpdl1414-watch https://github.com/jblezoray/hpdl1414-watch
- Guestmodinfo 5mo agoI like your hpdl watch better than the LilyGo watch. As a lover of analog and casio watches I can tell you that your watch can soon build you a loyal following in its current form if you only build 3 such watches and put them on Amazon, etc. and price them at 50$. Next batch of 3 you could try at 100$. Don't worry about glass cover, our local watch repair guy can easily slap one in it
- hrimfaxi 5mo agoThe HPDL-1414 appears to be discontinued though still available from some suppliers in varying MOQs and leads.
- dang 5mo agoOk, we'll make the title say programmable instead.
- sho_hn 5mo agoLove it, especially your choice of digit display. Very nice hack! I'd wear that.
- Retr0id 5mo agoIt's cool that the firmware is hackable but I think "DIY" is an imprecise way to describe that.
- jwr 5mo agoThis does look very cool. Every peripheral one could think of, even LoRA!
- hrimfaxi 5mo agoThat stood out to me, too. Garmin should take a hint.
- aa-jv 5mo agoThe peripherals are great until you realize there's a dirth of software to use with them .. like, GPS is fun and everything, but not if all you've got is the coordinates .. I really love the idea of LoRA in a watch though, so I hope that once this gets shipped, the software makes some leaps and bounds ..
- gitowiec 5mo agoThis device looks capable of a lot of features and possibilities. Unfortunately nothing comes to my mind because I'm not good with diy hardware (once connected raspberry pi zero with led strips). Could someone tell examples of interesting and/or useful projects one can implement with this watch?
- oritron 5mo agoI like a good smart watch and I appreciate open source, but an ESP32 isn't a great pick when low power consumption is important and the device is going to be communicating regularly. I'm surprised LILYGO went that direction in a watch form factor.
- smlacy 5mo agoWhat would you suggest instead?
- oritron 5mo agoNordic Semi, or maybe ST Micro. I've got an STM32WB on my bench at the moment with sensitive coulomb counting and it looks very promising but without all those radios. Of course with all those radios (ie, if you need LoRa on a watch... which is a design decision I'm also skeptical of) then Nordic has a good track record.
- jkestner 5mo agoDifferent use case (environmental data recorder) but our current product uses an STM that turns on an ESP32 (not trusting that sleep mode) when it needs radio, to run on 2 AAs forever.
- analog31 5mo agoFor an application using bluetooth low energy, a Nordic NRF52840 turned out to be the winner.
- ImPostingOnHN 5mo agoPreorders sold out already!
- briandw 5mo agoNo mention of battery life? I guess it depends on the software that you run. But it would be nice to have a benchmark for how long it would last in normal watch mode.
- MrDrMcCoy 5mo agoThere are only a few features I care about in a smartwatch: 1. O2 monitoring. I have sleep apnea and live at high altitude, so this matters to me. 2. Motion sensor. Also mostly for tracking sleep. 3. Vibrator for notifications. 4. A screen backlight. 5. Battery life longer than a week. 6. Waterproof enough to survive a splash in the shower/rain. I consider GPS, cellular, AI, touchscreens, cloud-only sync and control apps, and just about everything else to be anti-features. There are no devices that really cover all this that I've found. A few Garmin and Amazfit/Zepp devices come close, but they have enough drawbacks for me to not be happy with them. The new Pebble is nearly perfect, but the lack of an O2 sensor is a dealbreaker for me :(
- Findecanor 5mo agoThe Sensor Watch circuit board [1] inside the case of a Casio F91-W / A158W / A159W satisfies 2, 4, 5, and 6. Accelerometer or thermometer available as daughterboard. Battery life measured in months, if not years. Although the simple LED backlight and the segmented LCD leaves a bit to be desired, and there is no wireless connectivity for notifications. Open source firmware. The Ollee watch circuit board [2] is similar, better backlight but closed-source firmware and configuration over BLE in a smartphone app. Still no notifications over BLE though. I'd think combining 1 and 6 (O₂ monitoring and waterproofing) would be difficult. [1]: https://www.sensorwatch.net/ https://www.sensorwatch.net/ [2]: https://www.olleewatch.com/ https://www.olleewatch.com/
- curiousgal 5mo agoThe Pro version has a better screen (still segmented but more), RGB LEDs and an infrared sensor.
- doctorpangloss 5mo agomy experience with a sensor watch has been terrible. imagine breaking a $3 watch that is not quite as indestructible as people think it is, but it is nonetheless pretty robust, and then trying to shove something 100x glitchier and 5x as expensive into its case...
- 5mo ago
- inasio 5mo agoDoes anyone know if this has an accelerometer? I recently got a nice sports-oriented smartwatch (non-Garmin), to use it mostly for rowing, but it doesn't track the rowing-rate. It should be pretty easy to program one if the watch has accelerometers, but couldn't tell from the spec sheet (maybe that means no?)
- fjfaase 5mo agoIt had a Bosch motion sensor with AI abilities it says in the description.
- avipars 5mo agotrun on and trun off
- dariosalvi78 5mo agoNo heart rate sensor
- pickleglitch 5mo agoThis is almost $80. The PineTime watch is less than half that price. Obviously the specs are different but that's quite a difference.
- npodbielski 5mo agoWhere you can buy pinetine for 40$?
- deleted 5mo ago[deleted]
- jjulius 5mo agoFrom PineTime. https://pine64.com/product/pinetime-smartwatch-sealed/ https://pine64.com/product/pinetime-smartwatch-sealed/ https://pine64.com/product/pinetime-dev-kit/ https://pine64.com/product/pinetime-dev-kit/
- codebje 5mo agoBoth of those products are out of stock.
