I bought my first Apple Watch for two reasons:

1. Tracking health metrics like sleep, exercise and steps
2. Acting as a buffer between myself and my iPhone

I’ve come to see The smartphone as a digital pet. It demands your attention and is great at keeping it once you’re in its sights. Even something as innocuous as checking a reminder or a message can turn into a black hole of wasted time.

In contrast, the smartwatch is blissfully passive. Even with all notifications turned on, there’s not a whole lot that you can do on it that I’d consider a time waster. There’s no browser, no social media, no games. It feels more like a tool than a general-purpose computer.

My current watch has no eSIM, so it requires the iPhone for connectivity. I’m wondering what it’d be like to use only the Apple Watch. Looking at What do I absolutely need my phone for?, it’d pretty much cover my needs for GPS, communication and music. Other tasks I could offload to my laptop or to the household tablet that tends not to get that much use.