Do you have an Apple Watch that is older than a year, or does the smartwatch respond slowly? Then you can make it run a lot smoother with these simple tips.
Apple Watch slow? This will speed up the watch
As with the iPhone, iPad and Mac, the performance of the Apple Watch also deteriorates over time. The battery lasts less, opening apps is slower and with every watchOS update, the smart clock has more trouble keeping up with the new functions.
However, that does not mean that a few years old Apple Watch is immediately written off. In fact, in 2019 you can still use the very first Apple Watch, although this smartwatch no longer supports the watchOS 5 update. You also notice from the loading times and crashes that this older Watch has more trouble with it. So lend the device a hand with the tips below.
1. Put fewer apps on your Apple Watch (which you don’t use anyway)
If you just got an Apple Watch, you probably want to put as many apps on it as possible. After all, this way you can see what the possibilities are and what developers have come up with for functions. After a while, there are (in our experience) very little left that you really use regularly.
That is why it is a small effort to thoroughly clean up the apps on your Watch. To do this you need the Watch app on your iPhone. Open the app and scroll down to see all installed apps. Except for Apple’s apps, you can delete all of these manually, so that they are listed in the ‘Available apps’ list. Here you can easily reinstall them in the future.
To prevent your Watch from filling up automatically in the future, you can also disable the automatic installation of apps on the Watch via the ‘Watch app> General’. As a result, the corresponding watchOS apps are not automatically installed when you put a new iOS app on your iPhone.
2. Put fewer apps in the Dock
Since watchOS 3, the Apple Watch has a Dock for your favorite apps. Handy, because that way you do not have to restart it all over again. The downside to this is that all apps in this Dock will run in the background. That is why it is important to handle this carefully. So on the Watch, remove the apps you don’t use every day from the Dock, or do this via the Watch app on your paired iPhone.
3. Refresh fewer apps in the background
Just like on the iPhone, the Apple Watch can also refresh apps in the background. The same tip applies here as with the Dock: only do this for the apps that you actually use regularly. Via the Watch app and ‘General> Refresh’ in the background, you can indicate per app whether it should be refreshed in the background.
4. Turn off animations
Sure, it’s nice to see the Apple Watch making smooth animations, but if you’re going for the best performance, you better turn it off. You can turn this off on the Watch in three steps. This makes the movements on the watch look less smooth, but the smartwatch responds faster.
- Open the Settings app on the Watch;
- Go to ‘General’ and ‘Accessibility’;
- Tap ‘Reduce Motion’.
New: watchOS 6
Later this year, Apple will release the watchOS 6 update for all recent Watch models. The update introduces a number of new watch faces, own App Store for the Watch and a decibel meter to protect your hearing.
Read more about the Apple Watch
- WhatsApp on the Apple Watch: this is how you send apps from your wrist (10-4)
- Facebook is working on a wristband for operating smart glasses (19-3)
- Which Apple Watch do I have? This is how you check it in 4 steps (22-2)
- Apple Watch tip: This is how you set a Live Photo as your watch face (9-11-2020)
- watchOS 7.0.2 with battery fix fix now available (12-10-2020)