Pebble, the E-Ink Smartwatch That Refuses to Die, Just Went Fully Open Source

An Anonymous Coward writes:

Eric Migicovsky wants to ensure Pebble can't be killed again, and DIYers benefit most:

Pebble, the e-ink smartwatch with a tumultuous history, is making a move sure to please the DIY enthusiasts that make up the bulk of its fans: Its entire software stack is now fully open source, and key hardware design files are available too.

Pebble creator Eric Migicovsky announced the move on Monday in a blog post and video detailing the changes his reborn Pebble watchmaking firm has undertaken, and they're considerable.

For those unfamiliar with the saga of Pebble, the budget e-ink smartwatches are Migicovsky's brainchild, and first became widely available in 2013. Color models came later, but by 2016 the company had been acquired by Fitbit, which canned hardware sales and put the Pebble software ecosystem out to pasture. Support for the devices disappeared with the Fitbit acquisition too, leaving independent tinkerers operating under the name Rebble to take up support for the devices of their own accord.

Fitbit was later acquired by Google, which open sourced Pebble's operating system in January 2025. Migicovsky launched a new company, Core Devices, in March, with plans to release two new Pebble watches. Google's trademark on the Pebble brand had expired, Migicovsky told us, and he now owns it under a new filing.

First off, all the electrical and mechanical schematics for Pebble's one currently available device, the black-and-white Pebble 2 Duo, are now available on Github for anyone to tinker with or to build their own Pebble 2 Duo.

The schematics for the Core Devices' other new watch, the yet-to-be-released Pebble Time 2, aren't available on Github, naturally. That device is going to begin shipping sometime early next year, Migicovsky said in his blog post, but he told us in an email that he hasn't decided whether to publish the schematics for that device yet.

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