The Pebble smartwatch was a runaway success on Kickstarter, and backers have been receiving units in the mail for the past several months. Nearly 70,000 Pebbles have been shipped, and today the watch’s SDK has been updated to allow two-way communication between the Pebble and mobile apps. Pebble is encouraging devs to create “watchapps” that can “send and receive data from a connected smartphone app.”

Apps were previously restricted to the Pebble’s basic functions, but now nearly every facet of the watch can be controlled with (and control) a third-party iOS or Android app.

Pebble gave some examples of what the new SDK allows:

• Watchfaces augmented with data from the internet
• Remote controls for internet connected devices
• Multi-player Pebble games
• 4sq/Facebook/Yelp Check-in Apps
• Sports/Weather/News/Traffic tickers
• Emergency beacon activator
• Deeper sports integration (skiing, hiking, surfing, tennis, soccer score keeping)!
• Bitcoin price trackers (most important watchapp?)

Android devs should have no trouble creating apps with the updated SDK, but iOS is a little more complicated.

“In order for Pebble to work with iPhones, we joined the Made For iPhone program (a requirement for hardware accessories to interact with iOS apps),” said Pebble. “Unfortunately this also means that if you build an iOS app with Pebble 2-way communication, we (Pebble) will need to whitelist your iOS app before you can upload it to the App Store.”

We should start seeing some cool Pebble apps in the coming months. RunKeeper is a great example of what devs can do with the platform.

• SourcePebble