Smartwatches are available since a couple of years and they are becoming more and more important in the wearable industry. In 2015, more than 24 million smartwatches were sold worldwide and this number will likely increase in the next upcoming years. The first editions of the different smartwatches weren’t that mature and offered not that many apps and functionality. However, this might change in the near future and smartwatches can become the next big thing and will extend smartphones and tablets with useful functions. It may happen that you or your company decides to write an extension for your existing Android, iOS app also for the different smartwatch operating systems.
This extension to the mobile apps add more complexity to your environment from a development and testing perspective. In order to handle the new complexity and the challenges this series will help you to understand the different smartwatch platforms and provides you with useful testing ideas to handle this situation.
In the upcoming series I will focus on the following smartwatch platforms:
In the next upcoming weeks I will publish for each smartwatch platform a post that is covering the different aspects of each system that are important to know when developing and testing an app for it.
Smartwatch App Testing
All posts will have the same structure that should help you to compare the different systems and to get a better overview of possible testing challenges. For each smartwatch operating system you will get an overview of the different functionalities and features that are important to know when developing and testing apps for this platform.
Every post will cover the following areas:
- Design guidelines
- Interaction methods/ gestures
- Connectivity
- Manufacturer/ hardware
- Software features
The last post of this series will contain 4 key areas of smartwatch app testing and will explain why they are so important. In addition, to the 4 key areas, the last post will provide you with useful testing ideas for areas such as:
- Sensors
- Environment
- Skin conditions
- Performance
- Input methods
- and more
More than 40 test ideas will be provided in this post, that you can use to test your smartwatch app. If you are already too curious about smartwatches and how to work with them, I recommend reading the article from Jonathan Kohl about Designing For Smartwatches And Wearables To Enhance Real-Life Experience and the article from Eran Kinsbruner about 2016 Will Be the Year for Wearables So Test Wisely.
One more thing
If you are already too curious about this series and you want to read everything already today, you can get my brand new book about Smartwatch App Testing on leanpub. The book contains the whole series and an exclusive chapter with a smartwatch app testing cheat sheet just for the people who will purchase the book.
#HappyTesting
Title image source: http://www.gizmag.com/best-smartwatch-comparison-2015/40432/