At WWDC 2024 on June 10, Apple unveiled watchOS 11, the next operating system update for Apple Watch. Apple will make the Apple Watch software update available to compatible Apple Watches on Monday, September 16.
The software brings new apps, new features, new face customization options, an improved Smart Stack, and significant changes to the Apple Watch’s health and fitness features.
watchOS 11: release date
Apple’s watchOS 11 will be available for download on September 16.
Updating to the new version should be straightforward, but if you’re not sure how to do it, you can check out our step-by-step guide on how to update watchOS.
Even after Apple releases watchOS 11, further software updates will be available throughout 2024 and into 2025.
watchOS 11: Compatibility
watchOS 11 will work with the Apple Watch Series 6 or later. The Apple Watch Series 6 was released in 2020, while the Apple Watch SE was also released in 2020, so it doesn’t have WatchOS 11.
This therefore includes:
- Apple Watch Series 6 (2020)
- Apple Watch Series 7 (2021)
- Apple Watch SE 2 (2022)
- Apple Watch Series 8 (2022)
- Apple Watch Ultra (2022)
- Apple Watch Series 9 (2023)
- Apple Watch Ultra 2 (2023)
- Apple Watch Series 10 (2024)
watchOS 9 and 10 were compatible with the original Series 4, 5, and SE.
What are the new features in watchOS 11?
Read on for a sneak peek at the new features coming to your Apple Watch with watchOS 11.
New Watch Faces
We’ll start with something that comes up almost every year: new watch faces.
Or maybe we should say upgraded faces instead of new ones, since this is a change from the existing Photos face. The way this will change in watchOS 11 is that you’ll be able to create custom faces more easily, thanks to some help from the operating system. The watch will analyze thousands of your photos to make a recommendation on which ones will work well as a face (based on composition, facial expression, and other factors), then help you crop and zoom to get the best positioning in the frame.
You’ll get a range of customization options beyond that, including font, layout, clock size, and more, and there’s also a dynamic mode that will display a different photo every time you raise your wrist.
Ability
The Apple Watch’s core features revolve around health and fitness, and it’s no surprise that Apple is focusing heavily on these areas in watchOS 11.
On the fitness side, there’s a new metric called Training Load, designed to help users understand the strain that exercise puts on the body and how workouts are impacting their body. Workouts will be given an effort rating on a scale of 1 to 10, based on age, height, weight, heart rate, GPS data and workout type, but users can further tweak this to account for factors like stress. Then, longer-term data can be used to analyse whether the strain on the body is “increasing, staying the same or decreasing so they can adjust their training to get the best results”.
watchOS 11 also brings the ability to pause the Activity rings when you need a day off or are dealing with an injury but don’t want to interrupt a streak. (It’s a feature that’s been needed for as long as the Apple Watch has existed.) You can pause the rings for as long as you want: a day, a week, or even a month or more.
These rings will also be more customizable than in the past. You’ll be able to choose to change the rings’ goals based on the day of the week, so that calorie goals are lower on Sundays, for example, if that’s when you like to rest. This is another feature that’s been needed for a long time; it’s always been odd and inflexible for the Apple Watch to insist that your fitness habits be the same throughout the week.
Another regular feature of watchOS updates is the addition of new workout types, and watchOS 11 is no exception. The key factor here is improved GPS positioning, meaning more workout types can track distance and provide GPS map data, including soccer, American football, lacrosse, cross-country skiing, golf, outdoor rowing, and more. The Custom Workouts feature can now also be used for pool swimming.
Vital signs
There’s a new app for the Apple Watch, an entirely new app on all of Apple’s platforms, called Vitals. It brings together useful health-related metrics (including the new training load information discussed above) and makes them easy to browse in one place.
For example, you can monitor your heart rate and compare the current measurement to your usual heart rate. Outliers are flagged, in case they deserve to be checked by a healthcare professional, and the app explains what has changed compared to the norm and suggests possible causes.
Higher temperatures, for example, “can be caused by many factors, including illness or alcohol consumption.” Apple says a notification may be triggered if two or more measurements are outside their normal range.
Pregnancy support
Continuing with a focus on health and fitness, watchOS 11 (along with iOS 18 and iPadOS 18) is designed to help pregnant women “reflect changes in their physical and mental health during this important time.” You’ll need to log the pregnancy in the Health app, and then the Apple Watch’s Cycle Tracking app will track gestational age, let you log symptoms, and prompt you to adjust your high heart rate notification threshold and similar features. Fall Detection can adjust its sensitivity to account for the typically more unsteady nature of pregnant women, while the Health app can be set to prompt the user to regularly review their mental health.
Translate
Here’s another new app, but in this case, it’s only available on Apple Watch. The Translate app uses machine learning to help you navigate conversations in other languages. (There’s a total of 20 languages supported.) It also provides romanized pronunciation guides for languages that use different alphabets.
Smart battery
Apple announced that the Smart Stack feature has gotten even better. It can now suggest live activities, letting you follow sporting events or the progress of your Uber driver. The feature can use information about your routine, as well as time and location, to suggest appropriate widgets, like a weather alert widget when bad weather approaches. There are also new widgets based on Shazam, Photos, Distance, and more.
The Smart Stack can also suggest a relevant translation widget when you’re traveling to another country and includes access to the Check In feature, which is also coming to Apple Watch for the first time.
Registration
Speaking of which… this handy personal safety feature, already available on iPhone since the launch of iOS 17 last year, lets you easily let your friends and family know that you’ve reached your destination. And now it’s coming to the Apple Watch.
It’s been integrated into the Workout app, which seems perfect for those who do nighttime runs, as well as Messages (like on the iPhone).
What about Apple Intelligence?
The new Apple Watch Translate app and the Photos watch face customization algorithm both rely on machine learning, but it was noted at WWDC that the Apple Watch has much less access to Apple’s new AI developments, at least in this first wave. Apple Intelligence features are coming to the iPhone, iPad, and Mac… but the Apple Watch wasn’t mentioned.
It’s likely that watchOS will be part of Apple Intelligence at some point, but not yet. With one small exception: Apple says that “summary notifications, powered by Apple Intelligence, will flow from iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max to Apple Watch.”
History of the Apple Watch and watchOS
watchOS 11 is available now as a developer beta, and a public beta will be available in July. The final version of watchOS 11 will be available to the public in the fall. We expect to see the Apple Watch Series 10, Apple Watch Ultra 3, and Apple Watch SE 3rd generation, running watchOS 11, launch in September 2024 at the company’s Glowtime event (see how to watch the September event). If you’re in the market for a new Apple Watch, check out our Apple Watch buying guide , our roundup of the best Apple Watch deals , and our advice on whether to buy the Apple Watch now or wait . You might also be interested in what other new Apple products are coming out this year and when the next Apple event is . Below are links to all of our Apple Watch reviews.
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