TL;DR Team of developers who kept Pebble watches afloat after the company’s shutdown now accuse the founder of “stealing” their work.
While Rebble and Core Devices had initially agreed to work together, the former now claims to disagree over the terms.
Rebble alleges that Pebble’s founder, Eric Migicovsky, could build a “walled garden,” restricting further open-source app development.
Update: Nov 19, 2025 (1:55 AM ET): Eric Migicovsky responded with a blog explaining his stance. He says while the agreement between Rebble and Core includes a licensing fee of $0.20 per user per month, Rebble assert a 100% claim on its app store data.
He counter-accused Pebble of “attempting to create a walled garden around 13,000 apps and faces that individual Pebble developers created and uploaded to the Pebble Appstore between 2012 and 2016,” and added he’s “working hard to keep the Pebble ecosystem open source.” I believe that these apps and watchfaces should be archived publicly and freely accessible by anyone. Further labeling Rebble’s claims as “plainly false,” Migicovsky stated that he is in the process of rewriting the Pebble App Store front end as a native app rather than a web view, while relying on Rebble’s APIs for the backend. As per Migicovsky, users would not require a subscription or a Rebble account to download these apps.
Additionally, Migicovsky, in his blog, challenges Rebble to “prove that you believe in an open, unrestricted Pebble community. Tear down the walled garden you are trying to create. Publish your copy of the Pebble Appstore archive.” Further details are added to and elaborated in the blog if you’re curious to get inside the weeds.
Original article: Nov 18, 2025 (09:26 AM ET): After almost nine years of hiatus, the no-frills Pebble smartwatch is being revived. Pebble’s founder, Eric Migicovsky, shared an update earlier this month, revealing that 70% of the Pebble 2 Duo units have already been delivered, while the remaining orders are either in transit or scheduled to be shipped in the following days. In addition to this, Migicovsky has also relaunched the Pebble app store for early backers to enjoy new watch faces, apps, or games on their latest watches. While this is a positive development for Pebble fans eagerly waiting to relive nostalgia and cherish the same minimal smartwatch experience as the last decade, a newly emerged roadblock may stall Pebble’s recent progress.
The new hindrance comes from Rebble, a community of developers who gave the classic Pebble watches another chance at life after the company’s official closure in 2016. Rebble played an enormous role in Pebble’s upkeep and revival. After the company shut down, Rebble took the necessary steps to create an unofficial PebbleOS spin-off, called RebbleOS, and maintain an unofficial app store for Pebble watches. The same store now forms the basis of the reinvented Pebble brand, under its new name, Core Devices.
Following Google’s steps to release the PebbleOS source code and Migicovsky’s steps to revive the company, Rebble and Core reached an agreement, allowing the latter to use Rebble’s service as the backend for the new app store. This would also allow any apps added to the Rebble store to be automatically reflected in the Pebble Store. However, the Rebble team has now shared an update, alleging that Migicovsky has demanded complete control over their work.
Don’t want to miss the best from Android Authority? Set us as a favorite source in Google Discover to never miss our latest exclusive reports, expert analysis, and much more.
... continue reading