Nubia's insane smartwatch wraps a 4-inch display around your wrist

Despite the seemingly endless number of smartwatches available, there are only a few that are worth buying. The Apple Watch is the top choice. Get a Wear OS smartwatch if you're on Android. Then, there's the Nubia Watch that flies in the face of smartwatches with its massive 4-inch display that wraps around your wrist.

There's no overlooking how absolutely huge and insane the Nubia Watch is. It's actually the second-gen version of the Nubia Alpha, which debuted at Mobile World Congress (RIP) last year, and was rightfully shredded for its clunkiness. But here we are in 2020 and Nubia's still trying to make big bendy touchscreen smartwatches a thing. Kudos to them for not giving up.

This time around, Nubia's ditched the Alpha's goofy upward-facing camera and streamlined the body to be slimmer and sleeker. There are also interchangeable bands, but it doesn't look like that's something easy to swap out.

Works without a phone — Like cellular-equipped smartwatches, the Nubia Watch is meant to work as a standalone device with a built-in eSIM, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and NFC for mobile payments.

Under the hood — It's not an Apple Watch so the hardware isn't exactly cutting-edge. Here are some highlights:

• 4.01-inch AMOLED display (960 x 162 resolution)
• Qualcomm Snapdragon Wear 2100 processor
• 8GB of storage
• 1GB of RAM
• 420 mAh battery (up to 36 hours)
• Built-in heart-rate sensor for tracking sleep and workouts

As for the software... we certainly hope it's better than the Alpha, which was pretty awful.

China-only (for now) — If you're looking at this smartwatch and nodding your head because finally there's something different, we've got some bad news: it's only been announced for China so far. Pre-orders are live in China and sales begin on August 5 starting at CNY ¥1,799 (about $256). Nobody's going to stop you from importing one if you're hell-bent on getting the Nubia Watch for your wrist, though.