After linking your new Apple Watch to your iPhone, your favorite contacts are automatically synced over. But to get the most from the device, you’ll want to make a couple of tweaks to the Apple Watch Friends screen.
It’s truly one of the most important screens on the Apple Watch — here’s how to make the most of it.
You’ll find 12 of your closest family members and friends on the Apple Watch Friends screen, arranged in a circle at all the points of the clock. The Friends screen is accessed by tapping the dedicated physical button (aka the Friends button) on the side of the Apple Watch below the Digital Crown. You use the Digital Crown to scroll through the people on the list.
When you first set it up, your iPhone automatically adds up to 12 of your favorite contacts to your Apple Watch.
But if you have open slots (like I did), or want to rearrange your circle of contacts, you’ll have to head to your iPhone.
Pro tip: To get the most from your watch, you might want to add friends who also have an Apple Watch. That way, you can make the most from your new toy’s Digital Touch features, swapping heartbeats, pictograms and the new animated emoticons. After you add a friend with an Apple Watch, you’ll see the extra options. If a friend doesn’t have an Apple Watch, they won’t have the tap icon below their profile picture.
Also, if it’s not obvious who to add, head over to the phone or messages app on your iPhone to see who you are in regular contact with.
Add contacts to the Friends Screen
To add, remove or rearrange your contacts on the Friends screen, follow these steps.
- Launch Apple Watch app on iPhone.
- On the menu bar along the bottom, make sure you are in the My Watch tab.
- Scroll down the list of settings and hit “Friends.”
- Select “Add a Friend.”
- Search or select from your list of contacts.
- Hit their name and they will be added to the list.
Your new contact will now appear in your Friends list and sync over to the Friends app on your Apple Watch. Syncing is automatic and near instantaneous.
Reorder Friends or remove them
Want to change the order in which your Friends appear? Here’s how to move things around.
- Go the Apple Watch app on your iPhone and select the Friends tab at bottom.
- On the top right, select “Edit.”
- Tap and hold the hamburger grab bar on the right and drag the contact to a new position.
- When you’re done, simply tap the Done button at top right.
Want to remove somebody from your Friends list? Here’s how to quickly delete them.
- Go the Apple Watch app on your iPhone and select the Friends tab at bottom.
- On the top right, select “Edit.”
- Hit the red delete icon to the left of the contact’s name.
- Hit the “Remove” button to confirm.
- When finished, hit the “Done” button at top right.
Leander Kahney is the editor and publisher of Cult of Mac.
Leander is a longtime technology reporter and the author of six acclaimed books about Apple, including two New York Times bestsellers: Jony Ive: The Genius Behind Apple’s Greatest Products and Inside Steve’s Brain, a biography of Steve Jobs.
He’s also written a top-selling biography of Apple CEO Tim Cook and authored Cult of Mac and Cult of iPod, which both won prestigious design awards. Most recently, he was co-author of Cult of Mac, 2nd Edition.
Leander has been reporting about Apple and technology for nearly 30 years.
Before founding Cult of Mac as an independent publication, Leander was news editor at Wired.com, where he was responsible for the day-to-day running of the Wired.com website. He headed up a team of six section editors, a dozen reporters and a large pool of freelancers. Together the team produced a daily digest of stories about the impact of science and technology, and won several awards, including several Webby Awards, 2X Knight-Batten Awards for Innovation in Journalism and the 2010 MIN (Magazine Industry Newsletter) award for best blog, among others.
Before being promoted to news editor, Leander was Wired.com’s senior reporter, primarily covering Apple. During that time, Leander published a ton of scoops, including the first in-depth report about the development of the iPod. Leander attended almost every keynote speech and special product launch presented by Steve Jobs, including the historic launches of the iPhone and iPad. He also reported from almost every Macworld Expo in the late ’90s and early ‘2000s, including, sadly, the last shows in Boston, San Francisco and Tokyo. His reporting for Wired.com formed the basis of the first Cult of Mac book, and subsequently this website.
Before joining Wired, Leander was a senior reporter at the legendary MacWeek, the storied and long-running weekly that documented Apple and its community in the 1980s and ’90s.
Leander has written for Wired magazine (including the Issue 16.04 cover story about Steve Jobs’ leadership at Apple, entitled Evil/Genius), Scientific American, The Guardian, The Observer, The San Francisco Chronicle and many other publications.
Leander is an expert on:
Apple and Apple history
Steve Jobs, Jony Ive, Tim Cook and Apple leadership
Apple community
iPhone and iOS
iPad and iPadOS
Mac and macOS
Apple Watch and watchOS
Apple TV and tvOS
AirPods
Leander has a postgrad diploma in artificial intelligence from the University of Aberdeen, and a BSc (Hons) in experimental psychology from the University of Sussex.
He has a diploma in journalism from the UK’s National Council for the Training of Journalists.
Leander lives in San Francisco, California, and is married with four children. He’s an avid biker and has ridden in many long-distance bike events, including California’s legendary Death Ride.
You can find out more about Leander on LinkedIn and Facebook. You can follow him on X at @lkahney or Instagram.
