At the end of 2023 Apple made an announcement that it will be halting sales of the Apple Watch Series 9 and Apple Watch Ultra 2. The reason for this was due to a patent ruling by the International Trade Commission that indicated that Apple violated the patents of Masimo.

The result of this was that the Blood Oxygen sensor would not be available for any Apple Watch Series 9 and Apple Ultra 2 sold in the United States after December 24th, 2023. At the time, only these two items were affected, but it would include any future watches released in the United States, including the Apple Watch Series 10.

Even though the injunction was in place, it did not prevent Apple from including the Blood Oxygen hardware, which Apple continued to do.

Blood Oxygen App Returns

Yesterday, Apple announced that the Blood Oxygen sensor feature would return to the Apple Watch, with a slight change. From the Apple Newsroom post:

Following this update, sensor data from the Blood Oxygen app on Apple Watch will be measured and calculated on the paired iPhone, and results can be viewed in the Respiratory section of the Health app. This update was enabled by a recent U.S. Customs ruling.

On affected models, the new Blood Oxygen app will allow you to start a session, the data will be sent to the iPhone and then processed. The results will be shown in the Health app, under the "Respiratory" section. Affected Apple Watches will be able to take measurements in the background as well. This is particularly needed for tracking Blood Oxygen while sleeping.

In order to r-enable the Blood Oxygen app on the Apple Watch you will need to update your iPhone to iOS 18.6.1, and the Apple Watch to watchOS 11.6.1.

If you have an Apple Watch purchased before the ban, or if you purchased your Apple Watch outside of the United States, the Blood Oxygen app will continue to work as it always has, directly on the Apple Watch.

iOS 26 and watchOS 26

If you are currently on the betas for iOS 26 and/or watchOS 26, you will not have this feature, at least as of this writing. I would suspect this would be added in the next iOS 26 and watchOS 26 betas, but it is possible that it will not be available until the actual release of the 26 operating systems.

Below is the last reading I had, from September 20th, 2024 with my Apple Watch Series 9.

My Thoughts

I find it interesting that the way around the ban is to do the processing on the iPhone. I am not sure if this process can be patentable, but if it can, I would not be surprised if Apple does patent the process.

The other thought that came to mind is that this now inexplicably ties the Apple Watch to a paired iPhone. Furthermore, this also means that there is less of a chance for Apple to allow the Apple Watch to be set up on its own, at least in the United States, because it would mean that there is no way for the Blood Oxygen sensor to work.

It is good to see the Blood Oxygen sensor become usable again in the United States for the Series 9, Series 10, and Ultra 2 models, but it would be better if they could work the same across all devices, but this is better than not having it.

Source: Apple Newsroom

If you know me at all, you are likely aware that I do not like to be the center of attention. I rarely highlight my own achievements, and I do not like promoting myself in any manner. This is just how I am.

Back in 2014, Apple announced a new product category, the Apple Watch. It would not be made available until April 24th, 2015. One of the focuses of the Apple Watch is fitness, and in order to motivate people to use the Apple Watch, Apple gamified exercise a bit. This was done by allowing you to see how long you have had any of the three items tracked: standing hours, exercise minutes, and calories burned, and users could set their own goals for each of these.

The Apple Watch was one of the products that I ordered that I did not receive on day one. Instead, my Apple Watch did not arrive until May 1st, 2015. Even if I started using it on May 1st, I would not have been able to get my standing hours in. On May 2nd, 2015, I started my streaks and kept it up the rest of May, that was until May 31st. On May 31st, I did not get in my exercise minutes nor did I meet my calorie goal. The reason that I did not get this was because I had spent that entire week doing significant work to move buildings at work. This included staying up significantly late and getting little sleep. Therefore, my next move streak would begin on June 1st.

Today my "Longest Move Streak" is 3650 days, making it 10 full years of a continuous move streak. It is strange to think about the fact that it has been 10 years, not only because I have been wearing a watch for 10 years, but also because this means that I have had to jump through some hoops to keep the streak alive. One of the more precarious is the fact that for a portion of that time, health and fitness data was not synchronized over iCloud. Instead, it was backed up to your phone, so you would have to transfer the data from phone to phone, or via a backup on a computer. In all of that time, my data has stayed intact. Additionally, a vast majority of this time was during an era where you could not pause your streaks if needed; therefore, even when I did not feel all that well, I still managed to get all of my exercise, move, and standing goals accomplished.

I know some are probably thinking "big deal", but it is still a significant feat. I do not know how long the streak will go; it is entirely possible that it will end at some point, but until then, I will keep trying to keep all of my fitness streaks going.

It might be hard to believe, but it has been just over a decade ago since the Apple Watch was announced. I have owned an Apple Watch since May 1st of 2015. In the almost 9.5 years of owning an Apple Watch, I have seen it go from being an "iPhone Replacement" to primarily being used as a Health and Fitness device. It can be argued that the original Apple Watch was released a bit too early. The original Apple Watch was a bit slow, relying too heavily on the iPhone. Even today, the Apple Watch still requires an iPhone to even begin to be paired, but once paired, the Apple Watch is able to do a lot more on its own.

I am not a typical user when it comes to some of my devices. What I mean by this is that I upgrade my iPhone and Apple Watch each year. Given that I have owned an Apple Watch not long after it was released, it means that I have owned 9 different Apple Watches to date. I have purchased the aluminum version of each Apple Watch, in the largest screen size available.

In 2022, when the Apple Watch Ultra was announced, I thought about getting that version, but decided to stick with the aluminum model. Last year when Apple announced the Apple Watch Ultra 2, I again thought about getting it, but there was no dark version. Apple did finally announce the Black Apple Watch Ultra 2, and not the Ultra 3. Besides new bands and the new color, the Apple Watch Ultra 2 still has the S9 System in Processor (SIP), so I opted not to buy the Ultra 2. Therefore, once again, I have gotten the latest Aluminum Apple Watch. This time the Apple Watch Series 10.

You might think that it is somewhat straightforward to compare a device to its immediate predecessor, and sometimes it is, and sometimes it is not. It depends on what new features there are on the Apple Watch. This year I will be reviewing the Apple Watch Series 10 and comparing it to the Series 9, when appropriate. With that, let us get started on the review of the Series 10, starting with the color.

Color

The Apple Watch has come in a wide variety of colors over the years, including Space Black, Silver, Rose Gold, and PRODUCT(RED), just to name a few examples. Much like the "Pro" and "Pro Max" iPhones, the Apple Watch has come in a unique color since 2019, with the release of the Series 6. For the Series 6, it was Gold; Series 7 was Green; Series 8 was PRODUCT(RED); Series 9 was Pink; and now the Series 10 has its own color set. The available colors are Silver, Gold, and Jet Black.

I am not one to have a bright watch, so for me, I prefer more subtle colors. For all Apple Watches from the original to the Series 6, I opted for Space Gray; for the Series 7, 8, and 9, I chose Midnight. For the Series 10, I have opted for Jet Black. As was the case in past years, I opted for the darker color. I do not like the color Gold, so that one was out. Silver is a good choice because it is an entirely neutral option, but it is a bit too bright for my personal liking, so that meant Jet Black.

If you remember the iPhone 7, you may remember that there was also a Jet Black option for that phone, which was a darker color than the standard Black that was offered. The Jet Black Apple Watch Series 10 takes some of its cues from the Jet Black iPhone. Of course, the first is the name and the fact that both are a black color. The second aspect is the glossy nature of the Apple Watch Series 10.

All Apple Watches will reflect some light from the device, but the previous aluminum Apple Watches have all had more of a matte finish. Not the Jet Black Apple Watch Series 10, nope, it is very glossy, and more light will be noticeable.

Overall, having a glossy black Apple Watch has not been a problem. I have not really noticed the glossy aspects, unless I happen to be really looking for a reflection. Having the darker color means that it might go with more clothing than previous models.

