jonnysods
macrumors G3
Open up ways for us to design our own faces, would be so fun.
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watchOS 27 to Offer New Watch Faces, Including 'Modular Ultra' Variant
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Arran
macrumors 603
A "Face Playground" would interest me so much more than "Image Playground" currently does.
Apple could give it to the interns as a summer project and see what they come up with.
Arran
macrumors 603
Yeah, the chunkiness is getting old after a few years.
I'd like to get down to one Apple Watch for everything instead of an Ultra for daytime and S9 for sleep - but I like the Wayfinder and Modern Ultra faces too much.
Apple, focus on better battery, solar power charging, WiFi 6 for Watches, better connectivity and mic algorithms ...
Doesn’t the Series 11 technically have a bigger screen than the Ultra 3? I mean u get it but it’s funny they’re dialing back the size for a bigger display lol
Hand’s Avoidance sounds awesome. Just when you think all the features you have is enough new one shows up. Which garmin it is. Looks great.
the future
macrumors 68040
Nope. Series 10/11 have a slightly bigger screen than Ultra 1/2, but slightly smaller than Ultra 3.
Also, they need/want to make it work for the smaller version of the Series watches, too, and that display is significantly smaller and would not accommodate an unchanged Modular Ultra face and still be legible/tapable.
turbineseaplane
macrumors Penryn
Since Ultra is in the name this will no doubt be limited to the Ultra which sucks.
Grayburn
macrumors 68030
ipedro
macrumors 604
We know that Apple isn't likely going to let people create any watch face but it would be a good compromise if they expanded the capability to customize watch faces in a "Watch Face Builder" with available blocks mixing and even matching blocks from multiple watch faces. Would be cool if you could also share them like you can share Shortcuts.
apple4everOG
macrumors newbie
How about they just let developers build third party watch faces? Why Tim Apple has to be so stubborn to give his customers what they want and need.
RedGT
macrumors 6502
What would that app be??
I use Clockology, it’s easy to set up.
Plenty of tutorials on YouTube.
Lunarman25
macrumors member
MisterSavage
macrumors 603
Thinking of some of the pleasant people in this thread that I created that argued that we were "moaning" when pointing out how the Apple Watch needs good digital watch faces like the Ultra.
These times a thousand. It's the bare minimum that should have happened years ago but I'd be happy to get it.
I submitted one years ago also. 🙂
100%. Find someone that loves you as much as Apple loves analog watch faces.
Fun fact: I'm pretty sure the Series 10 had an Ultra-sized screen AND a CPU better than the Ultras when it was released because the Ultra skipped a year for a new model.
These times a thousand. It's the bare minimum that should have happened years ago but I'd be happy to get it.
I submitted one years ago also. 🙂
100%. Find someone that loves you as much as Apple loves analog watch faces.
Fun fact: I'm pretty sure the Series 10 had an Ultra-sized screen AND a CPU better than the Ultras when it was released because the Ultra skipped a year for a new model.
CarlJ
Contributor
i suspect Apple would say the limitation is screen size - if they put a watch face on the 46mm watch, they would want to offer it on the 40mm watch as well, and the 40mm watch only has about 7/8ths as many pixels across, and down, as the Ultra.
Apple has a long-standing habit of not going to extra work to shoehorn in new ideas to work on older or smaller devices, if it would take extra work. People often rail against this saying "there's no technical reason!" when there is, in fact a technical reason, it's just a small hurdle that Apple doesn't want to put the effort into overcoming, and/or feels the stepped-down version, to fit on the older/smaller device, "isn't up to their standards". It's a fairly predictable attitude from Apple.
| Apple Watch Ultra 3 | 422 by 514 pixels |
| Apple Watch S11 46mm | 416 by 496 pixels |
| Apple Watch S11 40mm | 374 by 446 pixels |
CarlJ
Contributor
I would absolutely love to have access to that kind of face on my Apple Watch - that's the exact reason I don't use any of the analog faces that have complications on the dial - slavishly recreating the mechanical experience down to obscuring useful information multiple times an hour/day is just asinine.
It's cool that Apple designers took inspiration from mechanical watches, but there's a need to evolve from that point, to take advantage of new technology, rather than just slavishly creating art pieces that look like mechanical watches.
I can understand that watch faces are a very special case on the Apple Watch in that they need to be extremely efficient and error-free, since they're on all the time. But you'd think by now Apple could have developed (maybe already has for internal use) a "watch face exerciser" that tests potential watch faces under all possible conditions they might face, to ensure they don't crash or use too many resources (running down the battery).
There should be a WatchFaceKit, even if Apple only provides a limited curated set of 3rd-party faces on the store, that meet super rigorous requirements. If they did that, I'd probably end up writing my own just for personal use (starting with a 24 hour from-the-bottom analog ring around digital time and complications - present the time in more non-standard ways (yes, there is the Solar Dial face - no, it's not what I want - starting with, it's pretty but stupidly hard to read at a glance - I want faster comprehension, not artwork).
Piggie
macrumors G3
I'm surprised.
I had no idea it was possible to use custom 3rd party faces on an Apple watch