In the past few years, new types of wearable technologies have been evolving, which are referred as wearable smart devices or simply wearable devices. The wearable devices can be defined as computing devices that has advanced electronics and communication technologies and can be worn by individuals, facilitating interaction between the users and a smart platforms. Furthermore, the wearable devices, especially smartwatches, are getting significant attention and huge investments by big smartphone companies (Apple, Samsung, LG, Google, etc.) which illustrate the evolving era of smartwatches (Dehghani et al., 2018).

The smart wearable device is one of the fastest growing markets globally. In 2012, smartwatches drew the attention when the Pebble Smartwatch was introduced on the crowdfunding website (Choi and Kim, 2016). In 2016, the International Data Corporation (IDC) anticipated that smartwatch market would substantially grow by 2020, estimating a market of $17.8 billion (Afrouz and Wahl, 2019).

The smartwatch is a wrist-worn device with a portable computer that can connect to other devices via short range wireless connectivity. In addition to having an integrated clock, the smartwatch can provide alert notifications, collect data via sensors and upload personal data in a 24 x 7 manner in an attempt to improve the quality of daily life (Seneviratne et al., 2017). Smartwatches have the advantage of connecting to the skin since they are wrist mounted which facilitate their wide use in the fields of sports and healthcare. Smartwatches could decrease consumer's attention given to other devices, such as smartphones, as important information is conveniently displayed on the user's wrist (Chuah et al., 2016).

In a recent study conducted in Germany (Afrouz and Wahl, 2019), it was identified that attitude toward using wearable technology was the strongest predictor for the intention to purchase smartwatches followed by Perceived Behavioral Control. The smartwatch can be used for various purposes such as navigation, financial payments, physical and mental health monitoring, sport analytics, and medical insurance analytics (Seneviratne et al., 2017). It is worth mentioning that most smartwatch producers have merged the technology and fashion in an attempt to attract more consumers (Chuah et al., 2016; Moore, 2016).

International reports predict an increased demand for smartwatches in the future while the current actual sales are relatively less than what is forecasted (Chuah et al., 2016). This difference implies that what influences the consumers to own smartwatches is not sufficiently known; especially that smartwatches technology is in the initial stages of its lifecycle. Therefore, more studies are needed to address this gap in the knowledge.

There have been various studies (Baudier et al., 2020; Scott, 2020) identified in the literature that focused on the adoption and use of smart devices. Various influencing the adoption of smart watches. Scott (Scott, 2020) has identified that privacy concerns is one of the major factors affecting the smart watches adoption in USA. A similar study (Scott, 2020) conducted in four developed countries including USA, UK, France, and Germany has found that age and gender factors moderately impact the adoption of smart watches. In addition, it was found that perceived ease of use had no impact on the adoption attitudes. However, in a study conducted in South Korea, found that perceived ease of use had a significant impact on the intention to use of smart watches (Baudier et al., 2020). Other, factors such as prior experience, affective quality and technology-related anxiety impacted the adoption of smart watches among the older adults (Choe and Noh, 2018). Similarly, another study (Lazaro et al., 2020) conducted in Malaysia identified four dimensions including perceived benefits, healthology, IT innovation, and smartwatch as luxury products which significantly influenced the adoption of smartwatches. Using a complex model smartwatches adoption among IT professionals was investigated in a study (Said et al., 2021) and it was found that self-efficacy, personal innovativeness, social media influence, social image, aesthetics and external social influence were major factors of influence. Similarly, various studies (Hsiao, 2017; Kranthi and Ahmed, 2018; Dutot et al., 2019; Pua, 2020; Visuri et al., 2021) identified different technical factors affecting the intention to use smart watches, while the behavioral and user-centered aspects were undermined.