Physical Characteristics

The Apple Watch is primarily a screen, a battery, and a system-on-a-chip. Yes, there are health sensors and buttons, but the primary interaction method is the screen, the digital crown, and the side button. Each version of the Apple Watch does make its own enhancements and tradeoffs in order to provide the best experience for users. The Apple Watch Series 10 has its own set of physical changes. Let us look at each, starting with the size.

Physical Size

The original 2015 Apple Watch came in two sizes, 38mm and 42mm. There was no functional difference between the two models, just a size difference. Three years later in 2018, the Apple Watch Series 4 increased the size of the screen options to 40mm and 44mm, about a 5% increase. In 2021, the Apple Watch Series 7 increased the size again, this time to 41mm and 45mm, this time it was approximately a 2.5% increase. This made the Series 7 approximately 7.8% larger than the original Apple Watch.

Again, three years after the last size change, there is another one. The Apple Watch Series 10 has increased to 42mm and 46mm.

Each screen size increase has been noticeable, but none of them have been jarring. The same can be said going from 45mm to 46mm. The absolute increase is merely a 2.22 percent increase. This is a minor increase over the 45mm. However, the 45mm was only a small increase over the 44mm. Even with the modest increase, the Series 7 provided a new option, a full keyboard. The increase to 46mm actually allows for some enhancements. This includes one additional line of text in apps like Mail and Messages, which may not seem like a lot, but it can actually provide more screen space.

Just like the increase from 44mm to 45mm being a minor increase, if you look at the comparison of the 46mm to the original 42mm, it is a more substantial increase. The difference is approximately a 9.52% increase in size, which is a substantial increase. The smaller Apple Watch model has received a similar size increase over the last ten years, specifically it has been 10.5%.

One of the items that is directly related to the size is the weight of the Apple Watch. So let us look at this next.

Weight

Each Apple Watch is an opportunity for Apple to adjust the internals. One of the benefits of increasing the physical size of the screen is that it provides a bit more area for housing components of the Apple Watch. If you have more area, you can possibly spread out components.

Even with the increase in size of the screen of the Apple Watch over the years, the depth of the Apple Watch has remained largely the same. The original Apple Watch was 10.5mm in depth, the Series 2 and 3 increased to 11.4mm in depth, and the Series 4 to Series 9 all went back down to 10.7mm in depth. The Apple Watch Series 10 changes this dramatically. In fact, the Series 10 is the thinnest Apple Watch that Apple has created. In fact, it is 9.4% smaller on your wrist than previous models. The Apple Watch Series 10 is 9.7mm in depth, and this is absolutely noticeable.

You might think that this could be an optical illusion. In order to indicate that it is indeed a difference, here is a screenshot of the same photo, with the level indicator:

With the decrease in depth, the weight of the Series 10 has also decreased. The Series 10 has gone down to 36.4 grams, which is down from 38.7 grams on the Series 9. This is a modest savings in terms of weight, and you may not notice the difference on a day-to-day basis, but any reduction in weight is a welcome change nonetheless. Let us now look at the screen on the Apple Watch Series 10.

Screen

The Apple Watch has maintained the same pixel density of 326 pixels per inch. This has been the pixel density since the introduction of the Apple Watch Series 4 in 2018. This remains true for the Series 10. One of the bigger changes is the type of technology behind the screen. The Apple Watch Series 4 introduced a new technology, a low-temperature polycrystalline oxide, or LTPO, screen. The Series 4 did not utilize all of the features of this technology.

The benefit of the LTPO screen is that it can reduce the amount of power used, which is made possible by adjusting the refresh rate. This screen technology is what makes the Always-On feature plausible. Specifically with the ability to have refresh rates down to 10Hz. The Series 10 includes an LTPO3 display, which is the third generation of the LTPO display. The change with this version is that it can go down to 1Hz, which can reduce battery consumption even further, particularly useful for a watch that has an Always-On display. The screen technology is not the only change.

If you are wearing your Apple Watch, you might not consciously think about it, but there are many times throughout the day when you actually end up looking at your watch, at some sort of angle. This could be when you are typing and you want to catch the current time, or it could be glancing at a notification that just came in. It could also be while you are exercising and want to see the current heart rate or split time. The Apple Watch Series 10 has been designed to allow you to see the screen while viewing it at an angle.

The Apple Watch Series 10 has what Apple is calling a "Wide‑angle OLED" display. This does not necessarily mean that according to Apple, the viewable angle of the Series 10 is the same, but the screen should be 40% brighter when viewing the Series 10 at an angle. This means that it should be easier to see when you are not directly looking at it.

When I first started using the Apple Watch Series 10, I did not think that there was a big difference when viewing the Apple Watch at an angle. However, while I was working on this review, I did end up noticing that the screen is indeed brighter when viewing the Apple Watch at an off angle. It might not seem like it is all that useful, but I can see how it might be helpful for those instances when you really do need it.

On the topic of features that you might not use that often, there is another one, the speaker.

Speaker

The Apple Watch has always had a speaker; however, you have only been capable of using it in limited situations. The speaker can be used for notification sounds, making noise while ejecting water through the speakers, and you can even use it for phone calls. With the Series 10, there is another usage: listening to music.

Typically, you would not want to listen to any sustained audio on a speaker unless that is the intended use case of the device, like the Beats Pill. The reason you want to avoid doing so is because when you use the speaker on the Apple Watch or on the iPhone for that matter, it requires a lot more energy to play audio through the speaker. This makes sense because it takes a lot of power to move the speaker, which transmits the audio.

I went looking for the actual speaker on the Series 10 and went to compare it to the Series 9, and I was a bit surprised by what I saw. On the Series 10, the speakers look just like a standard set of speakers, being a series of holes that are placed to produce the best sound. What was more interesting is the Series 9. Instead of having speaker holes, there is a slot.

If you shine a light on the slot, you will see there is a grate, but I find it intriguing that it was actually a slot. It is not that I did not know it was a slot, but I do not typically pay much attention to the speaker because I do not use it much at all since I always have my Apple Watch set to be silent.

Playing music from the Apple Watch

The manner in which you actually play music may not be the most intuitive. In order to play a song on the Series 10, use the following steps:

1. Open the Music app on your Apple Watch.
2. Tap on the "…" icon in the upper right corner.
3. Tap on the "AirPlay" button.
4. Scroll down to the bottom of the list.
5. Tap on "Control Other Speakers & TV".
6. Tap on "Apple Watch".
7. Tap on the "Play" button to begin playing music.

As mentioned, the steps for being able to play music through the speaker can be a bit obscure, but it does indeed work. Now, let us talk about the actual experience.

Speaker Experience

I tested the speaker by playing a song that I synchronized to my watch. That song is "Good Luck, Babe" by Chapell Roan. As you might have guessed, it was not the most bass-heavy result. You cannot expect a lot of bass out of such a small speaker, but even without the bass, any music that you do play is actually listenable.

I have been trying to come up with a plausible use case for this, and it finally occurred to me that this could be useful if you would like to listen to music while going to sleep but you do not want to use your phone.

It is not likely that many will use the speaker for playing music, but when you need it, it can be a useful thing to have. Do not forget to be considerate of others while in public; not everybody may want to listen to the same music. As mentioned above, it takes a lot of power to play music through the speaker. If you do happen to use the music playing option often, you may find yourself needing to charge your Apple Watch more. On the topic of the battery, let us cover that next.

Battery

Given the physical size and the various features of the Apple Watch, it is not expected to have multi-day battery life. For most, they end up charging every day. There are some users who will partially charge their Apple Watch multiple times per day. Even with all that the Apple Watch does, Apple states that it does get "All-day battery". Specifically, according to their claims, the Apple Watch gets 18 hours of battery life. In fact, every single Apple Watch has indicated it gets 18 hours of battery life.

