KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 26 — Apple rolled out a whole bunch of software updates across its devices and while the iPhone, iPad and even the Mac (with the new Ventura version) all get updates, watchOS in particular gets a handy battery tweak.
Why is this a big deal? One of the biggest criticisms about the Apple Watch is its paltry battery life in comparison to its rivals.
While it has improved somewhat to the point you only need to charge it at the end of the day and you can quickly charge it before bed, to have enough juice to track you as you sleep, rival smartwatches boast days or even weeks without needing a charge.
Now the release notes of the watchOS 9.1 are as follows:
- Battery life extended during Outdoor Walking, Running, and Hiking Workouts with the ability to reduce the frequency of heart rate and GPS readings on Apple Watch Series 8, Apple Watch SE (second generation) and Apple Watch Ultra
- Apple Music can download while Apple Watch is off the charger using Wi-Fi or cellular
- Matter, the new smart home connectivity standard, is supported and enables a wide variety of smart home accessories to work together across ecosystems
Apple also noted the followings bugs, which this update also addresses:
- Voice feedback of average pace during Outdoor Run may be incorrect
- Chance of rain estimates shown in Weather app may not match estimates on iPhone in current location
- Hourly weather complication may label times as AM during PM hours
- Time duration displayed during Strength Training Workout may not advance for some users
- VoiceOver may not announce app name prior to reading notification when receiving multiple notifications
Apple hasn't been aggressive about marketing its smart home capabilities in the country with even the HomePods still not available here so Matter will not be much of interest to Malaysians.
The ability to download Apple Music tunes without needing to put your watch on the charger is pretty convenient as sometimes you just want to preload tunes to listen to when you run or commute, without that extra hassle of taking your watch off.
Anyway back to that battery life — what's interesting is the new battery life extension only applies to the Series 8, new (2nd-gen) Watch SE and of course, the new Apple Watch Ultra.
It's a bit disappointing for Series 7 users as the hardware for it does not differ that much from the Series 8 and will not help with the constant accusations of Apple indulging in planned obsolescence.
What do the owners of this year's Apple Watch release get for their money then with this update? They will have a new way of extending their battery life.
The new Low Power Mode works by turning off features such as the Always On Display and other sensors. It feels like you're defeating the purpose of using the watch as a tracker by deactivating or lessening the amount of times a sensor takes readings to be honest.
Still I suppose it would be useful in cases where you are running low on battery and are far away from a charger, or lost/forgot your phone and need your Watch to hang in there as a temporary replacement.
It does not address the fundamental problem -- that Apple needs to make better or bigger Apple Watch batteries.
Back to the update. Apple now has included an option to further decrease the frequency of sensor readings by going to Settings>Workout>Fewer GPS readings.
How much fewer? Well, you would now only get GPS readings once every two minutes, and heart rate readings just once every one minute.
What was it previously? Without the new setting, called the Low Power Workout Mode, turned on, heart rate and GPS would be recorded at one-second update frequencies.
What would you get? Apple claims this will help boost battery life to 60 hours on a single charge. Apple estimates that to include 15 hours of sleep tracking, 15 hours of hiking, walking or running, 35 minutes of app use and more than 600 time checks, and five hours connected to iPhone over Bluetooth as well as on-demand LTE connection.
Like it or not, the accuracy of measurements is helped by more readings so it is likely that the accuracy obtained while working out with the new lower power modes would be affected to a certain degree.
I would however think the modes do have use in situations where accuracy is not as important as having the watch last longer. For instance in emergency situations, or workouts where duration is the more important metric instead of others such as distance tracking or route mapping.
At the moment I am still testing the Apple Watch Ultra and so far the battery life has been very impressive and even surpassing Apple's estimates.
The update is still fairly good as a way to further convince people who just hate charging their watch every day to maybe be all right with charging it every other day.
To update your devices, just head on to Settings, where there should be a notification and for the Apple Watch, you will need to update it from the Watch app.
I look forward to the day where you can update your Watch software on your wrist so long as you have more than 50 per cent of your battery.
