I recently got my son an Apple Watch. It seems pretty clear that the band is a bit too clever for its own good. Any stress on the band is carried by the two narrow bits of material on the side of the hole for the end of the strap. Those are going to tear and fail sooner or later.
So my question: Any idea how long a watch band is going to last under normal use? Or does it give any signs of imminent failure? I’d like to have a spare on hand, but I’d rather not have to remember where I put the spare for too long.
I recently had to replace my band, it was a nice leather wrapped magnetic band, bought it when I bought the watch back when it came out in 2019, so a little less than 3 years… It began to delaminate, the little metal bits would fall out, I super glued it, but I knew it was doomed. So I began looking, turned out it was no longer being made, discontinued! But, cruising Amazon, I found another, similar, but it doesn’t go through a loop and fold back, only magnetics to keep it on, took a little getting used to, but it’s fine. I have a variety of others I originally bought, tried, but the leather has me hooked… Amazon has so many, it makes the choosing difficult. So any sign of deterioration, start looking…
My son got me a new Apple watch band for Christmas a few years ago as the original one was scratching the top of my wooden desk and was getting shabby looking. He gave me one of these which has worn well. I would buy these again.
I’m not sure why this URL looks like it does, but it is a link to an Amazon product page created by hitting the “share” link on Amazon.
My wife and I got our first Apple watches in December 2018 and replaced those in the fall of 2021. My wife chose to replace Apple bands with various 3rd party bands. My observation is the 3rd party products are inferior - her choices soil easier and show general wear and tear sooner. I have found the Sport Loop bands to be very good. They can be adjusted to any length as the closure is velcro - not holes in the band. I have been surprised at how well the velcro closing system works – typical velcro seems to collect “fuzz” in the hook side. So far I have not experienced any of that with the Apple product.
I used the silicone watch band that my watch came with for over a year then replaced it with a leather one. The silicone one is in immaculate condition and I keep it for a backup when the leather one fails…doc
Thanks for the info. I suppose I should have mentioned the type of material the band is made out of. It does appear to be silicone. Good to know they last longer than I would have expected.