Given that I am close to an Apple Watch charger most of the time, I typically charge my watch a couple of times a day. Normally, for my Apple Watch reviews, I do not change my charging habits. However, I decided to test Apple's claims of battery life. Since I use the Sleep Tracking features overnight, I end up charging just before going to bed.

I charged my watch and I removed it from the charger at 7:57 p.m. At that point, it was at 96%. I went through my day as normal, exercised once, and about 23 hours later, the battery level was still at 22%. This is well beyond the 18-hour battery claims, which is definitely a good thing.

There are ways of extending your battery life, like turning off the Always-On display and putting your Apple Watch into "Theatre Mode", just to name a couple. However, the options that you have are limited, and these will not stop the Apple Watch from performing actions in the background.

Last year, with the introduction of the Series 9, Apple introduced a whole new feature, Low Power Mode. When you put your Apple Watch into Low Power Mode, background tasks will be reduced so that your battery will last even longer. This can be particularly useful if you are not able to charge right away but want to still use your Apple Watch. I did not test Low Power mode, so I do not know if Apple's claims of 36 hours of battery life are accurate, but even if it is not 36 hours, it is likely close to it.

I was thinking about the fact that I still had 22% battery power remaining after 23 hours of usage, but I wonder if my battery level would have been lower if one of the apps was still available. More on that a bit later. Let us look at another battery-related item: charging.

Charging

When the Apple Watch was introduced, Apple indicated that the Apple Watch had magnetic charging. The physical size of the Apple Watch has meant that it might not be plausible to use standard chargers, like a Qi charging puck. Therefore, a special charger was needed. The inability to use a standard charging puck can be particularly true depending on the type of band that you have on your Apple Watch. As an example, if you have a Solo Loop attached to your Apple Watch, it is not possible to get the Apple Watch around a standard Qi charging puck.

Instead, you would need a way of charging. For these situations, you need a way of being able to charge while keeping the band connected. Therefore, Apple opted to create a custom charging puck, one that fit perfectly on the bottom of the Apple Watch. The Apple Watch Charger originally had a USB-A connection, but it has since been converted to USB-C.

The charging puck had one significant benefit: it is magnetic. In fact, Apple's MagSafe charging for the iPhone was likely influenced by the Apple Watch magnet, as well as MagSafe introduced on the MacBooks back in 2006. Having a magnetic charger makes it much easier to be assured that your Apple Watch will be charged when you need it. However, if your Apple Watch battery is low, it may take some time to get a sufficient charge. Starting with the Apple Watch Series 7 in 2021, Apple offered an additional option: fast charging.

According to Apple's statistics, fast charging on the Series 7, 8, and 9 can charge from 0% to 80% in 45 minutes. This is not a bad amount of time at all. Being able to get a sufficient charge in 45 minutes is probably plenty of time for most people. Yet, there is room for improvement.

The Apple Watch Series 10 improves on this by allowing fast charging to occur from 0% to 80% in 30 minutes. This is a significant 33% faster charge time, but there is a caveat. In order to get the 30-minute fast charging, you will need a 20-watt power adapter, or higher, in order to be able to get the maximum fast charging with the Series 10. While it may not always be needed, fast charging to 80% within 30 minutes can be useful when you really do need to charge your Apple Watch quickly.

One of the reasons that you might need to make sure that you have sufficient charge on your Apple Watch is so you can do some sleep tracking, and there is a new feature to look at: Sleep Apnea.

Sleep Apnea

Even though the Apple Watch was originally intended to be an "iPhone replacement", complete with all sorts of apps, it has not turned out that way; and that is a good thing. Instead, the Apple Watch is best used for notifications, health, and fitness tracking. Over the years, new health features have been added including the Blood Oxygen sensor, ECG app, and Sleep Tracking, just to name a few. Well, another item can be added to that list, Sleep Apnea.

If you have an Apple Watch Series 9, Apple Watch Ultra 2, or an Apple Watch Series 10, you can get some information regarding whether or not you possibly experience Sleep Apnea. According to the Mayo Clinic, "Sleep apnea is a potentially serious sleep disorder in which breathing repeatedly stops and starts.". Apple has some information about Sleep Apnea as well. According to Apple:

Sleep apnea is a common and treatable disorder that negatively impacts people's health and quality of life. Despite advances in public awareness about the importance of sleep, most cases of sleep apnea remain undiagnosed. Apple Watch can track Breathing Disturbances during sleep and provide notifications of possible sleep apnea if Breathing Disturbances values reach a level associated with moderate to severe sleep apnea.

There are actually two components to the Sleep Apnea feature. The first is a measurement for "Breathing Disturbances". This is the main aspect of the Sleep Apnea feature. The second portion is the actual notification. With iOS 18, you may possibly get a notification indicating that you might be experiencing Sleep Apnea, but only if the number of disturbances can be classified as "Elevated" over the course of 30 days. As is the case with most of the Apple Watch health features, the data will appear in the Health app on your iPhone.

You might suspect that the Sleep Apnea feature might be powered by the Blood Oxygen sensor, but it is not. In fact, Apple has developed an accelerometer-based algorithm. The algorithm detects the number of breathing disturbances that occur during the evening. It takes into account all three axes of movement of the accelerometer and uses these to determine how many disturbances you have experienced over the course of the evening.

It will take some time before the data can be collected, but it will be collected. It should be mentioned that "…neither component is intended or cleared for use by people who are already diagnosed with sleep apnea." Therefore, if you already have Sleep Apnea, this feature may not be worth enabling. If you do want to set up Sleep Apnea, you can use the following steps:

1. Open the Health app on your iPhone.
2. Tap on your Avatar in the upper corner.
3. Locate "Sleep Apnea Notifications".
4. Tap on "Set Up".

Here you will be able to follow the steps to enable Sleep Apnea notifications. You can read a lot more about the methodologies and research in the Sleep Apnea Notifications on Apple Watch PDF on the Apple Health website. While on the topic of health, let us talk about a missing feature, the Blood Oxygen Sensor.

Blood Oxygen Sensor

In 2020, medical device company Masimo sued Apple for infringing patents related to the Blood Oxygen sensor in the Apple Watch. The final outcome came in December of 2023, when the International Trade Commission ordered to cease imports of the Series 9 Apple Watch, as well as the Apple Watch Ultra 2. When the order was made, sales for these devices ceased. Apple appealed and was able to begin selling the devices again, but not until United States Customs and Border Protection was able to determine the changes made by Apple were sufficient. Ultimately, they were. When the devices went back on sale, there was a change: the blood oxygen sensor app was no longer functional.

It has now been more than 9 months after that change was made, and the blood oxygen sensor is still banned in the United States. What does this mean for the Apple Watch Series 10? Apple Watch Series 10 devices are subject to the same restriction, which means that the Blood Oxygen Sensor app is non-functional. As far as anyone can tell, the hardware remains in the device, so if there is a resolution, the app can be re-enabled, but as of this writing, the Blood Oxygen Sensor app is still not enabled.

The fact that there has been no resolution in 9 months is absolutely a failure on Apple's part. That is not to imply that Apple is the party at fault in the dispute, but Apple is the one who controls the design and functionality of the Apple Watch. Many may see the Blood Oxygen Sensor as unnecessary, but removing a previously functional feature is a downgrade. As Apple's own Vice President of Johnny Srouji stated in an interview with Geekerwan "Our goal is to build the best product delivering the absolute best user experience".

The interview is about the iPhone 16 and iPhone 16 Pro, but it is not a stretch to say that it applies to the Apple Watch as well. Therefore, not having the Blood Oxygen Sensor, in my opinion, does not make it the best product that Apple could make, at least not in the United States. If you are outside of the United States, you are not affected by this ban. In order for Apple to be able to claim that the Apple Watch Series 10 is the best product, it should include the full capabilities of the Blood Oxygen Sensor.

