Everything New in watchOS 4.3: iPhone Music Controls, Portrait Orientation Nightstand Mode and More

[MacRumors]

Apple yesterday seeded the first beta of watchOS 4.3 to developers, and there are some great new features that many Apple Watch owners have been requesting for quite some time.

We've outlined all of the changes you'll find in the watchOS 4.3 update in the video and the post below.

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First and foremost, watchOS 4.3 once again allows Apple Watch owners to access their Apple Music Library for iPhone, a feature that was removed in watchOS 4.

With watchOS 4.3, there's a new "On iPhone" section in the Music app that lets you access your playlists, albums, songs, and artists. Prior to this update, you could access your music library, but only when playing music on the watch itself.

When playing music on the iPhone, you were only able to use the Now Playing feature to skip tracks -- there was no library access for choosing songs to play on the iPhone from the Apple Watch. Apple Watch owners have been complaining about the removal of iPhone music controls on Apple Watch since watchOS 4 debuted, so this should be a welcome change for many people.

Along with music controls, watchOS 4.3 adds your daily Activity information to the Siri watch face, so you can see your current progress at a glance without needing to open up the Activity app, and it introduces a new charging animation when the watch is placed on a charging puck.

The final new feature in watchOS 4.3 is Nightstand Mode while the Apple Watch is in portrait orientation. Since Nightstand Mode was first introduced, using it has required putting the Apple Watch in landscape orientation on its side. That's no longer necessary -- you can now use Nightstand mode in any orientation.

Apple doesn't make watchOS betas available to its public beta testers because there's no way to restore an Apple Watch to an older operating system, so the watchOS 4.3 update will be limited to developers until its public launch.

We'll likely see watchOS 4.3 in the spring alongside iOS 11.3, macOS 10.13.4, and tvOS 11.3.

Article Link: Everything New in watchOS 4.3: iPhone Music Controls, Portrait Orientation Nightstand Mode and More

 

[archvile]

11.3 and 4.3 both seem like big steps in the right direction... hopefully they iron some of the bugs out on the way, especially with iOS.

 

[RF9]

I was hoping Watch OS 4.3 supported iMessage in iCloud the way 11.3 does on the phone. The phone syncs to iCloud but the watch does not yet sync. Or is the plan to never sync with the watch?
When I say sync, I'm primarily talking about deleting messages on one carries over to the other. I currently still have to delete them in both places.
If not, it would be nice to get a "delete all messages" option. Deleting them off the watch one by one is tedious.

 

[Braderunner]

I want it. Wish they had public beta for WatchOS.

 

[scottcampbell]

2
:38

Really? Not...
2:
38

 

[tmoney468]

My original apple watch is almost at EOL - it's really only useful for telling the time and tracking workouts. Everything else is impossibly slow and unusable.

 

[0958400]

The .3 XXos sound interesting so far. Let's hope they are not as buggy as the last versions. While I'm looking forward to some of those features, I prefer a seamless experience, that Apple used to stand for.

 

[trailrunner]

The way my nightstand, charger, and velcro band interplay when I set my watch down at night make it tough to do Nightstand Mode in landscape. The watch always flops down since the band doesn't have enough stiffness to hold itself up. The portrait nightstand mode is very welcome!

 

[RemE]

Cards in general, like iHeart Radio, Downcast etc. have improved over the firmware versions but they still are inconsistent. Open a card one day and immediately play something, try it later and they just sit maddening idle, forcing you to just pull out the phone and play what you want. The rest seems like, how you say, "mouse nuts".

 

[tomtendo]

I want Night Stand Mode to always be on when plugged in... otherwise whats the point of it?

 

[bluespider]

YES! Absolutely looking forward to seeing music library on watch!!!

 

[kemal]

I wish there were a way to switch from BlueTooth to wireless when the phone is jut far enough away for BT to see the phone but not transfer any data.

 

[djeeyore25]

So happy to see iPhone music controls back on the Apple Watch. They never should have been removed to begin with.

 

[s15119]

Progress. I hope I get Breathe Reminders

 

[northernbaldy]

Still no podcasts

 

[scrapesleon]

Does the new charging animation works for series 1?

 

[dgeviper]

My boyfriend recently bought one of these. Really the only feature he wanted was a pedometer that stayed on the screen at all times. How is this not an out-of-the-box feature? How about they add THAT feature in one of these new versions of the software?

 

[Gnratnx]

How they can allow us to download offline music but not podcast is seriously annoying. How hard can that possibly be?

 

[themick4u]

Thank you Apple for finally hearing us all!!!!

 

[robertcoogan]

Wow! I am totally psyched about being able to control my music from my Apple Watch.

Just so I can save myself the agony of doing it on my iPhone. Which is in my pocket.

 

[porkrind]

I want it. Wish they had public beta for WatchOS.

Soon

 

[RF9]

My boyfriend recently bought one of these. Really the only feature he wanted was a pedometer that stayed on the screen at all times. How is this not an out-of-the-box feature? How about they add THAT feature in one of these new versions of the software?

I know it's not out of the box, but what you want is https://healthfaceapp.com/
It'll give you complications for any data you want, like steps.
Apple prefers to give rings instead of raw data. That's Apple for you.

 

[Shirasaki]

Also, please add a feature to allow us to forward or rewind the music played through watch. Right now, I cannot find any such option in WatchOS 4.2.2.

 

[Apple_Robert]

I want it. Wish they had public beta for WatchOS.

The beta has the risk of bricking your watch. And if that happened, you would have to send off to Apple.
[doublepost=1517006359][/doublepost]

Progress. I hope I get Breathe Reminders

Breathe reminders are already available on 4.2.2 s3
[doublepost=1517006465][/doublepost]

I want Night Stand Mode to always be on when plugged in... otherwise whats the point of it?

You can always ask Siri what time it is and the watch lights up.

 

[s15119]

Breathe reminders are already available on 4.2.2 s3

Hmmmm, not working for me and many others. Any suggestions on how to make them work? Are they working for you?