TL;DR
- Motorola brand licensees have announced the Moto Watch 100 and Moto Buds 600 ANC.
- The watch ditches Wear OS and an OLED screen for a much cheaper price tag.
- The earbuds bring Fast Pair, Snapdragon Sound, and more for $149.
Motorola has allowed other brands to license its name for tech products for a while now, with smartwatches and earphones leading the charge in this regard.
Now, we’ve got two new Moto-branded products entering the fray as CES 2023 looms, namely the Moto Watch 100 and Moto Buds 600 ANC.
Moto Watch 100: A cheap watch with fall detection
Hadlee Simons / Android Authority
The Moto Watch 100 is eBuyNow’s latest Moto-branded smartwatch, coming a few years after the rebooted Moto 360. This time, the brand licensee is switching from a premium approach to a more affordable proposition.
Expect to pay $99.99 for the new Moto Watch, but you’re also getting a number of cutbacks as a result. For starters, the wearable runs a basic “Moto Watch OS” in lieu of Wear OS. In saying so, this rudimentary software experience also allows for significant battery life improvements, with the company claiming up to two weeks of juice.
Related: The best cheap smartwatches worth buying
Other notable cutbacks compared to the original Wear OS watch include a circular 1.3-inch LCD screen in lieu of an OLED display, seemingly no user-accessible storage, and no Wi-Fi connectivity.
Otherwise, you can expect heart-rate monitoring, SpO2 tracking, 28 sports modes, 5ATM water resistance, Google Fit and Strava integration, GPS, and your choice of six watchfaces. Furthermore, eBuyNow claims this is the cheapest watch in the market with fall detection functionality.
The Moto Watch 100 is available now in Glacier Silver and Phantom Black color options.
Moto Buds 600 ANC: A more polished offering
SGW Global has launched a variety of Moto-branded audio products over the years, and the Moto Buds 600 ANC is its latest offering. This follows the Moto Buds-S ANC, which our SoundGuys colleagues called a “pretty drab experience in practice.”
The new Moto Buds offer the same $149 price tag but brings a few notable additions to the table. Starting with audio-related additions, the company is touting Snapdragon Sound support for improved music and call quality, support for aptX Adaptive tech, and clear voice capture tech to reduce background noise.
These new true wireless earbuds also bring Bluetooth multi-point so you can connect to two devices at once as well as Fast Pair tech for seamless pairing. You should also expect battery life gains with the charging case, with a claimed 26 hours of total juice versus the previous model’s 18 hours.
You’re still getting some familiar features on the Moto Buds 600 ANC otherwise, such as wireless charging support for the case, hybrid noise cancellation, touch controls, Google Assistant support, an IPX5 rating, and mono mode.
Expect the Moto Buds 600 ANC to go on sale in January, although it can be acquired as part of a Motorola Edge 30 Fusion bundle right now.
