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watchOS 26 Adds Four New Apple Watch Faces

When Apple previewed watchOS 26 in June at WWDC, the company didn't reveal any new watch faces, but now we know Apple was just holding them back to show off with the new Apple Watch models that it unveiled on Tuesday.

watchos 26 faces
During its "Awe dropping" event, Apple also dropped the release candidate of watchOS 26. As it turns out, there are four new watch faces included in the upcoming update, some of which you may have already seen adorning the Apple Watch Series 11 and Apple Watch Ultra 3.

According to Apple's release notes, they are as follows:

  • Exactograph is a modern re-imagination of a traditional regulator watch which separates out hours, minutes, and seconds for more precise timekeeping
  • Flow uses Liquid Glass numerals that refract a fluid orb of color that responds to your wrist movements
  • Waypoint acts as a live compass that shows where you are in relation to saved locations in Maps or points of interest (Available on Apple Watch Ultra)
  • Hermès Faubourg Party features animated shorts that appear based on the time of day or your movements, with a series of characters (Available on Apple Watch Hermès)

These faces are coming to older models too. Waypoint is exclusive to Apple Watch Ultra models, adding to the two existing Ultra faces called Wayfinder and Modular Ultra.

Meanwhile, Hermès Faubourg Party – as the name suggests – is limited to Hermès models.

That leaves Exactograph and Flow, both of which will be available to all Apple Watch models that support watchOS 26. As a reminder, the existing Photos face has also been enhanced by a new design with Liquid Glass, elevating numerals so more of your photos are visible. Apple says the watch faces can be explored more easily thanks to a redesigned watch face gallery, where faces are grouped into collections.

watchOS 26 will roll out to all users on Monday, September 15.

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Top Rated Comments

turbineseaplane Avatar
9 months ago
Why can't 3rd parties make their own Apple Watch faces yet?

This is such a huge missed opportunity.

It's incredible to see what folks come up with at garmin.watchfacebuilder.com and the like.
Score: 19 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Séamus Boyle Avatar
9 months ago
These new ones are hideous and also useless for most of the styles because you can’t have complications. So absurd.
Score: 11 Votes (Like | Disagree)
9 months ago
I still think it’s asinine that watch faces can’t be designed either through submission and review of a “watch face store” or with some sort of end user tool.
Score: 8 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Eric_WVGG Avatar
9 months ago

For sure.
I'm just surprised they haven't monetized it yet.

There is surely way more money to be made by doing a 3rd party Watchface store.
Everything could be paid if they wanted... no free options
This probably isn't the main reason, but I just realized that there would be a huge problem with people doing "inspired by 1982 Casio" copyright-infringing suits.

There's this developer who made a Mac app called Bauhaus clock and immediately got slapped with a legal threat. Had to back up and remove all references to his inspirations and possibly alter the design a bit. https://bauhausclock.com/
Score: 3 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Phogro Avatar
9 months ago

Why can't 3rd parties make their own Apple Watch faces yet?

This is such a huge missed opportunity.

It's incredible to see what folks come up with at garmin.watchfacebuilder.com and the like.
If Apple wanted to they would have by now. By not supporting 3rd party faces they are basically showing us they want to maintain control of the watch face. There's also likely some amount of protecting the "upsell" for the Ultra/Hermes with exclusive faces.
Score: 3 Votes (Like | Disagree)
TheJackal Avatar
9 months ago
So the most simple, uncomplicated and elegant one still remains California :)
Score: 3 Votes (Like | Disagree)
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