Guides The Insider s Guide to the Apple Watch
C ongratulations! After months of patiently waiting for your Apple Watch to arrive at your doorstep, it s finally on your wrist but now what? Here s everything you need to know, from managing your apps to customizing your watch face. Shortcut! Switch Between Tasks The Perfect Pair When using your Apple Watch, you can quickly return to the app you last used by double-tapping the Digital Crown. First thing s first, you ll need to pair your new Apple Watch with your iphone. To do this, make sure that you are running ios 8.2 or later and that your iphone is no older than an iphone 5. On your iphone, turn on Bluetooth on your iphone, launch the Apple Watch app, and tap Start Pairing. A yellow box will appear on the screen; center it over an animation on your Apple Watch. Once paired, tap Set Up as New Apple Watch. Using the Apple Watch iphone App So other than pairing your devices, what does Apple Watch app do? Well, a lot of things actually. The app lets you go in-depth with your wearable, allowing you to customize some of its most important settings such as app layout, notifications, and glances. You can also watch how-to videos that explain its different features under Explore, and find and download compatible apps under Featured. 2 iphone Life Insider Guide - Apple Watch Guide
Notifications Notifications are a convenient way to receive messages and alerts directly to your Apple Watch but it s up to you to decide what information gets relayed. Toggle Notifications Indicator on if you would like a red dot to appear on your watch face whenever you have unread notifications. The Notifications Privacy feature lets you block notification details from appearing on your watch face. Tap on individual apps to customize their notifications. The Activities app lets you control reminders to stand, progress updates, and a weekly summary of your activity. All other apps will let you choose whether to mirror that app s iphone notifications or to customize them for your watch. App Layout and Glances You can customize the position of app icons on the watch screen in the Apple Watch app on your iphone by tapping App Layout and holding and dragging apps into their desired position. To access the Home screen on your watch, press the digital crown once. The Apple Watch s Glances view gives you quick access to your most important apps. But Glances become significantly less useful if you have to swipe through 20 of them to get to what you want. To add an app to your Glances, tap the green plus sign next to any app not currently included. To remove an app, tap the red minus sign next to the apps listed at top. To reorder your app Glances or move an app in or out of the list of included apps, press the three horizontal bars to the right of the app name and drag it where you want it to appear. iphone Life Insider Guide - Apple Watch Guide 3
General Under General, you ll be able to choose your wrist orientation, access the watch s accessibility features, activate Wrist Detection (which locks your watch when you re not wearing it), and enable Handoff. Handoff lets you transfer tasks from the Apple Watch to the iphone when it s easier to complete the task on the larger screen. To complete a task in Mail, Maps, Messages, Phone, Reminders, Siri, or Calendar on your iphone, just swipe up on the app icon in the lower-left corner of your lock screen to pick up the task where you left off on your watch. If you try to use Siri for a task that your Apple Watch can t fulfill, such as responding to an email, it will also bring up a screen asking you to use Handoff to complete the task to your iphone. Did you Know? Tapping on Automatic Downloads lets you automatically load all Apple Watch-compatible apps to your watch. Otherwise scroll down to the bottom of the My Watch view to see a list of all your Apple Watch apps. Tap on individual apps in order to customize their watch settings, including whether an app appears on your watch or not. Navigating Your Apple Watch Your Apple Watch requires a Bluetooth or Wi-Fi connection to your phone to perform most of its functions. Stay within about 30 feet of your iphone for best results. You ll receive a notification at the top of your watch screen if you roam out of range. Just like the iphone, your Apple Watch has a touch-capacitive screen that you can navigate via swipes and taps. Additionally, there s Force Touch, which reveals addi- 4 iphone Life Insider Guide - Apple Watch Guide
tional controls when you press firmly on the screen. There are also two buttons on your watch: the Digital Crown and the Side button. The side button not only lets you turn on and off the watch by pressing and holding, but it also lets you access a wheel of up to 12 friends with a single tap and Apple Pay with a double tap. The Digital Crown is like the Home button on your iphone, which you can press to both activate your watch and return to your Home screen. You can also use it to scroll and zoom while in apps, or to activate Siri by pressing and holding the crown. Accessing Notifications Once you ve activated your watch, you can view your notifications by swiping down from the top of the screen. Swipe up and down or turn the digital crown to scroll through your notifications. Tap on individual notifications to take action. Accessing Glances To view Glances on your watch, swipe up from the watch face to access information summaries from each of your favorite apps. Navigate through the Glances by swiping left or right. Tap on a Glance to open the associated app. Haptic Vibrations The watch delivers notifications to you via an audible sound (which sounds vaguely like someone snapping their fingers) and a vibration pattern on your wrist. In Settings on your iphone or Watch, you can control both the volume of the alerts and the iphone Life Insider Guide - Apple Watch Guide 5
