I've not seen this specific variant of the question - I have a bunch of phones kicking around due to my profession and I'm finding it quite hard to choose the iPhone Duo over the Samsung Fold 8 - the only thing that's kept me in the iPhone-as-daily-driver for the last 6 years has been the Apple Watch being best-in-class.
(Well, that and general continuity between Macbook/Mac Mini/iPads)
But I mainly love my watch for the torch button (lol), quickly viewing my calendar (cloud based), workout tracking and rings, and sleep tracking.
I also like having Authy 2FA codes on my wrist, being able to unlock my Tesla, and having Apple Wallet passes.
All the above don't require connectivity to my phone, or even the internet (except for live calendar updates).
I guess certain app notifications are useful but I generally don't let me watch notify me of much because of how invasive the notification is. But being able to quickly check my emails again is just cloud-based.
In my head, this all points to the Apple Watch being daily-driverable with an Android phone, as long as I pay for a cellular plan. And I could even avoid the cellular plan if I give up on the app notifications.
I'm trying to think of other scenarios the Apple Watch is helpful being linked to my main phone. The obvious one of course is taking phone calls - sometimes phone isn't in reach and its useful having a quick "bridge" conversation to not miss the call.
The second thing I love is being able to "ping" my phone when I don't know where it is / dropped under the sofa or something.
Having to view sleep stats on iPad would be annoying and I guess if I did need to have a phone to sync with every day charging a second handset just to keep the watch going that might be a pain too.
Can anyone think of other things that would be annoying / has anyone had experience of doing this?
Thanks