Casio Android Wear smartwatch goes on sale March 25th for $500

Casio has announced that its its rugged Android Wear smartwatch, the Smart Outdoor Watch WSD-F10, will go on sale on the company’s website, the Google Store, and Amazon, from March 25th for $500. The device was first unveiled at CES earlier this year, and unlike many of the new smartwatches we saw then, the Smart Outdoor Watch was commendable for its clear sense of purpose. It’s massive, yes, with its 1.3-inch, 320 x 320 watch face surrounded by a chunky plastic frame, but it’s built to actually be useful when you’re romping about in the great outdoors.

The watch has a number of specialized watch faces (Casio calls them “tools”) which give users easy access to information like altitude, tides, sunrise and sunset times, air pressure, and compass directions. There are physical buttons so the watch can be used while wearing gloves, and the device comes preloaded with a number of on-theme apps, including RunKeeper, ViewRanger, and MyRadar. You just need to remember to bring a battery pack if you’re going on a multi-day trip.