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Android Wear gets voice calling and message dictation in major update

Android Wear gets voice calling and message dictation in major update

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Android Wear is getting updated in a big way this month. Google is beginning to roll out an update with some major new features for Android Wear, including the ability to make and listen to calls directly on the watch. You'll need a watch with a speaker to do that, of course, and only two watches currently have one: the Huawei Watch and the 49mm model of the Asus ZenWatch 2. The update also adds in expanded support for controlling Wear watches with gestures — though you may need someone to decode them for you — and the ability to dictate messages to be sent from apps like Hangouts and WhatsApp.

Google says the update will be rolling out to existing Android Wear watches over "the next few weeks." It's an important update for the platform that adds in some features — like message dictation — that expand how useful the watch can be, while also putting forward new ideas about how smartwatches can be used with additional gestures. Google hasn't made many dramatic changes to Wear since its watches first launched about a year and a half ago, but it has managed to get a range of nicely designed watches out on the market from a variety of manufacturers, letting it offer far more style options than Apple, Samsung, or Pebble can.