I'd love to have this passive features, but the problems I have with smartwatches is that most of them are ugly, and I'm trying to minimize notifications in my life.
You can disable pretty much all notifications from the watch, separately from your phone. I only use my apple watch for activity tracking, music while cycling without my phone, and things like checking the weather (and time, I guess).
As for them being ugly, at least Apple has a wide selection of bands, and the watch itself is as unoffensive as a rounded rect can be, but I feel you there. It's not a work of art, but at least it's not the house arrest bracelets that fitbit sells.
I find that Apple Watch notifications are very useful because I can limit them to important ones (someone texting me, someone calling me, calendar events, reminders) and leave everything else to my phone.
If my watch tries to get my attention, I know it’s reasonably important. If my phone does, I don’t have to pull it out of my pocket if I don’t want to.
