Casio decides it's about time the simple digital watch got a little smarter
- ID
- 16771
- Status
- summarized
- Published
- 22 Aug 2026, 4:43 PM
- Fetched
- 22 Aug 2026, 4:48 PM
- Provider
- The Register
- Category
- technology
- Original URL
- https://www.theregister.com/personal-tech/2026/08/22/casio-decides-its-about-time-the-simple-digital-watch-got-a-little-smarter/5291223
- Source URL
- https://www.theregister.com/headlines.atom
Summary
- Score
- 2.0
- Created
- 22 Aug 2026, 4:48 PM
- Tags
- Audience
- developers
What happened
Casio's new F-B100W is a £55 digital watch that adds Bluetooth pairing and step tracking via Casio's smartphone app while retaining a ~2-year replaceable CR2016 battery life. It has no touchscreen, app store, or notifications—just a conventional digital watch with minimal connectivity. It improves on the existing ABL-100 by being smaller, cheaper, and lighter for similar functionality.
Why it matters
Minimal practical impact for this audience. The only relevant takeaway is the design pattern of adding Bluetooth Low Energy to a low-power device without a full OS, which could inform IoT or embedded hardware projects—but the article provides no technical detail on the implementation.
Discussion angle
Skip this for the weekly segment unless someone wants a 2-minute tangent on minimal BLE integration in low-power consumer devices.