Do Bluetooth and location have to be on all the time?

[Eggmundo]

On my Pixel 2?

Just got the Q Gen 4 today as a present. I hate the additional battery drain to my phone but do I need both services always on?

Another question: how can I change the watch to display the number of steps I've done instead of heart rate?

 

[jean15paul]

It all depends on what you want out of your watch.

If you turn off Bluetooth then your watch isn't connected to your phone, which means no notifications, no data connection, etc. It will still tell time and track your steps, but I most of the functionality will be neutered.

Turning off location is probably less of an issue, but it could definitely impact specific apps.

Regarding displaying your steps. It depends on the specific watch face that you're using. If you long press on the watch face you can then press the settings (gear) icon and see what options are there for that watch face. A little plus symbol on the face (while viewing the settings) let's you add a "complication" (a additional display for something like steps or missed calls, or battery, etc). Also after long pressing, you can swipe between watch faces. You can also install new watch faces from the play store.

 

[kramer5150]

No you certainly do not need to have location and BT on. I only turn on location when I need a weather update, use google maps for driving directions or a quick traffic check before I go out. BT on the other hand I leave running so I can receive text and call notifications. I don't find it a significant battery drain to either my phone or my watch (also a gen4 explorist).

 

[Eggmundo]

Thanks both. I'm finding this thing extremely slow and unresponsive. Is this normal? Anything I can do to fix it?

 

[kramer5150]

I only use mine for the very basic essentials... alerts for txt / voice /gmail notification over BT, step counting and maybe 1-2 heart rate checks during the day. I find it smooth and fast overall. It does lag from time to time, but not to the point of being unresponsive. You might be getting the latest update. I got mine a couple weeks ago. IMHO WearOS is kind of laggy and clunky during the update process.

Its slower over BT. So when I am doing things that require fast data transmission, I merge into my wifi for that.

I use Android messages as my txt app. I find that faster and better than the Verizon bloat text-er. If I do not delete old text messages, especially the ones with pictures the watch is slow opening the app. So I dont keep old message threads.

But I have not found anything to the point of being unresponsive.

 

[jean15paul]

In general I'd say Wear OS isn't as responsive as Apple Watch or as your phone. And all Wear OS watches are using basically the same processor and RAM, so you don't have the option to buy a faster watch.

I definitely experience slowness at times. But again, it depends on how you want to use your watch. In my opinion the best use is viewing notifications, dismissing notifications, passive step/activity tracking, and "find my phone". I don't like to actually run a lot of apps on my watch, so occasional slowness doesn't affect me much.

I also love to delete junk Gmail which I can do directly from the notification.

 

[Eggmundo]

Yeah thanks guys. I restarted the watch and it's smooth again.

Something weird happened though:

I asked Google through the watch to set a timer. It asked me how long for. I said fifteen minutes. It looked to have confirmed it, but I got no notification when the fifteen minutes were up.

Where would it have been displayed or should I have heard a sound or something?

 

[kramer5150]

Not sure about that one... I dont use the ask google feature, I turn it off for all my devices.