Samsung announces Gear S3 Classic LTE and some cool new concept watches

The Baselworld 2017 watch and jewelry show is currently underway in the Basel, Switzerland. It’s one of the biggest exhibitions of its kind and Samsung is there showing off a handful of new wearable products right now.

Among them is an upcoming version of the Gear S3 Classic which will support LTE connectivity. This was missing from the original S3 Classic, though it could be found in the S3 Frontier version released alongside it.

The new model will be compatible with carriers AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon, who will announce price and availability details later. For the Gear S3 Frontier, the LTE functionality added an extra fee onto the monthly smartphone contract price, so you can expect similar monthly costs for the Classic LTE.

Read more about the Gear S3 Classic and Gear S3 Frontier in our full review at the link.

Meanwhile, Samsung has also shown off some new concept watches at the show. These include an updated Gear S3 with a more premium finish, a hybrid pocket watch version of the S3, and a watch which has the appearance of the S3 but is actually a “traditional watch with Swiss-made movement and detail,” says Samsung.

Switzerland-based watch designer Yvan Arpa, who worked with Samsung on the original Gear S3 design, is joining Samsung at Baselworld to show off the new concept watches. In addition, Samsung has some fancy custom watch straps and color variations for the Gear S3 on display, take a peek at those below.

Concept pieces are usually something I find frustrating as I tend to prefer them to the commercialized products already available. I mean, if Samsung actually released that compass-wielding pocket watch on the left of the middle picture, I would be all over that — and I have very little interest in owning the regular Gear S3.

What are your thoughts on Samsung’s new watches? Let us know in the comments.