Wearables are the only platform where the interaction budget is measured in seconds and the user is usually doing something else. Testing at a desk removes both constraints and therefore removes the test.
What to put in the public brief
- The wearable platform, named exactly
- That physical hardware is required
- How they will get the build
- That video of the wrist is required
- Roughly how long, and over how many days
Keep the app identity and build private.
What to put in the private instructions
Ask them to use it while occupied
Walking, carrying something, cooking. A wearable tested while sitting still has been tested as a very small phone.
Ask whether they had to look twice
The single most useful question. A glance that fails and needs a second look is the difference between a useful complication and a deleted app.
Ask about outdoors and sunlight
Contrast that passes indoors regularly fails at brightness, and it is the environment wearables are most used in.
Ask about the notification, not just the app
Most wearable interaction is a notification arriving. Whether it is readable without opening anything is usually the whole product.
Proof worth requiring
Ask for
Video of the wrist during use, the exact device and OS version, whether any glance needed repeating, and one line on outdoor legibility.
Do not ask for
Screenshots. A two-second glance is a temporal event and a still frame cannot represent whether it succeeded.
When this task type is the wrong tool
If the phone app is the product and the watch app is an accessory, test the phone app first — an onboarding test will find more for less.
If the build cannot be installed on retail hardware, nothing here can run. The constraint is the device, and it is not negotiable.