Closing Thoughts

If you are wearing an Apple Watch Series 7, or older, the Apple Watch Series 10 is a great upgrade. The larger screen size may hardly be noticeable, but any increase that allows for more information to be shown on the screen is a welcome one. When you are using the Apple Watch Series 10, you may notice that you can see better when your Apple Watch is at an angle. This is due to the new Wide-angle OLED display on the Series 10.

If you are like me, and prefer a darker Apple Watch, you cannot go wrong with the Jet Black Series 10. This is a darker color than the Series 9 Midnight, and the Jet Black even has a gloss finish to it. While you are looking at the glossy Jet Black, and if you look closely, you may notice that the speaker arrangement is different and this is because the speaker can be used to listen to music. It may not be useful all of the time, but there may be those times when it can come in handy.

Should you find yourself in a situation where you are pressed for time and your Apple Watch is low on battery, you may be in luck. You can now charge from 0 to 80% in about 30 minutes, this is an improvement from the 45 minutes it previously took to get this amount of charge.

If you live in the United States, the decision to upgrade may be a tough one. If you are upgrading from a Series 4 or Series 5, you absolutely should upgrade, not only because of the larger screen, but you will instantly notice the speed increase. Since the Series 4 and 5 did not have a Blood Oxygen sensor, you will not notice any difference. But, if you are upgrading from a Series 6 or newer, and if the Blood Oxygen Sensor is important, you will need to decide if losing the Blood Oxygen sensor is worth the trade-off.

Today Apple has told 9to5 Mac that they will halt sales of the Apple Watch Series 9 and Apple Watch Ultra 2 later this week. From the 9to5Mac article:

The Apple Watch Ultra 2 and Apple Watch Series 9 will no longer be available to order from Apple’s website in the U.S. after 3 p.m. ET on Thursday, December 21. In-store inventory will no longer be available from Apple retail locations after December 24.

Furthermore,

Apple says that the ITC’s ban only impacts sales of the Apple Watch Series 9 and Apple Watch Ultra 2 because those devices offer blood oxygen monitoring capabilities. The lower-end Apple Watch SE, which lacks this sensor, is unaffected and will remain available for sale.

The ITC’s decision only prohibits Apple from selling the affected Apple models. For now, this means the devices will remain available for purchase from other outlets including Amazon and Best Buy.

However, the order does block all Apple Watch Series 9 and Ultra 2 imports to the United States after December 25. At this point, Apple would also be prohibited from selling those devices to resellers, as well. So if the ruling is upheld, it could subsequently impact Apple Watch availability for other retailers as well.

There are three possible ways that Apple could continue selling these watches. The first is that this ruling can be overturned by President Biden, but it is unknown if he will overturn the ruling. The second option is that Apple and Masimo will come to a settlement. The final option is that Apple appeals the ruling and will be able to continue selling the watches while the case is appealed.

My Thoughts

I find the timing of when the items will not be available for sale as interesting. December 21st at 3pm is likely the cutoff for shipping in time for holiday delivery. Similarly, Apple stores are open on Decemember 24th, meaning that they will be able to continue selling them up until the end of the holiday. I suspect that Apple would prefer to be able to continue to sell the devices, but using their own words "They must comply with laws in the countries that they operate".

The ultimate outcome is not known at this time. It should be noted that the Apple Watch SE is not affected because it does not have the blood oxygen sensor, which is at the center of the patent dispute.

Source: 9to5Mac

Introduced in September of 2014, and released in April 2015, the Apple Watch has had a steady march of improvements over the last 8 years. While each year may bring only a small number of changes, if you look back at the original Apple Watch compare to the latest, no one could argue that the Apple Watch has come a long way over that time.

Some of the improvements have included the addition of Cellular, with the Series 3, a larger screen with the Series 4, the Series 5 provided an Always On Screen, and Emergency SOS came with the Series 8. The Series 9 brings its own new feature, called Double Tap, but more on that a bit later. For now, let us start with which device I purchased.

Device

As has been the case since 2015, I have purchased an upgrade for each new Apple Watch. This year I bought the Apple Watch Series 9 in Midnight with a Midnight Sport Loop. I had considered the Apple Watch Ultra 2, but I prefer dark colors for the Apple Watch.

The Midnight color of the Apple Watch is the same color as the Series 8 in Midnight. The Midnight Sport Loop is visually different than last year's Midnight band. This year's Midnight band is a blue band. In fact it is a solid blue color whereas last year's Midnight band was a black with orange and blue strands woven within the band.

The new Midnight band is not a bad color at all. In fact it is a decent shade that matches closely to the other blue accessories that Apple is offering this year.

Now, let us move to setting up the Apple Watch Series 9, because I had a few issues with that.

Setup

My old Apple Watch Series 8 transferred to my new iPhone, which is the opposite of what I experienced last year. Even though my old Apple WAtch transferred, I could not setup the Apple Watch Series quite so easily. When I began the Apple Watch setup I attempted to use the backup of my Apple Watch Series 8. On the screen ther was a line that said that "an update is required". This made sense because I had updated my Series 8 to 10.0.1, and the Series 9 only had 10.0.0 on it. With Apple Watches you cannot restore a backup unless the new Apple Watch is on the same version, or a newer one. Therefore I started the update and the update downloaded without any issues, and it got to the point of sayin “Preparing”, but it would never continue.

Since I could not perform the update during setup, it meant that I had to setup the watch as a “new” Watch, perform the update, and then unpair it and reset it to transfer the Series 8 backup to the Series 9. This is not the first time that I have had this issue when setting up an Apple Watch, and I suspect it will not be the last. I had attempted to go through the process of setting it up as new, but I ran into an issue where I could not turn off the Series 9 Apple Watch.

Now, I am not new to Apple Watches and I have had to reboot them a fair number of times throughout my history of using them, but for some reason no matter which approach I took, it would not actually power off. I tried deleting the update from the Apple Watch and then powering it off, but even this did not work. The power off button never showed. Ultimately, this left me with no choice but to do a forced reboot. I was a bit worried not knowing what the current state of the Apple Watch was, but the forced reboot did reboot the Watch. I was then able to re-download the update and install it. This time the update did actually have the “Preparing” step actually move and the update was prepared.

After the update was done, I then went on to unpair and set up the Apple Watch again. Here, I ran into an issue. When you set up an Apple Watch it will perform an “Express Setup”. This was not what I had wanted. I had wanted to take the backup of my Series 8 and apply it to the Series 9. After I went back and did the “Customize Settings”, I was then able to choose my Series 8.

I really do wish that the Apple Watch that it could be setup on very similar versions, like watchOS 10.0.0 should be able to restore from an Apple Watch running 10.0.1. I completely understand not having a previous 10.1 restore to 10.0, but 10.0.1 should be able to be restored onto an Apple Watch running 10.0.0.

Design

Apple has been on a three-year cycle for form factor for the Apple Watch since the beginning. The original Apple Watch, Series 2, and Series 3 all had the same size options, of 38mm and 40mm. The Series 4, 5, and 6, increased this to 40mm and 44mm. The Series 4 brought not only a bigger screen, but also a design change.

The Series 4 moved away from the square screen of its predecessors and instead went to a rounded display. The Series 4 also brought with its a new sensor array which provided support for ECG and fall detection.

It is somewhat difficult to try to come up with an innovative manner of indicating that the form factor of the Apple Watch has not changed in the last year, but that is exactly the case. The actual design of the Apple Watch has not substantially changed since the introduction of the Series 5 in 2019. The Apple Watch Series 9 still sports the same 45mm Watch Face with the rounded screen that provides and edge-to-edge display.

The same form factor has been in use since the Series 7, when the size of the screen increased from 44 to 45mm. This is not necessarily a bad thing, given that it takes so much tooling to design and manufacture a product that using the same physical design for three years makes sound financial sense.

S9 Processor

When Apple introduced the original Apple Watch they indicated that it had a System in Package, or SIP. This SIP houses all of the processors for the Apple Watch. As you might have gleaned with each iteration of the SIP the Apple Watch adds functionality, or gains some improvements.

