My Apple Watch Renaissance

For a few months in the summer, I upgraded to the iOS 10 and watchOS 3 dev previews.¹ Expectedly, things didn’t work well, so I had to roll back. What I didn’t know was that you cannot downgrade an Apple Watch unless you mail it back to Apple! Thus, I was watchless for a few months.

When I got my watch back, nothing really changed with my usage. It’s a nice notification hub but it wasn’t ever essential. This changed when I started making the watch app for Moodsmitten 1.1. I was forced to see what has been done with the ecosystem. It had been a while since I launched a third-party app because watchOS 1 & 2 were ridiculously slow. watchOS 3 fixes the issue entirely, and makes third-party apps viable!

By far, the most useful feature of watchOS 3 is the ability to easily swipe between faces. I’ve made multiple watch faces for different parts of my day. I have a watch face I use for sleeping, one for workouts, two for work, and several others for Moodsmitten development. watchOS already the ability to have multiple watch faces from the start, but the combination of the complications introduced in watchOS 2, and the UX rework of watchOS 3 has finally made it click in my daily life.

I’ll go into particular apps in December or January, but I’ll say that my favorite complication is the large workout one in the Modular face that displays your last workout. I’ve started working out again, and seeing that I just exercised is very satisfying. I keep it on one of my "work" watch faces to give me motivation to get other things done.

Did you like this post? Are you smitten for Soundsmitten? Click the "Tweet" link below to retweet my post. It keeps my livelihood afloat, brightens my day, and I'm always eternally grateful. Thanks for your help!