Apple Watch Event: What to Look For - New York Times

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A crowd awaited the announcement of the Apple Watch in September. The device is expected to be in stores in April. Credit Jim Wilson/The New York Times

At 1 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time, Apple will hold an event in San Francisco to talk about the important features in the Apple Watch and share more details about the product.

Here is what you need to know:

• A Companion for the iPhone

The Apple Watch, which is expected to be in stores in April, is a miniature computer worn around a person’s wrist, with a touch screen and a so-called digital crown for navigating the device. There are three models, to be sold at different prices, and interchangeable watch straps.

Apple has highlighted the crown as its latest signature innovation for controlling a device, similar to the mouse pointer for the personal computer, the click wheel on the iPod and the touch screen for the iPhone. On the Apple Watch, the crown can be twisted to zoom in or out of the screen or to scroll through a list.

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Apple has marketed the watch as a device that can appeal to a range of customers, including fitness buffs and collectors of luxury watches. But it has limited its functions. The watch requires a newer iPhone to fully operate, partly because the iPhone will hold the third-party apps that run on the device.

The starting price for a basic Apple Watch is $350. Apple has not yet said how much people will have to pay for higher-end models, like the Apple Watch Edition, which is made of 18-karat gold. The company is expected to reveal more about pricing on Monday.

• Entering a Lackluster Market

Apple is faced with the task of convincing consumers who, so far, are not very excited about the idea of wearing computers on their bodies. The first batch of smartwatches from companies like Samsung Electronics, Motorola and LG have not sold well, nor were they particularly well reviewed. And wearable devices like the Google Glass eyewear that got mainstream attention — if not sales — were greeted with considerable skepticism.

But Apple has been in this situation before. Most consumers didn’t care about computer tablets before Apple released the iPad, nor did they generally think about buying smartphones before the release of the iPhone. In both cases, the company overcame initial skepticism.

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