watchOS Q&A

I have a time tracking app that has sync between devices. I am using background push notifications and PKPushRegistry to react to updates from other devices - to perform a sync with the server from the watch app and afterwards to reload the complications. My question is: after I move to using WidgetKit for my complications, can I still reload my complications from the background, within the pushRegistry(_ registry: PKPushRegistry, didReceiveIncomingPushWith:..) method? Or is it subject to strict limits for updating from the background such as on iOS? If the above is not possible, what is the recommended way of keeping WidgetKit-based complications on the user's watch face up to date? Considering that I also need to do a sync with the server from the watch app before it has the latest data to be able to display the correct state of the complication.

I have a Siri/widget-oriented app that would benefit from some sort of watchOS presence and I am trying to figure out the best approach. Can you help me understand the current options available? Initially I thought there was a kind of watchOS app that depended on an iPhone for nearly everything, but I am not clear if that approach has been deprecated. My app uses CloudKit for storage and is intended to be friendly to multiple devices, so theoretically the watch could stand on its own but in terms of staying closely in sync with the phone I am not clear that is the best approach. Further, it would seem to me better for Siri requests on the watch to directly update the phone if that were possible. My app heavily uses AppIntents, currently within the iPhone target. I am unclear if using an AppIntent extension would be a good path. I have found limited information about these extensions. I did an experiment with AppIntents in a watchOS app and had a lot of trouble getting the watch to recognize my shortcut phrases (or even to show the shortcuts in the watch Shortcuts app). With all of this in mind, can you offer me some recommendations about architecting a watch-friendly AppIntents approach.

I enabled Developer Mode on my watch but seemed to experience significant battery drain, so I tried to disable it (filed a feedback for the drain). But even after turning off dev mode on the watch and unpairing the watch from Xcode devices, I get prompted about trusting my computer. Is that expected behavior? I don’t remember it before turning on dev mode.

This is discussed here: https://developer.apple.com/forums/thread/801455 Essentially my users are finding there can be inconsistencies in the configurations offered for my app complications depending on if they are doing so on their Apple Watch directly or via the Watch Face Gallery in the iPhone Apple Watch app. Are there any new changes here or any best practices to follow when creating WidgetConfigurationIntents?

Hello! As I try to use Xcode (has happened in versions 16 and 26) and my Apple Watch (has happened with Series 6 and 10), the Devices and Simulators window reports problems connecting to the Watch. Messages vary from "Connecting to Apple Watch" to "Waiting to reconnect: Previous preparation error: the tunnel connection failed while the system tried to connect to the device; client unable to receive tunnel handshake response", or "Apple Watch may need to be unlocked to recover from previously reported preparation errors. Ensure the device is unlocked and near this Mac for better connection quality." The Watch was operational, and on my wrist, so it was unlocked. Any suggestions on how to move beyond this? Thank you!

One screen of our app has a calculator interface that takes over the toolbar area to afford sufficient tap targets for buttons. (Just like Apple's Calculator app without interference from the clock.) watchOS 11: works watchOS 27 b1: works Clock avoidance does not work in watchOS 26. Is there a specific API call we can use for this one screen in 26?

Hi! I've seen during the Keynote that watchOS will support Siri AI (when your iPhone is nearby), which sounds really exciting. Out of curiousity, I also noticed that both Core AI, and now the Foundation Models framework, are available on watchOS 27. This sounds amazing - bringing intelligence features to the watch could enable some great tailored experiences on the go. Here are some of my questions: Do these require a nearby iPhone? Do they work offline (on-device)? Lastly, are there any device limitations? Also, if there are any additional details or fun facts about using Foundation Models or Core AI on watchOS (or perhaps iOS, if making use of the companion app to run those models on the iPhone), I’d love to hear them!

Moving the minimum OS version from 4 to 9, I see a message "WatchKit Settings Bundles Deprecated". Settings used to be handled by providing a plist which the Watch app on the iPhone would then use to display settings and allow the user to change them. How, nowadays, should we make settings available to the user to be viewed and changed?

Xcode 27 refuses to build common Swift Packages for watchOS, such as swift-algorithms or swift-collections. ... 'WATCHOS_DEPLOYMENT_TARGET' is set to 8.0, but the range of supported deployment target versions is 9.0 to 27.0.x. The error disappears by explicitly declaring in the SPM manifest "platforms: [.watchOS(.v9)]". (Patching the "SwiftStdlib" availabilities in swift-collections is insufficient.) Is there a better workaround than mirroring our whole SPM graph to declare the platform minimum? Our projects' minimums are correctly set at 11 or 26. (Also happens in the hello world Xcode 27 watchOS only project.) FB23037701 ref: https://developer.apple.com/forums/thread/829540

Our app displays a calendar of the week ahead. On tapping a date, it offers three pieces of text for that date. These pieces of text can be quite long. What is the best overall architecture? Reading the documentation and watching the videos, it seems to be a NavigationSplitView whose items are the dates, and whose detail is a TabView which in turn contains three TextViews. Is this right?

Many Swift Packages, including those from Apple, like swift-collections, don't compile with Xcode 27. It shows these error messages: error: The watchOS deployment target 'WATCHOS_DEPLOYMENT_TARGET' is set to 8.0, but the range of supported deployment target versions is 9.0 to 27.0.x. (in target 'DequeModule' from project 'swift-collections') error: The armv7k architecture is deprecated. You should update your ARCHS build setting to remove the armv7k architecture. (in target 'DequeModule' from project 'swift-collections') Is this an expected behavior? If so, how can we fix it? If not, when will this be fixed?

Let's take an example where a user is on an iPhone 12 running iOS 27. They have an Apple Watch Series 10 paired running WatchOS 27. Are they able to access SiriAI queries from the Apple Watch? If not is there a technical limitation on why this isn't possible? On Apple Watch models where SiriAI is fully supported, does it still have any on device capability or is it all now requiring Internet access? And can this be Internet over cellular without the paired iPhone nearby?