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Your phone has been hogging the spotlight for years. Now your jacket wants a speaking role, preferably mic\u2019d up and artificial intelligence-assisted.<\/span><\/p>\n Wearables have become a serious product category because they live where behavior happens: on your body. That makes them ideal for passive health signals, payments, authentication, and increasingly ambient AI that can capture context in real time. The market is already massive. According to IDC, 136.5 million <\/span>wearable<\/span><\/a> devices shipped in the second quarter of 2025, up 9.6% year over year.<\/span><\/p>\n Now, it looks like <\/span>Apple<\/span><\/a> is getting more into the game.<\/span><\/p>\n The tech giant is developing an AI-powered <\/span>wearable pin<\/span><\/a> (cameras, microphones, a speaker <\/span>and<\/span> wireless charging), potentially arriving as early as 2027, The Information <\/span>reported<\/span><\/a>. Apple is simultaneously pushing <\/span>Siri<\/span><\/a> toward a more chatbot-like future. It\u2019s not a shipping product yet, but it\u2019s a signal that the next interface war may be fought on lapels, not home screens.<\/span><\/p>\n The news made us here at the Weekender question: What else is out there, and do people really want to wear something that has no concept of personal space?<\/span><\/p>\n Believe it or not, the biggest wearable is the one you forget is wearable: earbuds.<\/span><\/p>\n Advertisement: Scroll to Continue<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Basic earwear accounted for 84.9 million units, or over 60% of Q2 2025 wearable shipments, according to <\/span>IDC<\/span><\/a>, because audio is the lowest-friction way to make tech feel like air. Smartwatches were the other pillar, accounting for 38.3 million units in Q2 2025, with Apple, <\/span>Huawei<\/span><\/a>, <\/span>Samsung<\/span><\/a> and<\/span> Xiaomi<\/span><\/a> among the top vendors.<\/span><\/p>\n The growth story is in the weirder edges. According to separate IDC research, worldwide shipments of augmented reality and virtual reality headsets combined with <\/span>smart glasses<\/span><\/a> without displays were expected to grow 39.2% in 2025, with volumes reaching 14.3 million units.<\/span><\/p>\n Smart rings are also climbing, as one industry <\/span>report<\/span><\/a> valued the global smart ring market at about $706.5 million in 2024 and projected rapid growth through 2032.<\/span><\/p>\n That means wearables are moving from counting you (steps, heart rate) to chronicling you (voice, habits, context). That\u2019s where the hidden-info and too-much-info tension shows up.<\/span><\/p>\n Here\u2019s a sampling of the wearables that are out there, in no particular order:<\/span><\/p>\n There are retro wearables, they\u2019re thriving because they don\u2019t try to become your life coach. <\/span>Pebble<\/span><\/a> is in revival mode with pared-down ePaper <\/span>watches<\/span><\/a> like the Pebble Round 2, leaning into battery life and simplicity over omniscience.<\/span><\/p>\n Meanwhile, <\/span>Casio<\/span><\/a> turned its <\/span>calculator watch<\/span><\/a> into a \u201cBack to the Future\u201d anniversary collectible that still does time, date, alarms <\/span>and<\/span> calculations without asking for your microphone permissions.<\/span><\/p>\n Here\u2019s the new wearable bargain: The smaller the screen, the bigger the data. Some of these gadgets reveal hidden information (a UI on your palm; a whisper captured in a ring). Others reveal too much information, mostly about our willingness to outsource memory, attention <\/span>and<\/span> basic social grace to whatever is closest to our skin.<\/span><\/p>\n If Apple\u2019s pin ever arrives, the winning feature won\u2019t be the cameras or the chatbot. It\u2019ll be <\/span>restraint<\/span>\u2014and an off switch you can find without asking your necklace.<\/span><\/p>\nWhat\u2019s Out There<\/span><\/strong><\/h2>\n
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Retro Wearables<\/span><\/strong><\/h2>\n