- pickleglitch 5mo agoSo is the T-Watch Ultra.
- sdevonoes 5mo agoI would buy it if it had wifi. A (decent to wear) watch with wifi would be awesome. Tons of ideas for apps I would build for myself Ofc, im excluding apple
- matt_trentini 5mo agoOddly, the article didn't mention it - but the watch does have wifi.
- jdiff 5mo agoThe article mentions it as "Wi-Fi" if you were scanning with Ctrl+F.
- jdiff 5mo agoIt's an ESP32, it has wifi.
- a96 5mo agoYes. Though not all ESP32 variants have wifi. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ESP32#Features https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ESP32#Features
- chaosprint 5mo agoI doubt if esp32s3's power consumption can be used in real life.
- JaggedNZ 5mo agoAnyone know what the battery life is likely to be like?
- padjo 5mo agoBad.
- rbanffy 5mo agoI would love to see some extra sensors for heartbeat, temperature, blood oxygen and whatever else could be captured by the design.
- amelius 5mo agoWhen can we finally buy a smartwatch that can keep its (color) display ON during the entire day?
- joe_mamba 5mo agoWatches with color memory-in-pixel displays have existed since Pebble.
- jolmg 5mo agoTo add, the current Pebbles are estimated to last 30 days. 10-14 days for the round ones.
- taejavu 5mo agoSeptember 18, 2020. That's when Apple released their Watch Series 6, which has an always on color display, and enough battery to last all day.
- gnabgib 5mo agoA Garmin memory-in-pixel eInk (MIP) watch? Lots of choices there, since about 2015. Modern versions (MIP not AMOLED, the category is getting confusing) last about 10 days on a charge.
- deferredgrant 5mo ago[flagged]
- sho_hn 5mo agoThis is mean-spirited and daft. This is a product aimed at a very specific hobbyist segment of the smart tinkerer, who will probably get more joy out of it than most buyers get out of their Apple Watch. Is that a smaller market? Yes. That doesn't make it a bad product.
- Retr0id 5mo agoI think it's a relevant critique for something that goes on your wrist, especially when products like PineTime exist in the same market segment with aesthetics much closer to an apple watch (an aesthetic I'm not fond of either, but hey, it seems to be popular)
- nl 5mo agoIt doesn't look dissimilar to the Apple Watch Ultra plus a Casio GShock/Garmin Fenix vibe
- throwaway5Am1k 5mo agoThis watch shares a lot of visual characteristics with something like the original Casio GShock. Just because it doesn't look like a modern smart-watch, doesn't mean it's ugly. I quite like the rugged aesthetic.
- deleted 5mo ago[deleted]
- Aardwolf 5mo agoToo bad it seems to not do health monitoring, my main use case of a watch now is sleep tracking with as long battery life as possible
- p0w3n3d 5mo agothe same for me, however I can imagine that creating a good sleep analysing software based on the hypothethical HRM and accelerometer is mission impossible. I find the best software is Garmin at the moment of writing, or at least suits me well, and it blocks me from buying any opensource watch, unless I want to have two watches on my hands
- wao0uuno 5mo agoThat's awesome. If only it didn't look so tacticool.
- bronlund 5mo agoNow we are talking! This one, in addition to all the other alternatives out there, makes the new Pebble dead on arrival. At least at the current price point.
- DennisP 5mo agoA watch some people can actually wear. 49x63x22mm is a bit much for my skinny little hacker wrists. But with the LoRa I'm tempted to pick up a couple anyway.
- ChrisRR 5mo agoYou'd barely pick up anything with a lora antenna that small
- danparsonson 5mo agoI've loved the idea of a computer on my wrist since I was a kid but now they're available, I find myself unable to think of an actual useful application for them apart from telling the time - what do you smart watch people actually do with them? Are they mainly toys or do they enrich your life in some practical way?
- Silamoth 5mo agoI stopped wearing my Apple Watch because notifications were too distracting when trying to work (even with Work Focus, I want some notifications, but I don’t want my wrist buzzing and lighting up all the time). I don’t miss it. The only real use I ever got was GPS directions when riding a bike or electronic scooter. I guess I also tracked my runs with it. But I don’t use those often enough, and I can wear the watch for those situations if needed. I do also love the idea, though. I think part of the limiting factor is that you can’t attach sensors or peripherals to it. Even with a hackable watch like in TFA, there’s only so much you could add without it getting bulky. And the screen is too small to do much with.
- Revanche1367 5mo agoSame here, loved the idea since I was a kid and I spend a lot more money on gadgets than I probably should but somehow managed to avoid getting a smartwatch because it doesn’t do anything a smartphone does better. I just wear a simple casio solar powered watch I got for about $100 which I never have to charge. I still like the idea of something programmable though, but this watch in OP is a bit too DIY for my tastes.
- crabbone 5mo agoSmart watches, in general, have a better GPS antenna. I tried running using just my phone's GPS and it's all over the place, completely unusable for that task (it showed me crossing walls, canals, running in circles where I went in a straight line etc.) Also, a lot of smart watches come with a pulseox, so, you can look up your pulse any time you like :D Not super useful unless you are working out, but there's that.
- 5mo ago
- Zopieux 5mo agoGenuinely curious: why/what would I ever want to run edge AI on a 1100mAh wearable with a tiny power-optimized embedded SoC? I can't think of a single useful scenario. At this scale, a few ifs/elses will do.
- arjunthazhath 5mo agoBen 10 is slowly becoming a reality
- econ 5mo agoStill much to big for my taste. It should (IMHO) have performance like a ZX spectrum or a c64, bare minimum io. 4-6 buttons and so cheap you have to buy it.