The Apple Watch starts shipping April 24, but if you want to try before you buy, you can make an appointment at a physical Apple Store. Here's how you do that, and what to expect.
The appointment process was surprisingly smooth. I went to the Apple website, clicked on the appointment link on the Apple Watch page, and entered my region and Apple ID. To my surprise, the several Apple Stores in New York all had plenty of openings. I selected the Apple Store in Grand Central Terminal, one of the smaller stores in the city (especially compared to the Fifth Avenue and Meatpacking District stores, which are multi-tiered, glass-staircase-equipped monoliths), and scheduled an appointment with a click.
Unlike some of my colleagues, I haven't had any hands-on experience with the Apple Watch, so this was my first time seeing it up close.
One of the large tables used for product displays was reserved for Apple Watch demos, with six stations overseen by clerks at the store. It was fairly busy, but not cramped or overbooked. I walked up, told them my name, and was given a demo a few minutes before my scheduled appointment.
The clerk asked if I had a preference of Apple Watch to try on, and opened a drawer to reveal 10 different models of the standard Apple Watch and Apple Watch Sport. I asked to try on a regular 42mm Apple Watch with the Milanese Loop and Leather Loop watch bands. She pulled two Apple Watches out of the drawer, wiped them with a soft cloth, and laid them out on the padded surface of the table.
The Milanese Loop is a very attractive, all-metal watch band that looks like very fine chainmail. A magnet on the end of the band holds it in place, and while it was awkward getting used to the "stickiness" of the magnet on every other inch of the band, it felt secure and comfortable. The Leather Loop is a standard leather watch band with a standard one-pin buckle.
The watches I was allowed to try on didn't let me use them. By double-pressing the button on the side, they took me through the same demo that showed different watch features. It was a completely non-interactive movie on my wrist that only occasionally buzzed to show the watch's force feedback.
To actually see how the Apple Watch would feel to use, I had to play with a separate model mounted on a large display with an embedded screen that showed more information of each app and feature I brought up on the watch. This mounted watch was fully functional, and I could use the dial and touch screen to explore the interface and different apps, including the large, colorful, grid-based photo viewer. However, without it on my wrist, I couldn't get a good sense of whether the Apple Watch would be comfortable.
The $10,000 Apple Watch Edition was displayed in a glass case with the other Apple Watch versions, but they didn't have one I could try on. I remain puzzled by the Apple Watch Edition, from its five-digit price tag to its use of the word "Edition" without any modifier.
The hands-on appointment at the Apple Store gave me two half-demos of the Apple Watch that almost-but-not-quite added up to a deep look at it. I got to see how the watch looked and felt on my wrist, and I got to see how the watch's interface worked—just not on my wrist. It was an interesting experience, but not worth the effort to make an appointment in advance. Had I wanted to purchase one, I'd have to do that online; find out more in the video below.