According to Apple the S9 has 5.6 billion transistors, which is 60 percent more transistors than the S8. Along with this it has a new four-core Neural Engine, which allows for twice the speed when processing machine learning models.

One of the benefits of the machine learning improvements is with Siri. Many of the requests that you make with Siri are now done on the Apple Watch itself. This includes things like playing music, obtaining Health data, like sleeping, and starting and stopping timers.

This may just be a placebo effect, but it does seem like the S9 is faster than the Series 8, particularly when it comes to things like unlocking the Apple Watch when Sleep Mode is activated.

Storage

The one thing that the Apple Watch has not always had is a lot of storage space. The original Apple Watch, through Series 3 all had 8GB of storage. The Cellular version of the Series 3 and Series 4 both had 16GB. The Series 5, 6, 7, 8, both SE and SE 2, and the Apple Watch Ultra all had 32GB of storage. Now with the Apple Watch Series 9 has 64GB of storage.

It seems odd to have 16 times the amount of storage in an Apple Watch as my first iPhone. I am not one who keeps a bunch of data on my Apple Watch. I do keep some music on it, just in case I am in a situation where I only have my headphones and Apple Watch.

Do not get me wrong, it is better to have more storage that you might need than not enough, as was the case with the Series 3, where it became problematic when trying to do updates on later versions of watchOS with only 8GB of storage.

Display

The Apple Watch Series 9 has a display that is capable of going from a single nit up to 2000 nits. This range is twice as bright as the Series 8. It is not likely that you will see the difference in brightness that often. It is likely that you will see it if you use the Flashlight feature from Control Center. This is where the screen on the Apple Watch will become as bright as possible.

I could not find a way of making the screen drop down to its lowest level of 1 nit. According to Apple’s Apple Watch Series 9 press release.

For dark rooms or early mornings, the display can also lower to just one nit so as not to disturb people close by.

Being able to have the screen go as low as a single nit yet go as high as 2000 nits is a good thing to have on an Apple Watch, particularly for those times when you need it.

Double Tap

Staring with watchOS 10.1 there is a new gesture that you can use, called Double Tap. Double Tap is a simple gesture that you can use your index finger and thumb to perform an action. The action performed is the primary action for the app. You can perform actions like snoozing a timer, answering or ending a phone call, playing and pausing music, or even swiping through the Smart Widget Stack.

The way that the Double Tap gesture works is by uses a machine learning algorithm and the optical sensor to be able to detect the slight movement of your fingers as well as the minuscule blood flow changes in your arm when you perform the double tap gesture. This is only made possible with the new S9 and its Neural Engine.

I have not yet had a chance to try this yet, because as of this writing watchOS 10.1 is not yet available. Since it is not yet available I cannot vouch for how well it works, nor its capabilities.

Find My

One of the features of the Apple Watch has had for a long time is the ability to ping a paired iPhone so you can locate the iPhone. This is still available with the Series 9, but there has been some improvements. The new improvement with the Series 9 is that you can now use precision finding to find your iPhone. This works in the same way that finding any other device that supports precision finding does.

In order to perform Precision Finding on a paired iPhone, you simply bring up Control Center by pressing the side button, and then tap on the Find iPhone button. Once you do this a sound will be played as it was before, but it will also start the Precision Finding mode, which will direct you to your paired iPhone.

This is a nice addition that will allow you to more easily find your paired iPhone, particularly if it is in a location that is not easy to find at first glance.

Closing Thoughts

On a year over year basis the Apple Watch does not radically change, in fact the form factor for the Apple Watch has been on a three-year cycle. While the exterior of the case may look the same as the previous two Apple Watches, the new sensors allow for new interactions, like the Double Tap gesture.

I will be interested to test out the Double Tap feature once it is available in a software update. According to Apple it will be available in an update in October, probably watchOS 10.1.

The Apple Watch Series 9 is a great upgrade if you have an Apple Watch Series 7, or older. If you have an Apple Watch Series 8, unless you want the new Double Tap gesture, it may not be a worthwhile upgrade.

The Apple Watch is now a pretty mature product and it has come into its own, in terms of finding its primary use cases. The biggest uses for the Apple Watch are for fitness and health. The reason for this is that the Apple Watch is almost always on ones wrist throughout the day, including when someone is sleeping.

With the Apple Watch being a mature product, it does not get nearly as many hardware advances as one might expect. However, there are a couple of new features for this year’s Apple Watch Series 8. Before we dive into those, let us quickly cover my pre-order experience.

Pre-Order Experience

Apple held their “Far Out” event on September 7th and Apple Watch pre-orders were available that afternoon after the event had concluded. Once orders were available, I ordered a 45mm Aluminum Series 8 in Midnight with a Midnight Sport Loop band. Due to my choice of band, the only option I had was delivery. If I had gone with another band, like the Storm Blue, I could have picked it up at my local Apple Store. However, delivery was fine with me since Fedex and UPS do not deliver until the afternoon, at least for me.

Let us briefly look at the Midnight Watch and the Midnight Watch Band.

Midnight Apple Watch and Midnight Bands

Last year when they introduced the Apple Watch Series 7 they introduced a new color, "Midnight". Midnight replaced the standard "Space Gray" or "Black". Midnight is not a pure-black, but more of a really dark blue. Typically when Apple releases an Apple Watch they have a corresponding set of bands to go with it, however, they did not do that last year. This year though they have released a new Midnight Sport Loop as well as a Midnight Solo Loop.

Apple classifies these as "black", but they are not. Here is a comparison of the Midnight Solo Loop and the Black Solo Loop. In the picture below the Midnight Sport Loop is lying on top of the Black Sport Loop. The Black Sport Loop is on an Apple Watch Series 7.

As you can see the Midnight Solo Loop is a slightly brighter shade and is more blue than black. Even though it is a brighter shade that does not mean that it is a bright blue, far from it. It is still a dark color, but just not as nearly dark as the Black Solo Loop.

The Midnight Watch is the same shade as the Series 7 Midnight color. As mentioned above, the Midnight Sport Loop is a new band. The Midnight Sport Loop has alternating stripes of colors. One side is green, while the other is a light gray. There are stripes of blue, green, orange, and gray throughout the band. It was the most subtle band that Apple offered, hence the reason why I chose it when I did my pre-order. 

What I would really like is a color-matched Solo Loop because even the Black Solo Loop is not as dark as Midnight Apple Watch. Now, that we have covered the color and bands, let us look at a couple of new features for the Series 8, Crash Detection, and the Temperature Sensor.

Crash Detection

One thing that everyone hopes to not be involved in is a crash. However, should a crash occur the Apple Watch Series 8 has the ability to detect when you are in a crash. This is done using the new accelerometer and gyroscope, along with algorithms for crash detection. The new accelerometer can handle up to 256Gs of force, which is way beyond what a human can withstand. If you are in a crash, the Apple Watch can contact emergency services, and your emergency contacts. The Watch will do so if you do not cancel out of the SOS emergency call.

Back in 2016 there were reports about Apple doing testing in an area and there were complaints of excessive engine noise from neighbors near the facility. I am now thinking that some of that noise could have been testing of the Apple Watch, and iPhone 14, Crash Detection algorithms. If it was not that, it could have been testing to obtain data for the algorithms. This is pure speculation on my part, but the crash detection does make some sense. Features like this are not created in just a few days, but they do take significant testing and tweaking to get correct.

Let us turn to another new hardware feature, the Temperature Sensor.

Temperature Sensor

The Apple Watch is designed with health tracking in mind. This includes fitness, mindfulness, and even sleep tracking. One area that can be health related is cycle tracking. Cycle Tracking was added to watchOS 6 in 2019. The Cycle Tracking features would allow women to track their menstrual cycle and record various aspects, like how much bleeding, any factors like being pregnant, lactating, or using contraceptives, or any other symptoms that they might be experiencing. 

