{"id":18482,"date":"2025-06-27T07:35:15","date_gmt":"2025-06-27T07:35:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/18482\/"},"modified":"2025-06-27T07:35:15","modified_gmt":"2025-06-27T07:35:15","slug":"your-apple-watch-is-about-to-get-a-pretty-cool-new-ability-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/18482\/","title":{"rendered":"Your Apple Watch Is About to Get a Pretty Cool New Ability"},"content":{"rendered":"

Apple is gearing up to give your Apple Watch some of your iPhone\u2019s standout features.<\/p>\n

\"watchOS<\/p>\n

watchOS 26 updates to Control Center<\/p>\n

Apple has a habit of rolling out new features to the iPhone and then spreading similar features to its other devices the following year. And that holds true this year, as well.<\/p>\n

Last year, with iOS 18, Apple gave users the ability to customize their iPhone\u2019s Control Center<\/a> in vastly new ways. And with the upcoming watchOS 26, some similar significant changes are coming to the Apple Watch\u2019s Control Center for the first time.<\/p>\n

\"watchOS<\/p>\n

To date, you\u2019ve had very few options regarding customizing your Apple Watch\u2019s Control Center in a few ways. – Credit: Photo by Tucker Bowe for Gear Patrol<\/p>\n

Superior wrist control<\/p>\n

The Control Center on your Apple Watch provides quick access to essential settings. You can turn on your flashlight, toggle Wi-Fi on or off, or ping your iPhone if it gets misplaced.<\/p>\n

So far, you\u2019ve managed to customize the Control Center on your Apple Watch, but just barely. You\u2019ve been able to rearrange various icons or add a setting from one of Apple\u2019s default apps.<\/p>\n

But thanks to watchOS 26, your iPhone\u2019s Control Center is coming to your Apple Watch\u2019s Control Center for the first time. This is pretty neat for two reasons.<\/p>\n

\"watchOS<\/p>\n

Last year, with iOS 18, Apple gave your iPhone\u2019s Control Center significantly more customization options. Now it\u2019s bringing similar capabilities to the Apple Watch. – Credit: Photo by Tucker Bowe for Gear Patrol<\/p>\n

Control your iPhone \u2026 from your wrist<\/p>\n

First, it lets you better control and monitor your iPhone from your Apple Watch. With watchOS 26, your Apple Watch\u2019s Control Center will have access to the same toggles as the ones on your iPhone\u2019s Control Center for the first time.<\/p>\n

This means that as long as your Apple Watch is paired with your iPhone, you\u2019ll be able to use the Apple Watch\u2019s Control Center to do things like: turn on your iPhone\u2019s flashlight, toggle your iPhone\u2019s Wi-Fi or Bluetooth on and off, or even monitor your iPhone\u2019s battery life.<\/p>\n

Basically, Apple Watch\u2019s Control Center isn\u2019t going to be stuck with only watch-specific tasks anymore.<\/p>\n

Support for third-party apps<\/p>\n

Second, your Apple Watch\u2019s Control Center will have access to third-party controls for the first time. This is a big change from just Apple\u2019s default toggles.<\/p>\n

In its keynote presentation, Apple used Dark Noise (a popular ambient noise app) as an example. With watchOS 26, you\u2019ll be able to add a custom control to the Apple Watch\u2019s Control Center that allows you to turn on a sleep soundscape without picking up your iPhone.<\/p>\n

(Note: Third-party developers will be able to create custom APIs specifically for the Apple Watch\u2019s Control Center, and not all will be available at launch.)<\/p>\n

If the third-party app doesn\u2019t have a corresponding Apple Watch app \u2014 which Dark Noise does \u2014 you\u2019re not out of luck.<\/p>\n

Since your Apple Watch will have access to the same Control Center toggles as your iPhone, you\u2019ll have access to many of its third-party toggles too. When you toggle them on your Apple Watch, the action will occur on your iPhone.<\/p>\n

\"watchOS<\/p>\n

Dark Noise is one of the third-party apps that will be supported in the Apple Watch\u2019s Control Center at launch. – Credit: Apple<\/p>\n

Other upcoming features?<\/p>\n

In addition to the Control Center changes, watchOS 26 will bring quite a few other features to your Apple Watch.<\/p>\n

This includes a \u201cWrist Flick,\u201d a quick movement of flicking your wrist, which dismisses things like app notifications and incoming calls, as well as silencing timers.<\/p>\n

The other standout upcoming feature is called \u201cWorkout Buddy.\u201dWhen doing an exercise in the Workout app, an AI-powered assistant will talk to you, feeding you real-time data and words of encouragement.<\/p>\n

Apple will officially release watchOS 26 this fall, most likely in early September, when it announces the next-gen Apple Watch models. To learn more about all the upcoming features, check out\u00a0Apple\u2019s blog post<\/a>.<\/p>\n

About the Author: <\/p>\n

Tucker Bowe has been on Gear Patrol\u2019s editorial team since 2014. As a Tech Staff Writer, he tracks everything in the consumer tech space, from headphones to smartphones, wearables to home theater systems. If it lights up or makes noise, he probably covers it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Apple is gearing up to give your Apple Watch some of your iPhone\u2019s standout features. watchOS 26 updates…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":18483,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[239,4124,17577,705,158,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-18482","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-gadgets","8":"tag-apple","9":"tag-apple-watch","10":"tag-control-center","11":"tag-gadgets","12":"tag-technology","13":"tag-united-states","14":"tag-unitedstates","15":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114754179856066650","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18482","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18482"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18482\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18483"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18482"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18482"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18482"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}