What if the Apple Watch got rid of its physical digital crown? The patent suggests replacing it with an optical sensor.
Among the characteristic features of the Apple Watch, you can safely call the digital crown. Although referred to as the digital crown, it is actually a physical crown that serves as a button or more accurately a dial to navigate the interface, watch lists, etc. This also allows users to navigate menus and make certain adjustments. This is another way to interact with the watch, rather than using the touch screen.
What if the Apple Watch got rid of its physical digital crown?
That being said, the Cupertino company might consider ending it. According to a patent discovered by Patently Apple, the apple brand has filed a patent for an Apple Watch without a digital crown. The smartwatch described in the patent document now has an optical sensor.
This sensor will offer the same functionality as the Digital Crown, except that it will analyze the user’s gestures to determine what the user wants to do. According to the description that came with the file, removing the physical crown would allow the Cupertino company to save space inside the watch, a volume that would be used for other components, while at the same time making everything more stable as it would remove the mobile physical component – still relatively fragile..
The patent suggests replacing it with an optical sensor
It has also been suggested that by implanting such an optical sensor, the new digital crown could also be used to measure vital constants such as heart rate, respiration rate, blood pressure, etc. In addition to the ECG that is currently removed using the Digital Crown, viz.
That being said, since this is just a patent, there’s no way to know if Apple really intends to make such a change or not, but with the benefits listed above, we wouldn’t be surprised if there’s an Apple Watch like this, whether or not there’s such an Apple Watch that’s the Series 8 or otherwise.