One area that the Apple Watch has not been able to help with is temperature. That changes with the Series 8 Apple Watch, because there is a whole new temperature sensor.

The temperature sensor in the Apple Watch Series 8 has two different parts. The first is on the back of the Apple Watch that is in contact with your skin. The second is closer to the surface of the Apple Watch Series 8. The reason that this is needed is because temperatures can differ depending on sleeping environment. The sensor closer to the surface of the Apple Watch is used to detect the temperature of the environment, while the one on the back of the Apple Watch is used to detect your body temperature. According to Apple, “Wrist temperature data will be available after about five nights.”

The temperature sensor on the Series 8 Apple Watch is designed to provide you with a baseline measurement and not the actual temperature. This information can be used to provide you with some possible insight into when you might have ovulated. This can help you with being able to assist you in possibly becoming pregnant. This is not a predictive feature, but a retroactive one. The feature is called "Retrospective Ovulation" and can only provide you with information about when you might have ovulated. It does not predict when you will ovulate. One thing to note about retrospective ovulation is that according to Apple, “retrospective ovulation estimates should be available after about two cycles.”

That covers all of the new features that are for the Apple Watch Series 8 itself, but let us cover a couple of new features for watchOS 9 that are worth noting. These features are the new Compass app, Low Power Mode, and some notes about the Nike Apple Watch.

New Compass App

The Apple Watch has a had a compass feature ever since the original Apple Watch was released in April of 2015. Its functionality has been fairly basic with just providing a digital version of an analog compass. For many people this is enough, but watchOS 9 brings some enhancements to the Compass app.

The Compass app has a new feature, called Backtrack. Backtrack is a way of being able to mark different points along a route so that you can make your way back, should you find yourself in a situation where you get off course.

While this feature is primarily designed to help you when you are out in the wilderness, it could be useful in any situation where you might not be able to find your way back to a place. Some possible examples could be if you are out on a hike, but it could also be just as useful in a new city and you need assistance making your way back.

Backtrack, and the new compass app, are not exclusive to Apple Watch Series 8, but they are new in watchOS 9. This is available for Apple Watch Series SE, and Apple Watch Series 6 and later. Next, let us talk about conserving power with Low Power Mode.

Low Power Mode

The Apple Watch has long had a feature called "Reserve Mode". This mode is an extreme one that would shut off all functionality of the Apple Watch with the exception of being able to keep and display the time. Power Reserve was a binary choice, it was either on or off, there was no middle ground.

The iPhone has long had a way of preserving battery through a feature called Low Power Mode. When you enable Low Power Mode on the iPhone many of the background processes are turned off, or their refresh rates are reduced.

Starting with watchOS 9, Low Power Mode is making its way to the Apple Watch. Low Power Mode is designed to allow someone to extend the battery life on Apple Watch. Low Power Mode can be enabled by swiping up on the Control Center, tapping on the battery percentage, and then toggling the Low Power toggle.

When you enable Low Power Mode there are a number of items that are turned off, or reduced. The items that are turned off include:

• The Always-on Display
• Background heart rate measurements
• Background Blood Oxygen measurements
• Start Workout reminders
• Irregular heart rate notifications 
• High heart rate notifications
• Low heart rate notifications

If your iPhone is not nearby the following items will also be disabled

• Wi-Fi connectiosn
• Cellular connections
• Incoming phone calls and their notifications

Beyond these items being turned off, there are also other items that are affected including:

• Phone calls taking longer
• Siri may take longer to process requests
• Compilations update less frequently
• Background app refresh occurs less frequently
• Animations may stutter more

You can enable or disable Low Power mode as needed. Low Power is not a feature of only the newest watches. In fact, it is available for any Apple Watch that is a Series 4 or later. You can also view additional information on Apple’s website. Low Power Mode: Apple Support Article https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT213336. Next let us move onto Nike Watch Faces.

Apple Watch Nike

Since the introduction of the Apple Watch Series 2, in 2016, there has been a separate version of the Apple Watch specifically branded as the Nike Edition. The Nike Edition of the Apple Watch has had all of the same features of their corresponding non-Nike aluminum versions. The one thing that the Nike version came with is a set of exclusive Nike Watch Faces that would only work on Nike Watches, and not on non-Nike versions.

Let us say that you had an Apple Watch Series 2 Nike edition and then you upgraded to a regular Series 4 Apple Watch, any Nike Watch faces that you had configured would no longer be available for you to use. This can be somewhat annoying for users of the Nike Watch who upgraded and wanted to continue to use those Nike Watch Faces. The only way to be able to continue to use those would be to upgrade to another Nike edition. This all changes with watchOS 9.

With the release of the Apple Watch Series 8, there is no separate Nike version. Instead, starting with watchOS 9 you can use any of the Nike Watch Faces that you would like. You can add any of the Nike Watch Faces by doing so on your Apple Watch or by adding one from the Face Gallery section within the Apple Watch app on your paired iPhone. The Nike Watch Face options that you have available are:

• Nike Analog
• Nike Bounce
• Nike Compact
• Nike Digital
• Nike Hybrid

Each of these has its own layout, but each of them can be customized in terms of complications and colors. One of the differences with the Nike Watch Faces is that you have a limited number of options when it comes to color. This is because the faces are designed to correspond to Nike watch bands. As an example, on the Nike Compact and the Nike Hybrid faces you can select any color combination from Summer 2021, Fall 2021, Spring 2022, and Fall 2022. 

The Nike Analog, Nike Bounce, and Nike Digital watch faces allow you to select any of the colors from Spring 2017 going forward. 

It is good to see the Nike Watch faces available to all Apple Watch users. I am sure that having separate watch models provided additional strain on supply chain, as well as trying to predict how many to manufacture. Beyond this, watchOS also had to know which models could use the Nike Watch Faces and which ones could not and that provided additional overhead for maintaining watchOS.

In some respects it did not make sense to have these versions be entirely separate since they were the exact same as the Aluminum watch, but it is what Apple wanted to do in cooperation with Nike.

The Apple Watch Hermès models still have their own unique Watch Faces. I do not expect the Hermès watch faces to come to other Apple Watches any time soon because the Hermès watches are a more expensive edition and have a more limited user base.

Closing Thoughts

The Apple Watch is focused on glanceable information, like notifications and complications on a watch face. Along with this, the Apple Watch is designed for fitness and health. The Apple Watch Series 8 is no exception for this. The Apple Watch Series 8 does add a few exclusive feature. The first of these is Crash Detection. If a crash is detected, Crash Detection will be able to contact emergency services and your designated emergency contacts that you have configured in the Health app, automatically on your behalf.

Along with Crash Detection there is a new Temperature Sensor. The temperature sensor is a two-part sensor that is designed to work for being able to sense minute changes in temperature for women who are using cycle tracking. The temperature information can be used to provide you with retroactive ovulation estimates. This is a great addition for women to help them with their reproductive health. I would not be surprised to see the temperature sensing feature be enabled for everyone in the future, or be used for future features.

The Apple Watch Series 8 is powered by watchOS 9. watchOS 9 has a bunch of new features, like Low Power Mode. Low Power Mode allows users to extend their battery life. When you enable Low Power mode some functions will no longer work, or the frequency in which they refresh will be reduced. These changes are made to help extend the battery life of the Apple Watch.

Lastly, you have some new options for Watch Faces with the availability of the Nike Watch Faces now being available for all Apple Watch users, and no longer being limited only to the Nike Editions of the Apple Watch.

Overall the Apple Watch Series 8 is a slight upgrade from the Apple Watch Series 7. If you have a Series 7, it may not be worth upgrading. However, if you do want, or need, the Temperature Sensor then it is worth the upgrade.

If you have an Apple Watch Series 6, it would be a stretch to upgrade to a Series 8, that is, unless your battery is not holding enough of a charge to get you comfortably through an entire day. If you have a Series 5, or an even older model, then the Series 8 should be a solid upgrade and one worth looking into possibly upgrading your Apple Watch.