As highlighted by Choia and Seongcheol (Choi and Kim, 2016), most academic studies on smartwatches have been driven by technology rather than audience. Thus, it is important to understand the users' perceptions toward the use of smartwatches and the various factors influencing the adoption of smartwatches. These findings would contribute to the literature in understanding users' usage, preferences, needs, and expectations that would aid smartwatches developers and also decision-makers in integrating the smartwatch technology in various service-enabled areas such as healthcare and e-learning. This study aims to understand the actual consumers' perceptions of using smartwatches and explore the critical factors influencing the intention to use smartwatches in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

A total of 135 responses were received to evaluate their use of wearable devices (smartwatch). As seen in Table 1, the most common age group was 35–44 years (40.7%) with more than a half (55.6%) were males and 46.7% had a bachelor's degree.

With regards to their occupational status, nearly two third (65.9%) were employed with 40.7% of them earned 10,001–20,000 SAR per month. The prevalence of participants who had information about smartwatch was 94.1% (Figure 1). When comparing the socio-demographic characteristics against owning a smartwatch. It was found that educational level (X2 = 9.365; p = 0.025) and knowledge about smartwatch (X2 = 7.897; p = 0.005) had significant association with owning a smartwatch.

The descriptive statistics of Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) subscales are shown in Table 2. Based on the results, the mean score of perceived usefulness, ease of use, enjoyment and healthology, and design aesthetic were 15.5, 17.4, 16.1, and 16, respectively (Figures 2, 3), while the mean score of attitudes toward using smartwatch, subjective norm, perceived behavioral control and purchase intention were 14.2, 10.4, 11.7, and 9.79, respectively (Figures 4, 5). With regards to reliability analysis, the Cronbach Alpha was higher on purchase intention domain (Cronbach Alpha: 0.964), followed by design aesthetic domain (Cronbach Alpha: 0.931) and attitude toward using smartwatch (Cronbach Alpha: 0.916) while perceived ease of use was the lowest (Cronbach Alpha: 0.717).

Table 3 showed the correlation procedure between design perceived usefulness, ease of use, enjoyment and healthology. It revealed that the correlation between perceived usefulness, perceived ease of use, perceived enjoyment and healthology, and design aesthetic were positively highly statistically significant (p < 0.01).

In Table 4, the correlation between attitude toward using smartwatch, subjective norm, perceived behavioral control, and purchase intention had high statistical significance as well (p < 0.01).

When comparing between design aesthetic, perceived usefulness, ease of use, and enjoyment and healthology in relation to the socio demographic characteristics (Table 5), it was found that respondents in the older age group (≥45 years) (F = 11.797; p < 0.001) and those with master degree (F = 3.449; p = 0.002) observed to have significantly lower mean score in design aesthetic while females exhibited significantly higher score in perceived enjoyment and healthology (T = −3.629; p = 0.001) as well as design aesthetic (T = −2.070; p = 0.043).

Table 6, shows that only occupational status showed significant difference with attitude toward the use of smartwatch with students exhibited significantly higher score compared to the other groups (F = 2.836; p = 0.031). Other socio demographic characteristics did not differ significantly when compared to attitude toward use, subjective norm, perceived behavioral control and purchase intention (all p > 0.05).

The purpose the study is to assess the actual perception of use of smartwatches and to investigate the influencing factors for utilizing them among Saudi population. This study enrolled 135 respondents to evaluates perception of the Saudi, regardless of owning a smartwatch or not, and their adoption intention toward this device. The findings of this study revealed that most Saudis, around 94%, have pre-existing knowledge about smart watches, approximately half (48%) of the Saudi who own smartwatch were: male (56.95%), had Bachelor's degree (55.4%), employed (66.2%) and their monthly income 10.000–20.000SR (44.6%). However, in a study conducted in Indonesia (Anggraini et al., 2019), it was identified that most respondents heard about smartwatches, half of them have a smartwatch and more than 70% of the remaining half don't have a smartwatch due to high price.

With regards to coefficient reliability during the study analysis, the reliability was higher in PI, followed gradually by DA, ATU, SN, BPI, PEH, PU, while PE was the lowest. This study revealed a strong association and positive relationship between the four domains: PU, PE, PEH and DA which were affected by the responder owning a smartwatch. It also showed strong association and positive correlation between the other four domains: ATU, SN. PBC, and PI which were affected by the responder who doesn't own a smartwatch among Saudi population. This is consistent with Hakroh et al.'s paper (Hokroh et al., 2020) where they investigated the association between: Heart Health (HH), Weight Management (WM), and Sleep Improvement (SI) as antecedents for Perceived Usefulness (PU). Also, Wearable Design (WD), Graphical User Interface (GUI) and Health Information Support (HIS) as antecedents for Perceived Ease of Use (PEU) as influences factors among Saudi population.

