If you’ve ever woken up to a smartwatch that slid slightly off its puck and didn’t charge, you’ll know why charging design matters more than a spec sheet might suggest.
Well, the latest Pixel Watch 4 leak suggests that Google is well aware of this fact, with a change to the upcoming smartwatches’ charging system that should make nightly charging less fiddly – and possibly opening the door to much better bedside accessories too.
New side-mounted charging system and dock
A new leak shared on Reddit suggests Google is moving to side-mounted POGO pins with a Quick Charge dock where the upcoming Pixel Watch 4 is concerned – a change from the traditional wireless charging puck we’ve seen from previous entries, and most other smartwatches on the market.
The slides suggest that the change should allow for a 25% boost to charging, as well as provide a new bedside clock mode when the wearable is docked. If accurate, this should improve day-to-day charging reliability and make stand-style docks feel way more helpful than they do at the moment.
Placing the contacts on the watch casing should reduce the hit-and-miss alignment you get with some magnetic charging pucks, while also giving accessory makers the freedom to build sturdier docks.
The leaked slides also mention moisture detection in the charger, which is a sensible addition – especially if you want to charge your watch after a workout or a stint in the rain. That side-mounted design means that water could pool in the charger, making it an excellent safety-focused feature.
But that’s not all
As well as a new charging system, the leak also points to an upgraded Gen 3 sensor hub for boosted health and fitness tracking, which should help the Watch be more consistent when it comes to elements like heart rate, sleep and workout metrics.
Display clarity and responsiveness are also said to have been improved, and battery life is listed at up to 30 hours for the 41mm model, and 40 hours for the larger 45mm model. On paper, that’d put the larger model in better shape for two-day use with lighter workloads – but we’ll need to test that in real-world conditions to see how it holds up.
On-device smarts look set to expand with built-in Gemini support – but given that the upgraded assistant has already rolled out to other Wear OS-enabled watches, that’s not exactly a huge surprise.
An announcement is widely expected alongside the Pixel 10 lineup on 20 August. As ever, treat these details with caution until confirmed, but the focus on charging reliability and steadier health tracking targets the areas we felt its predecessors needed improvement, and points towards a very exciting update indeed.
