At IFA 2018 in Berlin, Casio today announced the Pro Trek WSD-F30, the newest entrant in its Pro Trek Smart series. It follows on the heels of the Smart Outdoor Watch WSD-F10, which launched in 2016, and the WSD-F20, which debuted last year. And while it has a lot in common with its predecessors aesthetically, it’s sporting notable improvements under the hood.
It’s rugged, Casio says — that is to say, MIL-STD-810-certified and water-resistant up to 50 meters. Compared with the F20, it’s 3.9mm narrower and 0.4mm thinner (the case measures 60.5 × 53.8 × 14.9 mm), and there’s a new 1.2-inch, 390 x 390 pixel color OLED display with a secondary monochrome display mode that shows atmospheric, altitude, and compass bearing. Last, but not least, an improved watch band is more flexible than the band on the outgoing model.
Looking at other internals, you’ll find Bluetooth 4.1 Low Energy and Wi-Fi connectivity onboard, plus wireless charging and a bevy of sensors, including GPS, a barometer, an accelerometer, a gyrometer, a compass, and a sensor.
As for the battery, the company claims it can last up to a month on a charge with nothing but the monochrome screen enabled (Casio calls this Multi Timepiece Mode.) The baseline numbers aren’t bad, though — Casio estimates color screen life at “one and a half days.”
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On the software side, the WSD-F30 runs the latest version of Google’s Wear OS operating system and boasts an offline mapping feature that lets you download a geographic region and track your location in real time. Extend mode, a feature exclusive to the F30, shows a monochrome display and surfaces the color map when you tap on one of the physical buttons.
The F30 also ships with exclusive new apps. Casio signed on nine major developers across categories like activity tracking, fishing, golfing, swimming, skiing and snowboarding, fitness, and horse riding.
One on-tap is ViewRanger, a trail map-sharing app with millions of users. There‘s also Hole19, a golf app that estimates the distance to each hole, and Glassy, a social app for tracking performance in water sports. Other examples include MySwimPro, Fishbrain, Equilab, Exercise Time, and Zombies, Run!
The WSD-F30 will come in orange, blue, and black when it ships starting January 2019. Casio has yet to announce pricing.
The WSD-F30 is launching as the global wearables market gains considerable momentum. In March, IDC reported that worldwide shipments of smartwatches and activity trackers grew 7.7 percent in Q4 2017 and 10 percent in 2017. Shipments hit 115.4 million units overall.
Apple was the clear winner last year — it claimed the No. 1 spot for both the fourth quarter and the year. Time will tell if Casio can challenge the Cupertino company’s dominance — or at least carve out a niche somewhere beneath it on the totem pole.