strength of the vibration. Because the watch is made to be subtle, even the loudest alert may be too quiet and lead to missed calls and messages. To help with this, you can enable Prominent Haptic in Settings on your watch or in the Apple Watch app on your phone to start receiving an extra vibration before an alert. Choosing & Customizing Your Watch Face You can make the Apple Watch face look just the way you like using Force Touch. Press and hold the current watch face to see a side-scrolling list of styles. A Customize button appears below watch faces that let you choose what information, color, or visual you wish to include. Right now, sadly, your choices are essentially limited to beautiful watch faces or functional watch faces, not both. Although it s fun to watch colorful flowers bloom on your wrist or jellyfish swirl around the screen, these visual watch faces are lacking in so-called complications, the traditional timepiece term for extra features beyond hour and minutes, such as the date or alarms. On your Apple Watch, these complications act as visual representations as well shortcuts to apps such as Weather, Calendar, and Activity. If you opt for a more practical watch face, just tap the area you wish to customize, and then scroll through the options using the digital crown. A nice perk is that the watch will remember the changes you ve made to any style, meaning you can switch between styles to match the occasion without losing your customizations when you switch back. Apple Pay Like with your iphone, Apple Pay is baked in to the Passbook app on your watch. For security reasons, you can only use Apple Pay on your watch if you have set up a password that locks your phone when you re not wearing it. To set up a password, go to Passcode in the Settings app on your watch or to Privacy in the watch app on your iphone. Tip Log Changes in Weight The Activity and Workout app use your personal information to help give you an accurate calorie burn reading. If your weight changes while using the watch, open the Apple Watch app on your phone, tap My Watch along the bottom options, tap Health, and enter in your new weight to continue to get the most accurate readings. 6 iphone Life Insider Guide - Apple Watch Guide
Pay with Apple Watch A nice perk of using Apple Pay on your watch is that it s a standalone feature, meaning you can make transactions without having your iphone within range. Regardless of whether you use Apple Pay on your iphone, you ll need to set up the service on the watch separately before you get started. Open the Apple Watch app on your iphone and tap My Watch > Passbook & Apple Pay, and then follow the on-screen instructions. Once you ve verified your card with the bank, you ll receive a notification on your watch informing you that Apple Pay is ready to go. To make a payment, just double-tap the side button on your watch and hold it to the contactless reader. While thousands of stores accept Apple Pay, finding them takes a little practice. Look for a wireless or Apple Pay symbol at the checkout terminal or simply ask a staff member if the store accepts Apple Pay. You can also download the app Mastercard Nearby (free) and select Contactless during setup to see which merchants accept mobile payments near you. Setting Up Activity & Workout Apps The Apple Watch is an impressive health and fitness tracker, monitoring everything from heart rate to calories burned to steps taken. There are two fitness-related apps on your watch: the Activity app and Workout app. The Activity app keeps track of three general activity metrics, represented by three rings: green for Exercise, blue for Stand, and pink for Move. The Activity app keeps track of three general activity metrics, movement (measured in active calories burned), exercise, and time spent standing represented by three rings: pink for Move, green for Exercise, and blue for Stand. Your goal is to complete iphone Life Insider Guide - Apple Watch Guide 7
all three circles by the end of each day. While Apple has universally set the watch s Exercise goal to 30 minutes per day and Stand goal to a minimum of 1 minute per hour, you get to choose your own Move goal. To set up the Activity app, open it on your watch and tap Get Started. You ll be prompted to enter your personal information including sex, age, weight, and height to help the watch accurately measure your caloric burn. Turn the dial to enter each field, enter a Move goal, then tap Start Moving to begin. Each Monday, you ll receive a weekly summary of your activity progress on your watch. If you haven t met your Move goal or have exceeded it most days, the app will suggest a more appropriate goal for you. You can also adjust your goal any time during the week by using Force Touch when in the Activity app and tapping Change Move Goal. In the Apple Watch app on your phone, you can customize your Activity settings. Here, you can turn off Stand Reminders (which