Of watch faces and complications
Some tips & tricks after several months using Apple Watch
This article is also available to read on Medium
I change it often, but Utility has become my go-to Watch Face pretty much from day one. I love the minimal and modern look (I always use it with the minimum level of detail). I also love that it displays the full date (both the day of the week and the number) and how quickly you can change the accent colour. I’m usually on yellow, which creates a beautiful contrast with the black background and band, but I sometimes change it to orange or to bright blue whenever I’m wearing the blue sports band.
One of the other reasons I always go back to Utility is that instead of displaying two complications at the bottom it only shows one with more information. For example, if you have the calendar complication there, it shows the time and name of the event, which I find very useful to see at a glance. In the case of the Activity complication it is even more useful, because instead of showing a tiny representation of the three rings and how far you are in filling them, it shows a breakdown of calories, exercise time and stand up time (this is also accessible in the Modular watch face). Not only does it provide a much more detailed snapshot of your day, but I also find it way more useful than the rings, which become quite pointless once you fill all three since they don’t change after that, failing to indicate any extra activity. It’s great when you’re having dinner after a particularly intensive day and you know at a glance you can have that fourth slice of pizza because today you’ve more than doubled your Move goal. Little things.
Unlike most watch faces, which show a small representation of the rings, the Utility and the Modular watch face can show a much more detailed breakdown by calories, exercise and stand time.
Up until a few weeks ago my complications had always been the same: battery at the top left-hand corner, weather at the top right, and at the bottom Calendar or Activity depending on how eventful my day is. However, I’ve recently gotten rid of the Battery complication since I know I can get through pretty much any day without having to worry about it. Instead I’m now using a World Clock complication showing my current time, since I find it useful to have it shown in both digital and analogical fashion. Sometimes I need to know what time it is down to the minute, whereas at some other moments I just need to know how much of an hour I have left.
The only thing you need to know about the battery on Apple Watch is that it lasts, so you might as well make a better use of that Complication space.
Little tricks
When taking a plane or a train, I create an event with the time of departure and in the name field I enter the plane or the train number as well as the row and seat number. That way I can know at a glance where I’m seated without having to launch Passbook. The name has to be short so it fits, so for example if I’m in a flight with the number UX7263 and I’m seated in row 5, seat C, the event looks something like “20:15 UX7263 R5 SC”. Gibberish to anyone else but super useful to me.
One last trick: when receiving a notification on Apple Watch, the main two things you can do is to act on it or dismiss it, which you can do by tapping on “Dismiss” or simply by swiping down on the notification, literally pulling it away. The problem with dismissing notifications on your Watch is that it also clears them away from your iPhone’s lock screen and even from the notifications center, so should you want to act on it later you have no choice but to open the corresponding app and hunt it down. This is particularly annoying with notifications for iMessages, because dismissing them not only gets rid of the notification but also marks them as read, which may led to an awkward situation if you have read receipts turned on. However, if instead of swiping down or tapping on “Dismiss” you just press the Digital Crown, the notification goes away but remains accesible through the Watch’s notification tray as well as the iPhone’s lock screen.