In this study, it is identified that Saudi citizens who own a smartwatch are usually highly educated and knowledgeable about smartwatches. Saudi users over the age of 45 as well as those with master degree level both observed with low interest in design aesthetic for smartwatches while female users had remarkable interest in perceived enjoyment and healthology as well as design aesthetic. According to Dehghani et al. (Dehghani et al., 2018) gender plays an important role in smartwatch adoption intention and actual usage. Most of smartwatches companies don't pay attention to the aesthetic features but they focus on technology features in designs. Furthermore, Companies need to consider marketing pending on the customer needs, gender and different setting. In a study conducted in Taiwan (Hsiao, 2017), it was identified that perceived product contributes effectively on adoption intention of smartwatches.

Moreover we observed that Saudi students who don't own a smartwatch showed positive attitude toward the use of smartwatch technology, in other words, student believe that using a smartwatch is a good decision compared to the other occupational status groups. In a study (Arpaci et al., 2021) conducted in Malaysia, machine learning techniques were applied in assessing the adoption and it was the first study to gather a novel assistance to the information systems (IS) literature by assessing the student behavioral intention for adoption of wearable technologies (smartwatch).

The total number of participants in the study was only 135, which is considered a key limitation therefore, the generalization of findings in this study must be done with care by future researchers. In addition, this study focused on smartwatches in general. However, the functionalities of the smartwatches may vary with the brand, their purpose, features and functionalities. Therefore, our findings may not be applicable to all types of smartwatches. However, researchers can develop many future research projects from this study. The study can be taken forward in a larger scale with the use of mixed-methods such as interviews and surveys for in-depth analysis of the results. In addition, the future studies may focus on comparing the users' perceptions, adoption, and intention to use according to the smartwatches analyzed by brand, functions and features, and purpose.

Finally, our study carries both practical and theoretical implications. The findings from this study, such as the usage behavior of males vs. females; younger vs. older population; married vs. single; highly educated vs. low educated. can help in understanding the users' perceptions among the different groups, which can help the designers and developers of smartwatches in developing the devices according to the users' expectations and can streamline their marketing strategy by targeting a specific group of customers. Most importantly, our study contributes to enriching the knowledge gap in the literature about the users' perceptions, use, and adoption of smartwatches in the Middle East, and contributes significantly in understanding the users' preferences and adoption traits in this region, which can serve as a reference for future work in this domain.

Nowadays, Wearable's are becoming more mercantile and used among customers all over the world. Smartwatches are the most popular wearable's device known by most of the population. This study found the actual consumers' perceptions of smartwatch utilization in kingdom of Saudi Arabia, using TAM show the significant relationship between the 8 domains: PU, PE. PEH, DA, ATU, SN, PBC, and PI that used to determine the smartwatches acceptance among the Saudi population whether they own a smartwatch or not. These domains are considered as effective factors toward smartwatch utilization to provide wearable devices designed according to the user's preferences and needs. Finally, we can say, perceived product contributes effectively on adoption intention of smartwatches. Further related research is needed in order to further explore the influential factors for adoption intention, that were found to be significant in this study, for the sake of better understanding of consumers' needs.

The raw data supporting the conclusions of this article can be provided by the authors upon request without undue reservation.

The studies involving human participants were reviewed and approved by the Institution Review Board (IRB) at Imam Abdulrahman bin Faisal University. The patients/participants provided their written informed consent to participate in this study.

All authors listed have made a substantial, direct, and intellectual contribution to the work and approved it for publication.

Author DuA is an employee of Saudi Aramco. Author HM is an employee of Johns Hopkins Aramco Healthcare. The remaining authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article, or claim that may be made by its manufacturer, is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.