Resolved Always-on stopped working (only dims display)

[johannnn]

My battery was draining very quickly today, and upon inspecting what might be wrong, I noticed that the 1hz always on display doesn't seem to be working?

All that happens if I don't use the display is that it dims and hides "sensitive information".

I tried reseting the watch to factory settings, but I still never see the 1hz display.

I have double-checked the settings about always-on display. If I enable it it, it dims the display. If I disable it, the display turns black like on previous watches.

Has anyone heard of this problem? Any solution except taking it into an Store?

 

[StumpyBloke]

Unless I’m missing something, what you’ve described is exactly what’s meant to happen. When it dims it’s working at 1hz

 

[th1nk]

What do you expect to happen? 🤔

 

[johannnn]

Unless I’m missing something, what you’ve described is exactly what’s meant to happen. When it dims it’s working at 1hz

Woah I feel so stupid.
Maybe I changed watch face or something. But what I'm used to see (the 3 weeks I've owned it), is just a black screen with the time in the top right.

I tried to see what face that might have been, and I tried with the Siri watch face that has the time in the top right. But even with that one, the dimmed display still showed everything else on that face.

 

[StumpyBloke]

You only see the time top-right with the black screen if there is an app currently open and then the screen dims

 

[johannnn]

You only see the time top-right with the black screen if there is an app currently open and then the screen dims

Ah thanks, just tried it and it worked. This is what I'm used to see -_-
I had no idea that the always-on display had colors. I thought it was just black and white to preserve battery.

 

[th1nk]

Nah it is in color, which is very nice! However, a watch face with a lot of pixels lit up (not black) and lots of color will use a bit more battery than a face with only few lit up pixels. My battery life with AOD on is very good (up to two days without charging, background app refresh off), so your battery issues may have other causes. Let‘s hope watchOS 6.1 fixes those issues.

 

[johannnn]

Nah it is in color, which is very nice! However, a watch face with a lot of pixels lit up (not black) and lots of color will use a bit more battery than a face with only few lit up pixels. My battery life with AOD on is very good (up to two days without charging, background app refresh off), so your battery issues may have other causes. Let‘s hope watchOS 6.1 fixes those issues.

Disabling background app refresh sounds smart. On iOS there's apps like Twitter and Facebook where you can notice if you turn it off (takes a bit to reload your news stream), but most of these apps don't even exist on watchOS. Most apps on the watch seems to be utilities rather than having a stream on news, so background app refresh seems pretty unnecessary. Although if most are utilities I also doubt many apps actually update in the background?

Anything else you actively do to preserve battery? Settings? Watch face? Apps you avoid?

 

[th1nk]

I have disabled raise to wake, because with AOD I use it like a normal watch. If I want to use the smartwatch functionality, I tap the display. I guess this is personal preference and there is also a bug in watchOS that the waking is sometimes laggy, but this helps battery life as well. Other than that, no special things.

 

[johannnn]

I have disabled raise to wake, because with AOD I use it like a normal watch. If I want to use the smartwatch functionality, I tap the display.

This works great for me when I'm indoors, but the AOD is impossible to see outdoors. Even the normal display is quite weak outdoors, I wish Series 6 gets more bright..