Apple Watch Ultra 3 & new Apple Watch SE expected to ship in 2025
Following the Glowtime special event that didn't deliver an Apple Watch Ultra 3 update, analyst Ming-Chi Kuo forecasts the obvious, saying that it, and a new Apple Watch SE will arrive sometime in 2025.
Apple Watch Ultra
Apple's special event on Monday did include Apple Watch changes, but not on a massive scale. The expected upgrade to the Apple Watch Series 10 was accompanied by a new color of Apple Watch Ultra 2.
The relatively empty Apple Watch slate of updates is unsurprising, at least to TF Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo. Posting to X on Tuesday, Kuo proclaims to have gotten his prediction from one year ago correct, that there wasn't going to be a big Apple Watch Ultra update in 2024.
In October, Kuo wrote that there wasn't any development work done on the next Apple Watch Ultra model at the time.
Kuo said it was an "unusual" situation given Apple's usually lengthy product development schedules. At the time, he offered that the possibility of a 2024 release was unlikely.
While there's little chance of an Apple Watch Ultra 3 in 2024, Kuo continues his tweet by stating the obvious. The analyst proposes that it will be shipping in 2025 instead, alongside the similarly absent Apple Watch SE upgrade.
Consumers therefore have a long wait ahead of them before being able to use a new Apple Watch Ultra model, but it may miss out on a key feature.
Early rumors expected a microLED display in the Apple Watch Ultra in 2025, though it seems that the project may be dead. If true, it could continue to use an OLED display.
Rumor Score: Likely
Read on AppleInsider
Comments
The "advantage" of the S10 chip is simply that's it's thinner to fit in the new, thinner Watch 10 case. It offers no performance improvements, advancements or capabilities over the S9 that's in the Ultra 2. As for the next gen display in the Watch 10, it does offer a wider angle of view, but the current display in Ultra 2 is still 50% brighter--and for a watch targeted to the outdoor "adventure" market, brightness trumps angle of view.
The whole Apple Watch family is in a weird place right now. Everyone knows that the killer new functions that would spark a massive upgrade cycle and attract a whole wave of new buyers would be accurate blood pressure and blood glucose monitoring, but figuring out how to do that via a watch has been slow going, even with Apple's near unlimited R&D budget. In the meantime, I'm sure Apple could figure out a new, faster chip--but faster to do what, exactly? I never have the feeling that my Ultra 1 is too slow at anything. A faster chip would make sense if Apple Intelligence features appropriate for the Watch were in a future version of Watch OS, but we're probably a ways away from that happening. So, for now, Apple focuses on what it can advance, which is design, giving us the thinner Watch 10 with bigger displays and the black Titanium Ultra. The whole idea of compelling upgrades for a wristwatch every 1, 2 or even 3 years is a radically new one in the whole 200+ year history of wristwatches, a history where quality watches were and still are often passed down for generations. I still have my grandfather's Hamilton Railway Special pocket watch that he used as a train worker in the 1930s. Swatch approached the problem of a watch business built on customers continually buying and upgrading by churning out an endless number of models with different appearances--the watch as fashion accessory. But Apple faces a different issue, needing to mainly motivate the buying cycle through meaningful tech advancements and we're now at a point where that has become very hard to do.