Your Apple Watch will finally give you a rest day

Alex Choros - Managing Editor + Group Telco Editor

Last updated 11 June 2024

watchOS 11 - the upcoming version of the Apple Watch operating system - will finally let wearers take a day off exercise without breaking streaks.

If you're not feeling up to it - because you're sick or taking a break from exercise, for example - watchOS 11 will let you put your activity rings on pause for however long you need. A day, a week, or even longer. While your rings are paused, you'll maintain any streaks you've built.

Rest days, as a fitness concept, are universally understood to be good, even if you’re not sick. They give your body time to recover and help prevent injury. They can also improve performance and reduce fatigue. Given how health-centric the Apple Watch is, it's odd it took Apple this long to implement the concept.

Even if you're committed to closing your activity rings every day, watchOS 11 gets a little bit kinder. You'll be able to set different activity goals for each day of the week, rather than constantly working toward one inflexible goal.

Similarly, you'll be able to customise your summary pane in the Activity app to highlight what metrics matter to you, and hide ones that don't. This, for example, could let you hide your trends if you've been exercising less because you're recovering from an injury. You might not want to see every arrow pointing down whenever you open the Activity app, especially when circumstances are out of your control.

watchOS 11 is also a little bit more thoughtful in terms of how fitness is tracked. In addition to measuring the amount of kilojoules you burn and how long you spend exercising, your Apple Watch will be able to also track your training load. This lets you see how the intensity of your workouts impacts your body, and helps you work out if you're undertraining or over-exerting yourself.

On the health front, watchOS 11 adds a Vitals app. Using your sleep data, the app aims to give you an overview of key health metrics such as heart rate, wrist temperature, and blood oxygen, and will alert you if multiple are outside of your typical range.

Other new features coming in watchOS 11 include pregnancy tracking in the Health app, live activity widgets in the Smart Stack, and a translation app. In addition, developers will be able to start using the double tap gesture - where you click your fingers together to trigger an action on the Watch - in their own apps.

watchOS 11 is set to be available in Spring - likely in September. A developer beta will launch today, and a public beta is set for July. watchOS 11 will be available on the Watch Series 6 and newer. The Apple Watch Series 4, Series 5, and the first generation Watch SE will not be able to upgrade to watchOS 11. You'll also need an iPhone running iOS 18 to install the update.

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Alex Choros

Managing Editor + Group Telco Editor | X | Instagram | Threads | LinkedIn

Alex Choros is the Managing Editor of WhistleOut Australia and an award-winning journalist. He's been writing about consumer technology for over a decade and is an expert on the Australian telco sector, to the point where he knows far too many phone and internet plans by heart. In addition to leading the WhistleOut editorial team, Alex is responsible for ruining the office Sonos with his troubled taste in music.

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