Apple Watch 2 Review
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Apple Watch OS 2 release date
It's out right now, and has been for almost eight months. There was a five day delay on the release to start with, but just like past major Apple OS updates the Apple Watch's software upgrade is free.
Apple Watch OS 2 latest upgrades
WatchOS 2.2.1 is the latest software upgrade and most of the upgrades since the original watchOS 2 release have been minor improvements.
There have been a lot of fixes to stability issues and even the latest upgrade - watchOS 2.2.1 - just focused on performance issues.
Problems have been fixed such as limits on only being able to pair one Apple Watch with your phone, calendar issues and third-party app icons breaking. There's also support for a new range of languages for those who can speak multiple tongues.
Watch OS 2.0.1 was perhaps the most important though as it fixed issues with the battery performance as well as bringing in the new emoji characters that were included on iOS 9.1.
Sensors and controls
The Digital Crown provides functionality beyond zooming in and out. Rotating the crown lets you 'Time Travel' showing various events up to 72 hours into the future or past events, right on the watch face. Weather and news headlines are also other complications that Time Travel will work with.
It's cool seeing what the weather will be like, and if you've got your calendar set up perfectly it's neat to see what appointments are coming up.
But until more third-party apps offer complications for this section, we can't say we're enamoured.
The microphone is accessible to other apps now, which means developers are also be able to use your voice in their builds.
Developers now have access to the accelerometer too, so you can expect future apps to utilize this feature more.
Watch display settings
Previously capped at 15 seconds, the Apple Watch is now able to stay on for a whopping 70 seconds; why you'd need this we've not quite worked out, but that option is nice to have.
Tetherless Wi-Fi
Yes, this sounds exactly like what you think it is. The Apple Watch is able to connect to open Wi-Fi networks without needing to connect to your iPhone first. You can leave your phone in another room and your wrist will be a perfectly suitable alternative.
It's been hard to find a time to put this into practice though – you can keep the Watch connection alive in most homes thanks to being close enough.
Watch faces
There were 10 customizable Apple Watch faces at launch, and as we expected we've now got more to play with.
Modular looks much nicer with more colors to play with (along with the extra complications to check out).
Time Lapse: Apple shot time-lapse videos over 24 hours in Hong Kong, London, Mack Lake, New York and Shanghai to create these new faces, and Paris was recently added to the mix. This is one that we're really in to, as it adds an element of dynamism to the Watch, with movement every time you lift your wrist.
It would be brilliant if you could film your own time-lapse here and code it to the correct time stamps; given that the iPhone 6S is going to have a stabilized time-lapse mode, this could be awesome.
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