watchOS 26 comes to Apple Watch with an AI-powered Workout Buddy, a new design, and more

UPDATE June 9, 2025

A new software design makes using Apple Watch even more fun, Workout Buddy brings the first-of-its-kind workouts with Apple Intelligence, and Smart Stack and Messages are even smarter.

CUPERTINO, CALIFORNIA Apple today previewed watchOS 26, which offers a beautiful new look and more intelligence for a more personalized experience, supporting users to stay active, healthy and connected. The new design with Liquid Glass makes features like Smart Stack, Control Center, Graphical watch faces, and in-app navigation and controls clearer, while maintaining the quick familiarity of watchOS. Apple Intelligence enhances the fitness experience with Workout Buddy, which provides personalized, spoken motivation. The workout app features a new layout, and offers music you can listen to based on your preferences and type of workout. watchOS 26 makes everyday interactions even easier with Smart Stack hints and message updates, and introduces new hand gestures to easily dismiss notifications.

“Apple Watch is an essential companion for millions of people around the world, and watchOS 26 uses intelligence to provide a more personalized experience,” said David Clark, Apple’s senior director of watchOS Engineering. “From a beautiful new design, to Workout Buddy with Apple Intelligence, personalized music suggestions in the Workout app, and more intelligence in Smart Stack and Messages, we’re excited about the many ways watchOS 26 will support each user to stay active, healthy, connected, and safe throughout the day.”

Beautiful New Design

A beautiful new software design with Liquid Glass brings a new look to watchOS 26. In all applications, this new design enables a bright and reflective experience that displays and contrasts content using real-time rendering, bringing more focus to content and making using Apple Watch even more enjoyable. Smart Stack widgets, Smart Stack hints, notifications, Control Center, and in-app controls and navigation will use the new design. The popular photo watch face is enhanced with numbers made of Liquid Glass, allowing users to see even more of their image.

Apple Intelligence Comes to Training with Exercise Buddy

Workout Buddy is a first-of-its-kind fitness experience with Apple Intelligence that integrates a user’s workout data and their fitness history to generate personalized, motivating insights during their session, based on data such as heart rate, pace, distance, activity rings, personal fitness milestones, and more.

For example, as the user starts running, Workout Buddy will give a personalized pep talk that might remind them of their mile run for the week so far, or share how they’re doing against their Workout ring goals: “Way to go for a run this Wednesday morning. You have 18 minutes left to close your Workout ring. So far this week, you’ve run 6 miles.”

During a workout, Workout Buddy can mark milestones like mile splits, or tell them when they’ve reached a new milestone based on their fitness history: “Mile four. Picked up the pace and ran the last one in 8 minutes and 28 seconds.” “Hey, check this out. Your total running distance for the year just crossed the 200 mile mark! Lots of running!”

When a user finishes a workout, Workout Buddy will repeat their workout stats and congratulate them on their accomplishments: “Way to get your workout! You walked 4.3 miles in just over 38 minutes. Your average pace was 8 minutes and 58 seconds, and your heart rate was 128. That was your longest run in the next 28 days?” What will you do?

To provide meaningful motivation in real time, Workout Buddy analyzes data privately and securely, with Apple Intelligence. A new text-to-speech model then translates the information into dynamic voice output created using voice data from Fitness+ trainers, so it has the right intensity, style, and tone for a workout.

Workout Buddy will be available on the Apple Watch with Bluetooth headphones, and requires an iPhone supported by Apple Intelligence nearby. It will be available starting in English, for all the most popular types of exercise: Outdoor and Indoor Running, Outdoor and Indoor Walking, Outdoor Cycle, HIIT, and Functional and Traditional Strength Training.

Additional Updates to the Exercise Experience

The Workout app is one of the most popular apps on the Apple Watch, and in watchOS 26, it’s getting the biggest update to design and navigation since launch. Four new buttons in the corners of the app make it easy for users to access their favorite features to customize workouts, such as workout views, custom workouts, Pacer, Race Track, and more.

For added motivation, users can set music and podcasts right in the workout app to play automatically when they start a workout. For the convenience of users, Apple Music can now select the best playlist for a user’s workout based on the type of workout and their preferences.¹ Alternatively, users can see suggestions for playlists or podcasts based on what they recently listened to during that particular workout.