The Covid-19 pandemic has changed things in many ways, including accelerating trends that had already begun. One of the trends that had begun prior to the pandemic was contactless payments. Apple Pay has been available since 2014 with the release of iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus.

Even though Apple Pay has been quite successful, not everybody can use Apple Pay. There is an industry standard that many cards have incorporated that allow you tap on a payment terminal instead of having to insert your card and wait for authorization.

Yesterday, Apple announced that the ability to use contactless payments is coming to some models of iPhone. That feature is called "Tap to Pay". Tap to Pay will allow businesses to accept payments by using the Near Field Communication, or NFC, chip that is in an iPhone XS or newer.

"Tap to Pay on iPhone will work with contactless credit and debit cards from leading payment networks, including American Express, Discover, Mastercard, and Visa."

This is not an automatic feature for businesses because it will require a "partner-enabled" iOS app as well. The first partner that Apple will be working with is Stripe.

Here is the best feature for businesses: "No additional hardware is needed to accept contactless payments through Tap to Pay on iPhone.". This means that as long as the business has an iPhone XS or newer, it should work.

Ultimately, this means that if you have a contactless credit, or debit, card and the merchant has an iPhone with a Stripe-enabled app that supports "Tap to Pay", you will be able to simply tap your credit or debit card and pay for goods and services. Similarly, you can also use your iPhone or Apple Watch to pay using its NFC chip.

The new feature will roll out in the United States first, and possibly other countries later on. Apple has stated that other payment providers. Tap to Pay will also be rolling out to Apple's own stores later this year.

Source: Apple

Much like the iPhone, the Apple Watch sees a new model being introduced every year, usually at the same event as the iPhone, but if not, then sometime very close to it.  Some years the Apple Watch will bring new capabilities through sensors, while other years there are other changes, like screen size. This year is one of the years where the latter has occurred.

There are only a couple of new features to cover, the screen and color choices. We will get to those in due course, but let us look at the order process first.

Order Process

I think it is safe to say that this year’s Apple Watch Series 7 launch was bungled. The order process worked for me, and I did not have any hiccups, but it seems like the overall launch was bungled. The reason for this is quite simple, no details prior to pre-order day.

Unlike in previous years there was no gallery to see the possible combinations there might be, nor was there any sort of pricing, at least not prior to the beginning of the pre-order time. I can completely understand not having a pre-order system like they did for iPhone 13 models, but the minimum benchmark should be having the possible color combinations and pricing available before pre-orders go live. This would have allowed many to determine what they were hoping to order once pre-orders did begin.

With not having any time to look at models beforehand, anyone who might have wanted to get their Apple Watches as soon as possible had to frantically choose their watch case, color, and band as quickly as possible. Luckily, for me anyway, I was able to get the Midnight Sport model with Midnight sport band. The reason I chose this is because it was available for pickup at my local Apple Store on October 15th. I opted for pickup because, like the iPhone, I did not want to wait all day for it to arrive. I was able to get a 10am pickup time, so I could be one of the first in the store to pickup my order.

Next, let us jump onto the into color choices available.

Color Options

The Apple Watch has always come in a variety of colors. Which colors are available depend on the case material you choose. The Series 7 is the first time that Apple has not offered either a Space Gray or Silver as an option for the aluminum model. For the Series 7 aluminum models the available options are Midnight, Starlight, Green, Blue, and PRODUCT(RED).

Lack of Neutrality

As you likely surmised, there is no Space Gray or Silver color option for the aluminum models. For many they opt for the Silver because silver can generally go with anything. Starlight looks to be silver, but more of a gold-tinted Silver. For many, this is acceptable, however it is not likely to be as neutral as a Silver model would be.

Midnight 

As mentioned, I opted for the 45mm Midnight Apple Watch with the Midnight band. When you first look at the ‘Midnight’ watch case you may think that it is a black. But there does seem to be a tint of blue in the case. If you compare the Apple Watch Series 6 Space Gray  to the Apple Watch Series 7 in Midnight, you will notice that the Midnight is definitely darker than the Space Gray and that the Midnight might be a better overall "go with anything" type of watch.

While the Midnight case is darker, the pairing of the the Midnight watch band do not match. The Midnight band is more of a blue and it does work okay with the Midnight watch, but it is not the best pairing.

This is not all that uncommon, because often the Space Gray watch bands do not match the paired black bands. At the same time the Midnight watch band does not seem to be a good match with the Midnight watch. The case of the Midnight Watch is more of a black than the blue-black of the Midnight watch band.

The 'Midnight' Apple Watch is not the only device with an accessory that comes in "Midnight". There is also a MagSafe case for the the iPhone 13 line that comes in "Midnight". At least when it comes to the "Midnight" color of the Midnight iPhone 13 Pro Max case and the Midnight Apple Watch Band, they are the exact same color. Therefore, if you are looking to match your Apple Watch band and your iPhone 13 case you can be assured that these two will match perfectly.

Now that we have covered the coloring, let us look at the actual setup of the Apple Watch.

Setup

If you are setting up a new Apple Watch and you have never owned an Apple Watch the setup process is pretty straight-forward because you do not have any existing settings or configuration to worry about. However, if you have a previously paired Apple Watch and you want to transfer its setting to your new Apple Watch it may be a bit cumbersome and require jumping through some hoops.

The reason that it may be problematic is because if the version of watchOS on your old Apple Watch is newer than the version on the new Apple Watch you will not be able to transfer your current watch to your new watch. There is a workaround though. You can use the following steps to get your old Apple Watch settings onto your new Apple Watch.

1. Begin Pairing new Apple Watch
2. Setup as a new watch.
3. Complete Setup of the Apple Watch
4. Open Settings -> Software Update
5. Update Apple Watch to latest version
6. Unpair Apple Watch
7. Begin pairing of the Apple Watch
8. Use your current watch’s settings. It will have the text “(Current Watch)” next to your current watch. It will be similar to the image below.

For most people setting up an Apple Watch as new may not be too much of a problem. This is because things like cards added to Apple Pay will all need to be added again anyway. This is because each card added to Apple Pay has its own unique device specific identifier and those cannot be transferred between devices. 

It is important to make sure that you choose the proper device since there will also be a backup of your recently unpaired Apple Watch.

Now that the Apple Watch is setup, let us see the most notable change with the Apple Watch Series 7, the screen size.

Screen Size

The screen sizes of the Apple Watches has only increased by a single millimeter, or about 0.04 inches. However, the screen resolution has increased from 368x448 to 396x484, which is a 16.3% increase in screen resolution. This increase in screen resolution is absolutely noticeable, no matter which previous model you had, including the Series 6. You will also see some slightly higher percentages for the 41mm Series 7 as well when upgrading from a 40mm or 38mm model.

The first screen size change for the Apple Watch was with the Series 4, when the sizes went from 38mm and 42mm to 40mm and 44mm. This screen size change was an increase of 35.5%. If you are going from an Apple Watch Series 3, or earlier, to a Series 7, you will see an increase of 57.5% increase in screen resolution, which will absolutely be noticeable. 

When it comes to the Apple Watch any increase in screen size is welcome. This is because a watch cannot be nearly as large even the smallest iPhone and therefore the larger the screen size, the more easily you can see the time as well as the complications. This screen size increase has also allowed for one new feature, a full QWERTY keyboard.

Keyboard

The manner in which you are able to enter in text on an Apple Watch can vary, depending on the current context. You can use Scribble, emoji, Animoji, or even voice entry. With the new 41mm and 45mm screen sizes you can have the option of entering text in via a keyboard. 

One thing I have noticed while doing this is that I am so accustomed to the standard iOS keyboard that I forget that the backspace button is in the upper right corner. The backspace key is the same place as with the previous Apple Watches when using Scribble. The full keyboard is in the same place where Scribble was previously.

