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Benz63amg

macrumors 601
Original poster
Oct 17, 2010
4,590
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When I play music on my iPhone I don’t see the now playing small round icon on the top of my watch face as it used to show before the upgrade, is there a setting I need to switch on of something on the new OS?
 
I was about to write a thread for that after few restarts of AW… Luckily I am not alone.
What the…
I used it a lot to operate music played from iPhone on AirPods while in public transport.

Now I have to open damn app all the times as it’s sometimes way easier and faster to use watch than get phone out of pocket (beauty of crowded public transport where everyone is like inside sardine can).

Reports to feedback… you stunned me with this thread and liked posts
 
Now I have to open damn app all the times as it’s sometimes way easier and faster to use watch than get phone out of pocket (beauty of crowded public transport where everyone is like inside sardine can).

No, you don't have to do that. Simply press the side button on your AW to bring up the app switcher. Music/Now Playing will be at the top. Tap it. Voila.
 
No, you don't have to do that. Simply press the side button on your AW to bring up the app switcher. Music/Now Playing will be at the top. Tap it. Voila.
Still have to open it weird way.

Ridiculous, but thanks for workaround
 
And apparently the excuse for it is that the Music app will be at the top of the app stack when you press the side button on your AW to switch to an app.

Can't say I really used it a lot, but I don't understand their logic in removing it and providing no option to put it back.

Just noticed this as well today. But at least this will be more consistent for me. It was always a bit hit/miss it working for me.

Specifically, I'm mostly using a 3rd party podcast player. If not in Workout mode, their Watch app showed on top as expected (At least for me). But when in Workout mode, would get Now Playing app, which I was not happy with as could not pick playlists or different track, wound up having to do the side button thing anyway (had the app near the top of the dock).

AND: side button is a more deliberate way of getting to it, and in line with everything else (dock, app list/cloud, or complication).
 
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There are so many “features” in this release that seem like bugs. No “now playing” or workout icons at the top center anymore. The workout screen has a smaller font with a bunch of blank space around it. Notifications come in bigger (and it looks like a different font) but don’t translate nicely to the smaller version and just look obnoxious (all subtlety is gone). As a watch owner since the series 0 launch, this is the worst release I’ve seen.
 
There are so many “features” in this release that seem like bugs. No “now playing” or workout icons at the top center anymore. The workout screen has a smaller font with a bunch of blank space around it. Notifications come in bigger (and it looks like a different font) but don’t translate nicely to the smaller version and just look obnoxious (all subtlety is gone). As a watch owner since the series 0 launch, this is the worst release I’ve seen.
It's annoying when companies (And this is really every single company that makes software) get to the point where it's like they MUST change things just for the sake of saying things are updated/new/better etc...

But really, they should just let certain features exist as mature as they are...
 
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No, you don't have to do that. Simply press the side button on your AW to bring up the app switcher. Music/Now Playing will be at the top. Tap it. Voila.
Just found out about this as well after updating. Definitely not a fan of this change. I see it’s in the dock on the side button but I’ll also have to scroll to the top. So if I used another app in my dock previously and then want to change the music, I need to click the side button, scroll all the way up to my music app, and then tap the app. That’s a lot of hassle compared to before where I just tapped a small icon on my screen which was basically a free adaptive complication that only showed when needed
 
Just found out about this as well after updating. Definitely not a fan of this change. I see it’s in the dock on the side button but I’ll also have to scroll to the top. So if I used another app in my dock previously and then want to change the music, I need to click the side button, scroll all the way up to my music app, and then tap the app. That’s a lot of hassle compared to before where I just tapped a small icon on my screen which was basically a free adaptive complication that only showed when needed

Well that's odd. No matter how many other apps I switch to on my AW while music is playing, if I press the side button, the Music app is right there front and center--no need to scroll. In fact, if you pull up the app switcher without any music playing, and then press play on a song on your iPhone, you'll see the Music app pop up on the app switcher right in the middle:

incoming-E560274E-C9F0-437A-9611-7B27C3CD1EDF.PNG
 
Well that's odd. No matter how many other apps I switch to on my AW while music is playing, if I press the side button, the Music app is right there front and center--no need to scroll. In fact, if you pull up the app switcher without any music playing, and then press play on a song on your iPhone, you'll see the Music app pop up on the app switcher right in the middle:

View attachment 2089592
Strange. Do you have your app switcher set to show most recent apps or favorite apps? I have mine set to favorite.
 
Strange. Do you have your app switcher set to show most recent apps or favorite apps? I have mine set to favorite.

Watch > Dock (what we've been calling "app switcher") was set to "Recents", but I switched it to "Favorites" and it still worked the way I described. Even if I remove the Music app from my Favorites list, it will still jump to the top of the AW dock when I start playing a song from my iPhone.
 
"Now playing" is not longer appearing in my dock. Anyone else experiencing this?
Probably since watchOS 9.3, not sure.
 
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