Skagen Falster review – in pictures

What is it?

Smartphones certainly live up to their ‘smart’ billing these days, but smartwatches? Most of them are still at school swotting for their GCSEs. The Skagen Falster Connected is a Wear OS watch that lacks just about all the advanced features you’ll find elsewhere. On the other hand, it is just about the prettiest, most comfortable smartwatch you can buy. Will that be enough to help prospective wearers overlook its poor battery life too?

Design: fetching Falster

The priority of the Skagen Falster is clear: it wants to look good. And it really does. There’s a chunky black metallic bezel, and similarly chunky bars that sprout off the face to hold the real leather strap (or you can get it with a steel mesh band if you prefer). The sticky-out crown and ever-so-slightly oversized elements give the Skagen Falster what’s missing from most smartwatches: character.

Screen: mystery OLED

Skagen is so fashion-led it hasn’t released resolution details for the Falster’s 1.19in round screen. The usual procedure for taking a screenshot in the Wear app doesn’t work, but relying on eyes alone it’s obvious it’s not the most pixel-rich OLED around. Still, it’s a perfectly good display as long as you don’t want to do too much on it, with perfect blacks and decent visibility when outdoors.

Features: the cupboards are empty

With no sat-nav, no NFC, no heart-rate monitor, and no local music playback, there are none of the extra features you get with Skagen’s big-name rivals. You can use it as a basic fitness tracker but its accelerometer-based tracking isn’t completely accurate, so you’ll need your phone nearby to piggyback on its GPS signal. It’s not even fully waterproof. You get the feeling that the Falster is a smartwatch for people who don’t want their watch to be too smart.

Software and battery life: back to basics

So what does the Falster have? Well, there’s Wi-Fi, which every Wear OS watch has these days, a mic for talking to Google Assistant, and a selection of ultra-minimalist watch faces, some of which are based around world clock times, fitness stats and the weather. This hands-off approach could work if the Skagen lasted longer than its rivals but you still have to charge it every night. And while the wireless magnetised charging pad is smart (if not at all matching in colour or style), the battery doesn’t charge quickly either.

Skagen Falster: verdict

It’s a good job Falster’s Skagen looks good, because with fewer in-depth features than the Beano and disappointing battery life, it’s more like a first-wave Wear watch than one released in 2018. If you want more than basic notifications and rudimentary fitness tracking there are better options out there. But if it’s all about looks, there’s no doubt it’s got a prettier face than something like Huawei’s Watch 2. And when it’s something you wear on your wrist all day long, that really matters. Stuff says: ★★★