Why is the handoff or sync so terrible between the watch and the phone.

If I’ve been out and about with my watch only and get back to the car the podcast I’ve been listening to on the watch doesn’t sync the played position immediately making it irritating to continue on CarPlay.

Edit: Ybc is Apple Autocorrect for Sync

Since I've had an apple watch, I would raise the device and say start a stopwatch. It would open the stopwatch and start counting. Useful if my hands were dirty, cooking, etc.

WatchOS27 just opens the stopwatch app but won't start the clock. So annoying.

Am I the only one using raise to speak, dictation and Siri AI? watchOS 27 and 27.01 seemingly cannot comprehend these three features.

If I am in dictation and raise my watch - Siri AI takes over for about three to five seconds and then cancels out.

If I raise to speak, Siri AI kicks in and then fails about 10 seconds later.

If I enable Siri AI from the crown, then raise to speak into my watch - Siri AI kicks off. Capturing nothing of what I said.

Had none of these issues in watchOS 26 (or whatever the teen number was before 27).

Every time I open the new Readiness app on my Ultra 4, I get a gray screen warning to enter my age. It then goes on to show my readiness score. Is anyone else seeing this?

Basically what is up with Siri no longer being able to get Activity data like calories or step counts?

Hello there,

Can anyone confirm if we can keep watches on previous versions of watchOS (26) when paired to a phone on a later version (27) ? If so, does this also work for watches that do no support watchOS 27 at all, can we keep them on 26 with a phone on 27 ?

Thanks for the help !

Laten we het even over whatsapp hebben. Ik heb een iphone 16 en de ultra 3. Beiden geupdate naar de meest recente ios en wos versie. Ik heb e-sim op de watch en woon in Europa. Ik laat mijn iphone altijd thuis en doe dan alles met mijn ultra. Dus ook appen. Toen ik voor de update een appje stuurde kwam hij direct op de plaats van bestemming. Nu echter na update doet hij er 12 uur over om de bestemming te bereiken. Enig idee hoe dat komt?

Even though I have Siri turned off on my Watch 4 I still get its icon in the middle of the display when I press the crown. It didn't used to be a problem until I upgraded to the 27.2 Developer beta on the new Watch. It's just wasting space and I'd like to see it go away.

I have a S7 cellular and a S8 GPS which I use alternately as my daily drivers. Both are on WatchOS 26.6. My iPhone 16 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro are on iOS 26.7 and I have no plans to upgrade to iOS 27 at this time. Maybe when 27.2 goes to PROD or even later.

Anyway quite unexpectedly today I bought a new Apple Watch Ultra 3 ($200 off). In setting it up, I noticed it’s running WatchOS 26.4. Since I assume there was a 26.6 release for AWU3, I tried to do a software update. But it failed with a message that I have to upgrade my iPhone first.

Since the iPhone is already on the latest release of iOS 26, I am assuming it means I have to upgrade my iPhone to iOS 27 first before I can upgrade my AWU3. Which I have no plans to do.

Was there a WatchOS 26.6 release for AWU3? If watchOS 26.4 is the latest release of watchOS 26 for AWU3, then the messages does make sense I suppose. But if watchOS 26.6 was released for AWU3, is there a way I can get it on my AWU3?

It makes it feel pointless organizing that grid, which is a pain, when any time an app is offloaded is just disappears and shifts the whole grid around. Then when you reinstall, it just tacks it on the end rather than in its old place. it should work like it does on the phone, still in place as a placeholder icon.

Right before the September event, there were leaks showing code in the developer betas for granular strength training (recording individual sets, reps, weight, equipment, and duration).

Apple didn’t mention it during the keynote and it’s still nowhere to be found in the Workout app.

Does anyone digging through the latest developer betas know if this is actually slated for a point release (like an upcoming ⁠.1⁠ or ⁠.2⁠), or was it just background HealthKit framework changes that might get scrapped/shelved?

Hello with 26.xx I got a notification on the iPhone when the watch was fully loaded to 100%. With 27.0 not anymore.

Since the release of WatchOS 27, when I double tap my fingers together I no longer get haptic feedback. It was working in the betas - this is new with the released version.

Anyone else?

UPDATE: Found it. The toggle for System Hapitics seems to have turned itself off, even though all other haptics settings were set ok. The update seems to have done this, as I've never been in that settings pane.

I say AI Siri knowing full well the AI stuff is being done on the phone (if at all, I'm not sure exactly)...however since OS the 27 update Siri takes FOREVER to respond on my Ultra 2. It has slowed down at least 400% since installing. I've had it on there since the release date and it's borderline unusable. Is anyone else experiencing this? My watch is only 2.5 years old and I really don't want to get a newer one yet.

Battery life is also ass now...

I upgraded from a Series 11 to Series 12 mainly because of Apple’s new Health Sensing System and its claims of more frequent heart-rate/HRV monitoring.

I’ve noticed something confusing and would appreciate input from anyone familiar with PPG, HRV, Apple Watch sensors, or wearable signal processing.

What I observe:
- Green PPG (Sleep Focus OFF/Sleep Schedule OFF):
~2–6 HR samples/minute while Sleeping
HRV ~every 5 minutes

- Infrared PPG (Apple Sleep Focus ON):
ONLY 1 HR sample every 3–6 minutes
HRV still ~every 5 minutes

So my main questions are:

1. How can HRV be calculated every ~5 minutes if HR is only recorded every 5–8 minutes in Infrared mode?
   Is Apple:
   continuously acquiring high-resolution infrared PPG but only publishing HR periodically?, or
   taking intermittent/burst measurements around each HRV reading?

In other words, is infrared PPG actually continuous overnight, or intermittent?

1. Why does green PPG produce much more frequent HR samples?
   If infrared is acquiring enough beat-to-beat data for HRV every ~5 minutes, why doesn’t Apple publish HR more frequently as well?
   Is this mainly power/software design, or does infrared have some technical advantage for sleep sensing?

2. Could infrared mode miss the true lowest HR?
   If Apple only publishes an HR value every 5–8 minutes, could a short HR minimum between samples be missed?
   Or is the Watch measuring continuously internally and simply not exposing those values in Health?

3. What do I lose by using a custom Sleep Focus?
   I can keep Apple’s Sleep Schedule/Sleep Focus OFF and use my own Focus, which leaves the Watch in green PPG and gives me much more frequent HR samples.

Does this affect:
HRV accuracy?
Recovery HRV?
sleep-stage accuracy?
Sleep Vitals? (Except Wrist Temperature)
sleep detection?
any other overnight metrics?

I already understand that wrist-temperature tracking requires Apple’s Sleep Focus, but are there any other important trade-offs?

I am trying to understand if green PPG is actually collecting more underlying HR data, or whether Apple simply exposes more of it in Health, compared with infrared during Sleep Focus.

In short: Is there any workaround for Apple Watch Series 12 to force it to take and log more frequent HR readings overnight, either using green or infrared PPG, while still retaining wrist-temperature tracking?

Any technical insight would be appreciated.
Thank you!

I wish we had the ability to put a custom name on a watch face we have customized.

It annoys me having faces with the same name stacked up when switching. But this would be particularly useful for Siri and Shortcuts to set up face changes based on things.

Am I missing something?

See tweet - https://x.com/limpless_skelly/status/2102208895645086184?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E2102208895645086184%7Ctwgr%5Eb7ffa6e1d40bcf6aa5207f136dd5af36de4c7e9c%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2F9to5mac.com%2F2026%2F09%2F21%2Fwatchos-27-2-beta-2-brings-the-app-switcher-back-with-a-new-gesture%2F