by default prompt you to move if you ve been too idle), change how often you get updates on your progress toward your daily goal, and can turn off Weekly Summary and notifications when you reach goals or achieve new highs. To view your daily progress, launch the Activity app and swipe through your various activities. Swiping down from the main view will reveal stats including your total active calories burned, steps taken, and ground covered so far. If you just want a quick snapshot of your Activity, just swipe up from your watch face for glances or choose a watch face that includes a visual representation of your activity on the screen. Tip Watch Gets Better with Time While your watch doesn t have built-in GPS like your iphone does, once you ve gone on several walks and runs with your phone within range, the watch gets to know your stride and will be able to estimate your distance traveled even when you don t bring your phone on your next jog. 8 iphone Life Insider Guide - Apple Watch Guide
iphone Activity App For a more comprehensive look at your fitness, launch the Activity app on your iphone. Here you ll see a complete history of workouts logged with the Apple Watch. When you tap a day, you ll see the three-ring display as well as graphs for your Move, Exercise, and Stand metrics. Swipe left on any graph for a breakdown of stats. Under Move, you ll be able to see not only the active calories burned you see on your Apple Watch, but also your resting calories and total caloric burn, so you can learn how many calories on average you burn in a day. For a detailed breakdown of exercise sessions you ve logged with the Workout app, scroll to the bottom of the screen to where it says Workouts. Tap to see a list of time, calories, average heart rate, distance (if applicable), and how close you got to your goal if you set one. Log Workouts The Workout app on your watch logs your fitness, including real-time stats on your pace and distance. To start a workout, launch the app from your app screen or summon it with Siri. You ll see a list of distance-oriented activities like cycling, walking, and biking. If you re doing a workout not listed, such as yoga, crossfit, or pilates, tap Other. Next, swipe left or right to choose a goal whether it s burning calories, running a certain distance, or breaking a time record and then use the Digital Crown to set a number. If you re not feeling competitive, you can select Open to begin without a goal. When you are ready to begin, tap Start. Tip Keep Your Watch Band Snug During Workouts The heart rate sensor in the watch works best when it has direct contact with the top of your wrist. While you always want to be comfortable, you might consider tightening the watch during a workout session for more accurate results. Calling, Messaging & Digital Touch Friends Wheel With the friends wheel, Apple has built in a fast way to get in touch with your favorite contacts. Tap the Side Button to summon a wheel of your 12 most-frequented iphone Life Insider Guide - Apple Watch Guide 9
contacts and scroll through them using the Digital Crown. To select a contact, tap the picture or initials of the person you wish to correspond with. Under the contact s name, you ll see a message bubble icon to text, a phone icon to call, and a hand icon to send a Digital Touch message if the contact also owns an Apple Watch. Tap the icon for the corresponding service you wish to launch. To change who appears in your friends wheel, open the Apple Watch app on your iphone and navigate to My Watch, then Friends. Tap Add Friend to change who appears in the wheel on your watch. Calling Tapping the phone icon after selecting a contact in the friends wheel is a fast way to initiate a call on your Apple Watch. You can also initiate calls using Siri or launch the Phone app from your app screen to scroll through recent callers, favorites, your full list of contacts, or new voicemail messages. To receive an incoming call, tap Answer on your watch face. To silence a call, simply hold your hand over the watch face and the ringing will stop. Digital Touch Apple has built in an extra way to communicate with other watch wearers called Digital Touch. Digital Touch lets you send drawings, taps, or your heartbeat to other people with Apple Watches. To send a Digital Touch, navigate to a contact in your friends wheel. If the contact has an Apple Watch paired to his or her phone, you will see a hand icon signifying Digital Touch. 10 iphone Life Insider Guide - Apple Watch Guide
Tap the icon and press two fingers to the screen to have your watch measure your heartbeat and relay it to your recipient using the device s taptic motor. To send a drawing or series of taps, just draw on the screen with your finger or press one finger to the screen. Tap the small circle in the upper right corner to choose from a selection of seven colors. To view a Digital Touch someone has sent to you, tap the notification that appears on your watch. Tap the replay button in the upper right corner to view it again. The sketch or tap is stored on the recipient s device only for a few moments after it has played. Messaging The Messages app on your Apple Watch offers a convenient way to stay on top of your texts without picking up your phone. You have three choices for responding to a text: dictate your message, send an emoji, or choose from a list of preset responses. To dictate