Zac Hall, 9to5Mac, pulled together a bunch of unboxing videos, and some insight into the Apple Watch packaging.
Two things that stuck out:
First, Apple Watch Series 3 without LTE will no longer include the 5W USB charging brick, although the charging cable is still included. You can buy these separately of course, but a lot of customers probably also have spare bricks from iPhones and other devices.
This change strikes me as similar to not including a headphone to Lightning adapter in the iPhone box. A practical decision, no doubt fueled by market research. Not an issue for most folks, I suspect.
The second thing that stuck out to me was the pure beauty of the Apple Watch Series 4 packaging, enthusiastically shown off by iJustine in the video embedded below.
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This isn’t new. It’s crappy, but it isn’t new. People reporting it as new have always been using the nicer/ more expensive watches that had the chargers. Base models have been without. You just need to look at the product boxes – no space to put in even a 5w charger.
Let me prefix this by saying I don’t need any more chargers in my house. As far as I’m concerned, not including more junk in the box is a feature.
That said? Both my original Apple Watch and my wife’s original Apple Watch Sport (a base model) came with chargers.
“To use this you have to have an iPhone.
That means you have a charger. Realistically, you have a dozen USB charging ports of some sort or other and really don’t want another stupid brick.”
Yep. Apple Watch Series 1 started this by not shipping with a charger. I bought one and could not have cared less about that. Of more concern is that Apple offers only one multi-port charger, and it’s kind of ugly. They’re really not serving customers who have multiple devices. I can’t use a single port charger for an iPhone, Apple Watch, iPad, and AirPods. Apple’s meager selection of multi-port chargers is absurd.
iJustine still scares me a little.
A little? Her videos going back to Apple Watch 0 were all frightening. At least she’s a fan.
I assume in the box she opened at the start of the clip, where I must admit the packaging is quite impressive, there was a band hidden under there somewhere to attach to the watch unit, she just chose to open a different strap. I think it would be great for Apple to sell watch-only, but don’t believe they currently do.