Jon Gruber nails it with a typically insightful piece:

All three products (counting XS and XS Max as a single product in two sizes, which, as I’ll explain later, is how to think about them) are interesting, but to me, the Series 4 watch was the standout of the show. The XS and XR iPhones are refinements to the landmark X that was announced last year. The Series 4 watch is a landmark redesign.

I would argue that the landmark iPhone models were the original, the iPhone 4, the iPhone 6, and the iPhone X. It’s kind of interesting to me how the Apple Watch’s evolution has paralleled the iPhone’s. A first-generation model like nothing seen before, good enough to change an entire industry but deeply flawed in certain obvious ways. Second and third generation models that simply address those obvious flaws. And then a fourth generation model that takes things to an altogether new level, particularly pertaining to the display and the physical case of the device.

In the presentation, Apple executives made a big deal of the ECG feature of the new watch, especially the fact that it has FDA clearance. It is a big deal — as anyone with heart trouble will confirm. But Apple is being disingenuous in not acknowledging that they are late to this particular party. A company called AliveCor has been marketing an ECG monitor for the iPhone — and (irony of ironies) a special watch-band for the Apple Watch for some years. I know about it because a friend of mine found it to be a life-enhancing piece of kit. In fact, in lectures over the last two years I’ve been citing it as an example of the unquestionable upsides of mobile technology.

I guess those billionaire executives can’t bring themselves to admit that they’re behind some curves. That’s not to say that their implementation of the ECG tech isn’t neat. It is. But it’s not the first.