John Gruber:

A few people have wondered why Apple doesn’t just map fluoroelastomer Sport Band sizes to Solo Loop sizes. I can see why Apple doesn’t do that — they can’t assume everyone already has access to an Apple Watch with a Sport Band, and even for people who do have access to one, Apple can’t assume it’s the right size watch (38/40mm vs. 42/44mm). And to further complicate matters, each Sport Band comes with two sizes for the side with the holes: “S/M” and “M/L”. So that’s four separate mappings from Sport Band holes to the new Solo Loop sizes. That’s complicated. But it’s no longer a safe assumption that everyone has access to a printer, either, so let’s figure out the mappings here.

Great community contribution from John. And this Daring Fireball post is a bit of a collector’s item, with the ultra-rare embedded graphics, well composed and useful.

To me, this whole Solo band sizing kerfuffle is a bit of a mess. Ideally, Apple would have created a simple tool mapping your choice of bands (assuming you already own an Apple Watch) to a sizing recommendation, based on how you wear your watch now. Harder with some bands, but certainly doable with the Sport Band.

But I do get that rolling out an interface is harder than it might look.

That said, one thing I think Apple should absolutely address is the mixed messaging on Solo band returns. There’s a prominent report claiming that if your Solo band doesn’t fit, you have to return both the band and the watch. Even worse, you have to go to the back of the line to order a new one. Yechh.

Today, rumors have been flying around from folks who called Apple or visited Apple Stores asking about this policy. Some were told they could return their band, sans watch, no problem. Others were told they had to return both the watch and the band.

Unnecessary mess of mixed messages. I hope Apple sends out a clarifying, definitive policy message. And soon.