Samsung's watch faces are bad. Swatch's $170m lawsuit might finally encourage a fix

Industry infighting, lawsuits, and arguments over patents are rarely good news. In the tech industry they can stifle development, curtail competition, see features removed from devices, or in the worst cases, products removed from sale.

However, the ongoing Swatch vs. Samsung lawsuit could turn out to be a good thing for us as smartwatch buyers. Here’s what’s going on, why it matters, and why in an ideal world, it may end up as a positive.

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By  Andy Boxall

Swatch has sued Samsung?

What’s going on with the two companies?

Here’s what’s going on with Swatch and Samsung. Swatch seeks $170 million in damages from Samsung, according to court documents filed in the UK and seen by the Financial Times.

It’s not over the Galaxy Watch 8 or a specific device, but about watch face apps available in Samsung’s Galaxy Store, which included replicas of the Swatch Group’s dial designs.

Samsung has already been found guilty of infringing on Swatch’s trademarks, as the lawsuit has been going on for seven years now.

Samsung was found liable in 2022, after the lawsuit was brought about in 2019, but delays have meant the courts are only now assessing the damages.

There were 26 apps in the lawsuit, all created by third-party developers and long since removed, that were apparently downloaded at least 160,000 times when they were available.

Swatch noted the dials were direct copies of its own, right down to subdial positioning and use of logos. The Swatch Group owns not only the Swatch name, but also brands including Omega, Tissot, Longines, and Hamilton.

It’s all about the money

Or is it?

There’s a lot to unpack (if you’ll forgive the Samsung-related pun) here. Samsung has called the $170 million figure “absurd” and has said the total revenue from the watch face apps in question was around $1,000, and Samsung’s own commission was $300.

It has also removed all the apps. However, if the courts do hit Samsung with damages even close to the figure demanded by Swatch, it may have a wider impact on the industry.

Not only will it open the door to other lawsuits between the two companies elsewhere in the world, but it may also force other app store operators to take intellectual property and digital copyright around third-party watch face apps even more seriously.

However, none of this is why I hope this lawsuit will be a wake-up call for Samsung.

Samsung’s official watch faces are bad

It needs to do better

The standard collection of watch faces Samsung provides with its Galaxy Watch smartwatches are almost all awful. Out of the dozens it pre-installs, there are perhaps two which are well designed, attractive, and informative.

Whether it’s numbers shaped like bubbles, boring data bank displays, or animated characters filling the screen, the choice for normal human beings to happily and confidently use is woeful.

This is the reason people turn to third-party watch face apps in the first place. Even then, you’re faced with yet another subscription to consider, expensive single options that rarely work as stated, and faces that look great in the renders, but terrible on your actual watch.

It has been a Samsung (and Wear OS in general) problem for years, and this lawsuit should be the wake-up call it needs to start providing more choice and more mature designs as standard.

Apple shows Samsung how it’s done

How often do you change watch faces?

Apple’s choice of watch faces for the Apple Watch is superb. They cover all different genres, styles, and designs. The ones made for fun actually are fun, the ones influenced by watch trends look unique and stylish, and the ones for data fiends have all the numbers they’d want.

I’ve worn every Apple Watch model since the very first, and never once wished Apple would open up watch face design to developers. It’s just not really needed.

Samsung can’t coast along expecting developers to pick up the slack where it has failed. I suspect, like me, there will be smartwatch owners who choose one watch face and stick to it for ages.

On a Galaxy Watch, it’s shockingly hard to do, but on an Apple Watch? It’s almost hard to pick one, single favorite out of several winners.

If Samsung does the right thing and provides true, desirable watch faces on the Galaxy Watch without the need to visit the Galaxy Store or Google Play, it will have fixed an issue that has plagued its smartwatches since the start.

Now is the time Samsung

Even without a $170 million hint

Samsung is widely expected to launch the Galaxy Watch 9 series in July. It did a great job reinventing the design of its smartwatch with the Galaxy Watch 8, by using a 70s-inspired design, which continues to be one of the watch world’s biggest trends.

It doesn’t have to change the hardware to stay current. But now is the time to throw out the majority of the tired old Samsung watch faces, many of which have been around for years, and come up with a suite of beautiful new ones.

The Swatch vs. Samsung trial ended on June 26 in the UK, and the judge is expected to make a ruling on the damages in the near future.

Rumors point to Samsung holding an Unpacked event around July 22, where the Galaxy Watch 9 and smartphones including the Galaxy Z Fold8 Ultra are expected to be announced.