How can you test if a SmartWatch is waterproof?

[BiscuitMassacre]

This is the a stupid question, but I am getting a Pebble Steel on Christmas and it is supposed to be WaterProof. But how would you test it? Cause if it ends up being defective in the water proofing department, you lose a watch...

 

 

Any suggestions?

[Droidbot]

I'd guess just dip it under the water or just use it normally and see if it falls apart. Just RMA it with the seller if it dies and quote the waterproofing rating 

[Guest]

Take the plunge, literally.....       

[paddy-stone]

See what it says in the items description, usually something like "upto 1 Metre under water" if "waterproof", but if it doesn't say that, then it's more likely just shower/splashproof. Only real thing to go on is the items description and rating... if you use it outside of those uses then kiss your warranty goodbye.

[MeDownYou]

14 hours ago, BiscuitMassacre said:

This is the a stupid question, but I am getting a Pebble Steel on Christmas and it is supposed to be WaterProof. But how would you test it? Cause if it ends up being defective in the water proofing department, you lose a watch...

 

 

Any suggestions?

erm...or just read the specs and ask around, I'm wearing this watch right now *hint hint*...

 

I don't shower with mine as there are still contacts ect, and it's kinda weird to shower with a watch on imo...but I've had it fall into pools of water below where i normally set it, get completely soaked in rain, get pushed into a lake with it ect and nothing affected it. Now i HAVE heard of people swimming with these watches and them getting ruined that way. The reason isn't actually because of the water however, it's because the watch is getting forcibly slammed against the water and the seal breaks (think about it man arm stroke creates a lot of pressure when going HAM in the pool). 

 

so specification wise you can literally bath with your watch on and keep it submerged for up to a half hour, anything beyond that is risky, think about it as a defense mechanism against heavy rain, accidentally falling in the pool ect. rather than being "waterproof" which they only say water resistant anyway.

[BiscuitMassacre]

10 hours ago, MeDownYou said:

erm...or just read the specs and ask around, I'm wearing this watch right now *hint hint*...

 

I don't shower with mine as there are still contacts ect, and it's kinda weird to shower with a watch on imo...but I've had it fall into pools of water below where i normally set it, get completely soaked in rain, get pushed into a lake with it ect and nothing affected it. Now i HAVE heard of people swimming with these watches and them getting ruined that way. The reason isn't actually because of the water however, it's because the watch is getting forcibly slammed against the water and the seal breaks (think about it man arm stroke creates a lot of pressure when going HAM in the pool). 

 

so specification wise you can literally bath with your watch on and keep it submerged for up to a half hour, anything beyond that is risky, think about it as a defense mechanism against heavy rain, accidentally falling in the pool ect. rather than being "waterproof" which they only say water resistant anyway.

I don't plan on showering with it either.

 

I just want to be able to go swimming or get it really really wet without worrying. So basically you wouldn't advise "cannon balling" into the water but rather just getting in it? Thanks for the detailed answer btw.

[ShaithEatery]

Are you talking about the original Pebble Steel?  If so, just to give some feedback I might recommend looking at a different smartwatch because I have had nothing but issues with my Pebble Steel after the 3.0 update came out; my top button completely stopped working, and I'd say a good half of the time the screen would be in a frozen state with notifications causing the entire face of the watch to just show static until I scrolled down.  I was holding out hope that they would come back and update the firmware to improve performance and reliability, but since Fitbit just bought out Pebble and they have stopped all production on Pebble devices, I'd say there's about 0% chance of a firmware update happening now.  Just wanted to give you some words of caution for just now getting into one of these (I replaced mine with the Samsung Gear S3 Frontier smartwatch, and I'm loving it so far).

 

But to answer the actual question, I've gotten mine pretty wet and it didn't seem to be affected by it.  I never went swimming with it on and never showered with it on, but sometimes it would get pretty wet when washing my hands and it didn't seem any worse off (the button issue I described happened as soon as I upgraded the firmware to the new version, so I doubt water had anything to do with that issue).

[MeDownYou]

4 hours ago, BiscuitMassacre said:

I don't plan on showering with it either.

 

I just want to be able to go swimming or get it really really wet without worrying. So basically you wouldn't advise "cannon balling" into the water but rather just getting in it? Thanks for the detailed answer btw.

I'd generally just avoid things like cannonballing or diving, I don't bother taking mine off when i do a few quick dishes in the sink for example. I just generally wouldn't advise swimming with it, but I also wouldn't worry at all if I fell in the pool with it.

 

Oh, and as the person above me mentions ALL the original pebble devices have a slight problem in firmware. This include the original pebble, pebble steel, and even the pebble time. The problem is with the caps in the watch and is noticeable when you haven't charged your watch in a few days (so like if your watch lasts 6-7 days normally the last 2 days). Mine gets lines across the screen and i have to hit a button to refresh the display, but usually i keep it well charged to help fight this.