Smart Stack We work very hard

Smart Stack is designed to help users quickly access important information from any watch face. In watchOS 26, Smart Stack improves its predictive algorithms by integrating more contextual data, sensor data, and data from user behavior to provide Smart Stack strategies, actionable information for actionable suggestions that can be made quickly. Made of Liquid Glass, the Smart Stack tips will appear on the display as soft visual information. For example, a Backtrack tip might appear when a user is in a remote location with no connection, or a Pilates workout tip might pop up when a user arrives at the studio during their regular time.

Added Convenience to Messages

Apple Watch now supports live translation in messages with Apple Intelligence, allowing incoming texts to be automatically translated into the language of the user’s choice, right on their wrist.² And when the user responds, their texts can be quickly translated to the person they are talking to. Live Translation will be available on Apple Watch Series 9, Apple Watch Series 10, and Apple Watch Ultra 2, with iPhone supported by Apple Intelligence.

In addition, for users whose device is set to English, Apple Watch will intelligently suggest appropriate actions in Messages using the context of the conversation, such as starting Check-in when a friend asks the user to share with him when he gets home, or using Apple Cash when the user is asked to donate to a group gift. Customizable backgrounds set on iPhone will also appear on Apple Watch to make conversations feel more personal and unique, and users can respond to polls right on their wrist. Smart Answers gets even more accurate for users with their device’s language set to English, with an advanced on-device language model that can generate the right answers based on the context of the conversation.³

Notifications Easier to Manage

Notifications are even easier to manage with a simple hand gesture on Apple Watch Series 9, Apple Watch Series 10, and Apple Watch Ultra 2. If a user raises their wrist to check a notification but is not ready to respond, they can quickly return their wrist to dismiss the notification. Wrist gestures can be used to dismiss notifications and incoming calls, silence timers and alarms, and return to the watch face. It uses an accelerometer and gyroscope – and a machine learning model – to analyze the movements of the user’s wrist. Wrist Flick joins double-touch to allow users to do more on the Apple Watch with just one hand, during times when the user’s other hand is busy, such as when walking the dog, cooking, or holding a cup of coffee.

Apple Watch can now automatically adjust speaker volume based on ambient noise in the user’s environment for notifications, timers, alarms, incoming calls, and Siri, allowing them to stay connected without worrying about disturbing those around them.

More updates in watchOS 26:

• I Notes app comes to the Apple Watch, allowing users to access their notes on their wrists. Users can also pin and open notes, complete checklist items, and create new notes with Siri, dictation, and the keyboard.

• Grab an Assistant again Telephone Inspection come to the Phone app, if the iPhone is nearby. If the user is waiting for a live agent, Hold Assistant detects when a live agent is available and notifies the user to return to the call.⁴ Call Screening helps users manage incoming calls from unknown numbers more effectively by collecting the name and reason for the call before their phone rings, so they can make an informed decision whether to pick up, decline, or request more information.⁵

• For users who are deaf or hard of hearing, Live Listen The controls come to the Apple Watch with a new set of features, including real-time previews of what their iPhone is hearing on the paired Apple Watch while listening to audio.⁶ The Apple Watch acts as a remote control to start or stop live listening sessions on a paired iPhone, or jump back into a session to capture something you might have missed.

• I Photo faces will now shuffle photos based on Featured Content in Photos, so users can see photos of their most important moments every time they raise their hand or click the display.

• Users can now explore and discover the watch face more easily with the redesign view the face gallery on the Apple Watch and the Watch app on the iPhone, with faces grouped together.

Developers can take advantage of new APIs in watchOS 26 across design, Smart Stack, and more. Developers can use the new SwiftUI APIs to take advantage of the great new design elements of watchOS 26. With the Widget Control API, developers can create custom controls to be added to the Control Center, Action Button, or Smart Stack widget, and the Smart Stack Relevance API allows third-party widgets to be added to the Smart Stack with new signals such as point of interest data points, business user consent. For example, Smart Stack can intelligently display a Slopes widget when users arrive at a ski resort with enhanced location APIs, and now Dark Noise can add a custom control to Control Center so users can easily turn on the sleep soundscape without lifting their iPhone.