By default, Scribble is replaced by the full keyboard. This makes some sense given that you can be much quicker with the full keyboard than with Scribble. With the keyboard you can either tap on the individual characters or even use swiping between characters to enter in the text. When you use Swipe the Apple Watch will use predictive text to try and provide the correct word.

Scribble is still available if you want to use it. This is accessed by swiping up from the bottom of the Apple Watch to bring up the option of using Scribble or the full keyboard (Thanks to Michael @bearsfan34 on twitter for pointing me in the right direction). You can easily switch between the two depending on your preferred input method. 

Series 7 Only

Not having a full keyboard on the 38, 40, and 42mm makes sense given that the screens would be too small. Having the 41mm support a full keyboard does make sense given that the screen is more edge to edge. Yet, what seems odd is that the the full keyboard is not supported on the 44mm screen. Sure, it would be a slightly more cramped, but it would still likely be quite useable. My guess is that the full keyboard is designed to be exclusive to the Series 7 Apple Watch as a differentiating factor for the Watches.

Personally, I do not know how often I will end up using the full keyboard, but it is inevitable that having a full keyboard on the Apple Watch Series 7 will come in handy at some point. Let us now look at the new watch faces on the Series 7 Apple Watches.

New Watch Faces

The biggest aspect of the Apple Watch is the ability to customize the faces of the Apple Watch. All watch faces, regardless of them being digital or analog watches, have a thing called complications. Complications can display a number of things, like the current date, a calendar, or even the phase of the moon. Complications on an analog watch, as the name indicates, makes the watch more complicated to create. 

Similarly on the Apple Watch complications allow you to show items on the face of the Apple Watch. There are a number of different complication sizes, small, medium, large. Apple has a set of built-in complications, but third-party applications can also provide their own complications for people to use.

Apple adds new watch faces periodically. There are generally two instances when Apple adds new watch faces, either with a new version of watchOS or a when there is a new Apple Watch screen size. watchOS 8 includes two new watch faces, called “Portraits” and “World Time”. These watch faces are available to any Apple Watch that can support watchOS 8, meaning anything introduced after the Apple Watch Series 3.

As mentioned, the second possible instance for a new watch face is with a change in screen size. When there is a new screen size it is likely that new watch faces are introduced, or existing watch faces are modified, to take full advantage of the new screen size. The Apple Watch Series 7 has a couple new watch faces that are designed for the new screen sizes. Let us look at each one individually.

Contour

The Contour watch face is an interesting one. The Contour watch face is an analog watch face that has the hours around the outside edge of the watch face. As the name suggests the hours contour to the screen while the analog watch hands move around the watch face to provide the current time.

The Contour watch face allows you to set a specific color as well as add two sub-dial complications. One small complication that is towards the bottom of the screen as well a personalization complication. The personalization complication can be one of the following items:

• Today’s Date (default)
• Monogram
• Stopwatch
• Digital Time
• Timer

There are some other options that you can set, including the style as well as the dial color. There are two style options, “Regular” and “Rounded”. These watch face are different, but only subtly. The “Rounded” style takes the bottom portion of the hours and rounds them out so that the edges of each hour will be rounded. This is a very subtle difference. The easiest number to notice the difference is the “10”, but other numbers also change.

There is one last option called "Dial Color". The “Dial Color” option will allow you to set the entire dial to your selected color or even a multi-color. Let us look at the other new watch face, Module Duo.

Modular Duo

One of the watch faces that has been available since the original Apple Watch running watchOS 1 has been the Modular face. The Modular face allows you to choose the complications that will appear on the watch face. You can choose up to six complications, four small, one large, and an optional date in the upper right corner. On the Modular face there are three complications on the bottom row, the large complication in the middle, and one more small complication in the upper left corner. 

The Modular Duo face allows you the choice of three complications. There are two large complications and one small complication. The large complications take up the bottom two thirds of the Apple Watch face and the small complication is in the upper left corner. 

The Modular Duo watch face is a decent face that will help you quickly see information if you only have two large items and one small item you want to be able to see at a glance.

While I like the Modular Duo watch face, I think I am going to stick with my Infograph Modular watch face which was introduced with the Series 4. It provides me with the most number of complications so I can quickly get the information that I need. If you need only a couple of large complications, then the Modular Duo is a great choice.

Both of these new watch faces work well with the new 45mm Apple Watch Series 7 screen. There is one last feature to cover and that is around charging.

Fast charging

All of the Apple Watches have been capable of getting a decent level of charge fairly quickly. How quickly you can get an 80% charge, as well as a full charge, depends on the model. For the Apple Watch Series 3 you can get an 80% charge in about 90 minutes with a full charge in about 120 minutes. The Apple Watch SE takes about 90 minutes for an 80% charge and 150 minutes for a full charge. These charge times also similar for the other models as well. 

The Apple Watch Series 7 is different. It is capable of charging to 80% in 45 minutes and a full charge in 75 minutes. This means that you can charge the Apple Watch in half the time. This is great particularly if you do not have a lot of time to charge your watch, but you want to make sure it has enough charge. There are some limitations to this though.

First, you need a Fast Charge Apple Watch charger. This part is taken care of, because one is included in the box of your Apple Watch Series 7, so that will not cost you anything extra. The Apple Watch chargers that support fast charging can be easily identified because they have band of metal around the charging puck as well as around the USB-C plug.

The second thing you need is a USB-C charger capable of supporting USB Power Delivery, or USB-PD. This will need to be 5-watts or higher. This does not need to be an Apple USB-C adapter, but some of those are supported as well. The list of Apple power adapters that is supported include: 18W, 20W, 29W, 30W, 61W, 87W, and 96W USB-C adapters. If you have one of these adapters it will work. 

You can still use your other Apple Watch chargers, they just will not allow for fast charging. Therefore, if you have a favorite charger, you can continue to use it. You can replace them when the time is right for you.

Fast charging is a great addition to the Apple Watch given that there are no new sensors on the Apple Watch Series 7.

Closing Thoughts

If you currently have an Apple Watch Series 5 or Series 6, I am not sure how much of an upgrade you would notice. There are no new “must have” features that most users would notice, outside of the screen and full keyboard. However, if you upgrading from a Series 4, or as one person I talked to at the Apple Store, a Series 2, this will be a fantastic upgrade.

The increase in screen size will be very welcome and noticeable right away. The faster charging may not be immediately noticeable, but if you need to get a charge of 80%, it will take half the time, provided you use a compatible adapter that support USB Power Delivery, also known as USB-PD.

If you are in the market for a new Apple Watch the Series 7 is a great choice, whether you go with the 41mm or 45mm, you cannot go wrong. As of this writing there are many models that have a delivery date of early December, so you should order an Apple Watch sooner rather than later, if you are intending to order from Apple in time for the holidays. If you are new to the Apple Watch you will not be disappointed.

At their 'California Streaming' Apple announced the Apple Watch Series 7. At the time they announced that the Series 7 Apple Watch would be "available later this fall". Today, they have announced that pre-orders will begin this Friday, October 8th with devices beginning to arrive or be picked up October 15th.

Pre-orders will begin at 5:00am Pacific Time. The Apple Watch Series 7 starts at $399 for the 41mm, and $429 for the 45mm, with the cellular versions costing a bit more.

Source: Apple Newsroom

Today Apple unveiled a line of 22 different International Watch bands, along with accompanying Apple Watch faces. The International Watch Bands are Sport Loops. The list of available countries is:

• Australia
• Belgium
• Brazil
• Canada
• China
• Denmark
• France
• Germany
• Great Britain
• Greece
• Italy
• Jamaica
• Japan
• Mexico
• the Netherlands
• New Zealand
• Russia
• South Africa
• South Korea
• Spain
• Sweden
• United States

These Watch bands are considered limited editions, so they will only be available for a finite amount of time. Therefore, if you want to get one, you should order it soon. Each watch band costs $49, or the equivalent. And as of this writing, some are currently unavailable for purchase.

Source: Apple