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Apple Releases watchOS 10 With Widget-Focused Interface, New Watch Faces and More
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It's "Ok" but for me the worst of the iOS/IPadOS/WatchOS updates.
Not having swipe to change face is a step backwards. Interaction with watch faces now takes an extra tap. Os feels pretty buggy.
Oh and not really widget centric if you can only have four (on Watch 4)!
Not having swipe to change face is a step backwards. Interaction with watch faces now takes an extra tap. Os feels pretty buggy.
Oh and not really widget centric if you can only have four (on Watch 4)!
All I want from watchOS 10 is a big, clear timer countdown to appear on the watch face when I have a timer active. Literally all I've ever wanted out of watchOS!
iOS has this so it's always infuriated me that watchOS didn't (except for a tiny, dopey little widget that just annoys you when it's not active).
iOS has this so it's always infuriated me that watchOS didn't (except for a tiny, dopey little widget that just annoys you when it's not active).
For me this was something that often activated accidentally, and wasn't very intuitive anyway, so maybe this is a deliberate change. I wonder if the Apple Stores got a lot of "help! the watch face changed by itself and I don't know how to get the old one back" complaints?
(I've also always had issues with volume control activating accidentally if I brush the watch against something. Awful if you're wearing headphones and the volume suddenly punches up to max!)
This never happened to me accidentally. What did happen by mistake a few times was pulling down the notifications sheet, but that was no biggie. I can't think of a more "intuitive" way to change watch faces than to swipe from side to side; that's how I'd guess it would be done if I was new to the watch.
Why did they get rid of the swipe to change watch faces? That was my favorite feature to easily swipe between data or complications that I needed. I had high hopes for 10 but now my watch is unusable. Back to my Garmin I guess. Dang.
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Yep, no watch face swipe is a deal breaker for me.
What a waste.
Swipe up and turn of the crown do the same thing.
Leave the crown turn, but let a swipe up activate the dock again? Having the quick access to apps from the dock was wonderful. Maybe widgets will be better once all my most used apps have a widget.....for now, terrible. And, the top widget is the date and time and cannot be deleted from the stack??? Date and time are on almost every watch face. Why duplicate???
So many duplicated actions now that could be used for much quicker app access.
Watch face switch is slow. Tap and hold, then swipe. What a step backwards.
Most of these UI changes seem to be brought on by someone who never uses their watch on the go, say on a bike, jogging, etc.
Swipe up and turn of the crown do the same thing.
Leave the crown turn, but let a swipe up activate the dock again? Having the quick access to apps from the dock was wonderful. Maybe widgets will be better once all my most used apps have a widget.....for now, terrible. And, the top widget is the date and time and cannot be deleted from the stack??? Date and time are on almost every watch face. Why duplicate???
So many duplicated actions now that could be used for much quicker app access.
Watch face switch is slow. Tap and hold, then swipe. What a step backwards.
Most of these UI changes seem to be brought on by someone who never uses their watch on the go, say on a bike, jogging, etc.
I can't believe they removed the feature. Miserable decision by Apple in my opinion.
I just installed in a Series 6, I'm happy with the changes, and even the UX on how to swipe and use the crown and button are alright.
My concern is the battery; in an hour has gone from 100% to 92%. I know my battery health is 85%; old watch, but this is worrying.
Anyone else having these issues? Or is just consuming battery because it's indexing everything?
And yes, my other complain is the watch face swipe; IT SUCKS!!!! Not worth the widgets.
My concern is the battery; in an hour has gone from 100% to 92%. I know my battery health is 85%; old watch, but this is worrying.
Anyone else having these issues? Or is just consuming battery because it's indexing everything?
And yes, my other complain is the watch face swipe; IT SUCKS!!!! Not worth the widgets.
What finally seemed fixed in OS 9, was that Now Playing would automatically be opened with a wrist tilt when playing music from the phone. That has always been super convenient for me to adjust volume or skip a track. Now it's back to sometimes working, but mostly not. Frustrating.
I'm glad they added a dropdown notification on the phone when the phone unlocks the watch.
That was an issue for me in iOS9 where it would only unlock my watch some of the time.
I also like how all my complications are grey'd out when its locked. There were a few times I though my watch was unlocked when it wasnt in iOS9.
That was an issue for me in iOS9 where it would only unlock my watch some of the time.
I also like how all my complications are grey'd out when its locked. There were a few times I though my watch was unlocked when it wasnt in iOS9.
Before all you had to do to change between faces was swipe from the left or right side of the screen. It would immediately swipe to the face to the "left" or "right" of your current face. You didn't need to long press to open up the face editor and then swipe. This change makes it much more cumbersome to swipe between faces, and you can't do it quickly now at all.
For example, on one of my faces I have the timer, so if I had an active timer I would just swipe over a couple faces and quickly see how much time was left, then swipe back. Now, I have to long press on the current face, swipe over to the face with the timer, then because the timer doesn't live update in this face edit interface I need to click into that face, see the time remaining, then long press, swipe back to and select the initial face.
What before was literally just a couple swipes in a matter of seconds is now 8 interactions and having to wait for a long press to register multiple times. It took something that was a very convenient and functional way to use faces, and made it cumbersome in a way that is simply unfriendly to the user.
Setting aside the mess that is the loss of the Dock and side button, and that the launcher widget in the not-so-smart stack won’t even let me pick many of my installed watch apps, I think I found something that’s not simply bad UX but an actual bug:
It looks like if you updated an app on your iPhone, an iOS app which also had a watch app, and that watch app was the updated WatchOS 10 version, but you didn’t yet have 10 installed, after the upgrade to 10 the updated watch app never gets onto the watch. Saw this with both Carrot and WorkOutDoors, because I update all my apps before I take an iOS upgrade. After removing Carrot from the watch and reinstalling it, the new version appeared and was recognized by these new bits of watchOS 10.
It looks like if you updated an app on your iPhone, an iOS app which also had a watch app, and that watch app was the updated WatchOS 10 version, but you didn’t yet have 10 installed, after the upgrade to 10 the updated watch app never gets onto the watch. Saw this with both Carrot and WorkOutDoors, because I update all my apps before I take an iOS upgrade. After removing Carrot from the watch and reinstalling it, the new version appeared and was recognized by these new bits of watchOS 10.
Yes, my iphone location/weather works fine. Weather not updating on watch. I have reset both and even umpaired/repaired. Still no joy.
Typically a day or two of quick drain due to the indexing as you said. Hopefully.
This redesign can definitely throw people off after initially installing watchOS 10, as my grandmother did after her watch updated. I've been running watchOS 10 on my watch ever since the public beta came out, so I've gotten used to the new interface. Another thing is for someone who just got their first Apple Watch in the last few months. They get used to the old design language in watchOS 9 only to very quickly have to adjust to the new design language of watchOS 10. I myself have had an Apple Watch since Christmas of 2019, almost 4 years ago, but I know a friend of mine who just got their first Apple Watch for their birthday at the end of July, less than 2 months ago. My grandmother has had an Apple Watch since about a month after me (end of January 2020), my sister got her first Apple Watch last Christmas (2022), and my mom has had one since the same day as me, however she can't update to watchOS 10 until she gets a new watch as she's currently running a Series 3, which is also what I was running until last year when I upgraded to the SE 2 after it came out and the Series 3 was dropped from watchOS support.
Agreed! I use the faces to quickly access watch apps and it's a nuisance to have to treat the watch face as a 3rd button.
Knowing the noticeable crown function changed, the changing of faces hasn't doesn't seem any different.