a response, tap the microphone icon and begin speaking. For longer messages, you ll have a chance to review the text before tapping Send. You also have the choice to send the message as text or as audio. If you prefer to send just text messages or just audio messages and want to avoid the extra step of specifying each time, you can go into your watch app on your iphone and go to My Watch > Messages > Audio Messages and choose between Always Dictation or Always Audio. Just remember that when dictating messages, you ll want to speak punctuation such as see you soon exclamation point but that you should avoid that step if you send audio messages or you might get some raised eyebrows. Siri offers an easy way to initiate a text as well. Just press and hold the Digital Crown and the watch face will display the wording What can I help you with? Unlike Siri on your phone, the virtual assistant will not speak out loud but will instead discreetly display results on the watch face. Using a preset response or emoji is a great way to address messages quickly when you want to be discreet, like when you re at work or on a date. To send an emoji, tap the icon with a smiley face to scroll through Apple s collections of emojis. Swipe right and left for the watch s unique animated images, some of which you can customize by moving your finger across the screen. When you hit Reply to a message, scroll up or down to view a list of phrases. You ll also see contextual responses based on the words in your last message. To avoid sounding a little robotic, you can add a personal touch in the Apple Watch app on your iphone. Tap My Watch in the menu, tap Messages, Default Replies, then tap a response and enter your own. iphone Life Insider Guide - Apple Watch Guide 11
Apple TV You can also use your Apple Watch to control your Apple TV, which is pretty convenient considering the remote for the Apple TV is easy to lose and isn t particularly userfriendly. To set up your watch as a remote, your iphone must be connected to the same Wi-Fi network as your Apple TV. Open the Remote app on your watch and tap Add Device. On your TV, go to Settings > General > Remotes and find and select your watch. To pair the watch, enter the 4-digit passcode displayed on the watch and wait to see the Apple TV icon appear on your watch screen. Once paired, you can begin controlling the TV with your watch. As long as your Apple TV is on (press the power button on the black box to wake), you can swipe in all directions on your watch to navigate through menu options. Besides a Play/Pause button, you will control the TV mainly with swipes and taps. To visit the previous menu, tap the screen. Tap and hold to return to the top menu. Calendar vs. Reminders While you will receive notifications of Reminders on your watch, the watch does not actually host the app itself. In order to create new reminders on your watch, you must use Siri. To respond to a reminder, tap on the notification, scroll to the bottom, and tap Snooze, Completed, or Dismiss. The Calendar app, on the other hand, has an app on your watch and will display your upcoming week s worth of events from all calendar accounts set up on your iphone. To access the app, you can go to the app screen, swipe up for Glances, or tap a shortcut that is a feature of many of the watch faces. From the month view, tapping the screen will take you to the current day, which you can scroll through using the Digital 12 iphone Life Insider Guide - Apple Watch Guide
Crown. Swiping right will take you to the current time that day. Swipe left to walk through the upcoming week s schedule. Tapping the upper left corner will take you back to the month view. Tap an event to view more information about it. You can Force Touch the screen for the List option, which shows you your upcoming week of events in a scrolling list. You can create an event using Siri, but to modify an event, you must switch back to your iphone. If you receive an invitation to an event, you can respond by scrolling down and tapping Accept, Maybe, or Decline. Get Directions with Maps The Maps app on your iphone lets you explore the area around you as well as get turn-by-turn directions via the watch s taptic motor. You can view your current location by swiping up for Glances. For all the features of the app, tap the glance or launch Maps from the watch s app screen. Tap the arrow in the lower left corner to zoom in on your current location, use the Digital Crown to zoom in and out, and swipe the screen to move right, left, up, or down. To begin turn-by-turn directions, first you need to find the location you d like to navigate to. Force Touch the screen and tap Search for a list of recent or favorite locations as well as the option to dictate an address. You can also tap landmarks and attractions around you, and you ll see the option to get driving or walking directions. When exploring the map, you can even drop your own pin by lightly pressing and holding the screen. Tap the pin, and then you ll see the option for navigation. Tap Start to begin your guided navigation. Instead of hearing Siri s voice like you would on your phone, your watch will tap you on the wrist 12 times to signal a right turn. For a left turn, you ll feel three sets of two taps. Shortly before you arrive and upon completion, your watch will vibrate to signal your arrival. iphone Life Insider Guide - Apple Watch Guide 13