One question I've never asked is if you can disable notifications quickly on the AW? A scenario for me is when I get home from work and don't want all my emails and texts flooding through on my wrist but can leave my iPhone on the kitchen worktop for the evening not needing to be tempted to look. I know the watch can be taken off in the same manner but then you lose the watch element. What is the quickest way to disable, would it be airplane mode?
I use Do-Not-Disturb (DND) mode. In fact, I have it not only set to mirror my iPhone's setting, but on a schedule from 8PM to 7AM. I have a short VIP list that can punch through if it's urgent. DND is wonderful and brings me quiet evenings. By having it mirror my iPhone, I can set DND on either device manually and the other copies. You still have all other functions as normal, and a blue Moon icon at the top indicates DND mode.
Mute mode turns off sound, but still allows taptic notifications. A fast way to mute an incoming notification is to hold your palm over the watch face for three seconds. That not only silences the current notification (say an incoming call), but then sets Mute mode until you clear it. Great for meetings or while driving. This palm-to-mute mode is the Watch equivalent to the mute switch on the iPhone.
If I am at a concert or other event where I want to be sure there will be not interruptions, I will either set Mute and DND together, or I'll engage Power Reserve mode.
Power Reserve gives you just a simple watch that tells you the current time at the press of the side button (green digital hours:minutes). All sensors and radios are disabled. Consequently, you'll have up to 72 hours of battery life. I'd like to test that someday, but that would mean missing out on a week of fitness tracking, unless I manually entered the data later. I have had the watch go into Power Reserve mode on its own during a 6 hour hike I was tracking with the Workout App.
Airplane Mode would do it, but sacrifices all other functions that use data, such as weather or stocks (fitness tracking, and any locally saved data still work fine). I have Airplane Mode mirror my iPhone, so I can quickly set both just by setting Airplane Mode on either the Watch or the iPhone. Very convenient if I want to quickly just set everything to Airplane Mode.
Airplane/Mute/DND can each toggle via the Control Center Glance on the Watch, or the Control Center on iPhone. It sounds complicated, but once you figure out how you like to use it, it's a piece of cake. There's a lot of granularity there to configure it for your day-to-day flow.