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Wearable technology and their future

Wearable tech is best on the fastest-advancing sectors of the wider technology industry, now outpacing the development for the smart-phones. From the basic fitness trackers and highly-advanced sports and smart-watches, virtual or augmented reality headsets, wearables are everywhere.

With increasing dependency on our smart-phones in daily basis, the evolution into wearable computing was inevitability and welcomed too. Especially with the advent for the smart-watches design and availability, such tech has now become an obsession. To fuel that obsession and grow the market for more wearable computing devices like programming, application and thoughtful design needs to keep pace along with imagination.  

Smart-watches, fitness trackers and VR/AR headsets have become more and more prevalent in society over the previous years ago. It is predicted that wearables will only continue to grow in popularity, so naturally companies are finding for the new and innovative ways to apply them to our everyday lives. Below are just a few of the directions wearable production may be headed.

Authentication

Wearables also seem to be headed in the direction for authentication as a means for doing things such a getting into concerts, unlocking your home, and even buying things at the store without having to go through the checkout process. Disney currently uses for the wearable in its parks called the MagicBand that gives user’s access to rides, their hotel rooms and other features.

There are even smart tattoos in development that could be used for the purposes like these. They are essentially high-tech temporary tattoos that can carry or transfer information to devices such as smart-phones and scanners. If wearables become a common way for authenticating experiences, they could really change the way interact with the world by speeding up many processes in our lives, like visits to the hospital and security clearances.

Lower visibility

The wearables will become less and less visible even as they grow in popularity. Rather than actually looking like a fitness band and clip-on tracker, devices may end up looking more like jewelry and clothing. They also may be hidden from public view in the form of something like a patch and strap.

Many companies have already begun to do this, as evidenced in the smart-watch seen above, which has a traditional watch face instead of a screen. There are also some safety wearables that look like a normal ring and necklace but that can actually alert your friends and family to your location if you are in danger.

Medical wearables

In currently, the most popular wearables such as Fitbit and Apple Watch, are geared toward helping to improve your health and fitness. But various companies are taking the next step and are looking into wearable devices that monitor or solve medical problems. For instance, there's currently an artificial pancreas being developed for the diabetics, which can monitor blood sugar levels and automatically supply insulin.

This would allow users to track all types of medical activity that is currently unavailable to most people. Taking this a step further, the medical industry is looking into creating wearables that can be embedded underneath the skin. This could include blood analysis, the effects of drugs, and number of other vitals. It may be a while before see this type of technology hit the market, but it has the potential to change the lives of many.

Longer battery life

One of the more popular methods is called energy harvesting, which is a way of converting body heat, solar energy, and even movement into power. In recently, wearables have a fairly short battery life, especially those that require for lot of processing power and Internet connectivity. Because of this, some developers are looking into alternative battery sources.

If this were to become the norm for wearables, it would be a game changer. Users would not have to worry about the battery dying at inconvenient times and the hassle for having to regularly recharge it. By eliminating these problems, wearables could become even more popular in the future.