Apple’s software vision for the Apple Watch was unveiled during the company’s WWDC 2017 event today in San Jose, revealing a host of new features coming to wearers’ wrists later this year.
With watchOS 4, Apple’s designers have focused on making the device more personal than ever. Siri is more powerful than ever thanks to some new machine learning tricks that make the personal assistant absolutely indispensable.
Developers can grab watchOS 4 beta 1 today. It will be available to all Apple Watch owners as a free update later this year.
The new watchOS 4 update brings some big UI changes to the watch. Apple added a new dock that makes it easier to find apps. Simply scroll up to see recently used apps. There are also a bunch of new watch faces that make it easier to stay organized throughout the day.
Photo: Apple
watchOS 4 comes with a new kaleidoscope watch face too. You can create different styles for the face based off pictures in your iPhone’s Camera Roll. There are also new Toy Story faces featuring Woody, Jessie and Buzz Lightyear.
Activity notifications are more personalized in the new update. Apple Watch will now serve up personalized motivation notifications to keep you on track to beat your fitness goals.
The Workout app has been revamped to be more powerful too. You can now open the app and start a workout with one tap. There’s a new rest feature that pauses swimming workouts. High Intensity Interval Training is now natively supported in the Exercise app too.
Apple Watch will communicate with gym equipment now with watchOS 4. Devices that support the feature will let your watch connect to the gym’s machine so that it can share data. The feature will be rolling out this Fall.
More details on watchOS 4 will be made available through out the week, so stay tuned for new info on all the big and small features.
