🌞 Tired of squinting at a dim watch face? Turn your Apple Watch brightness up.

💸 Splitting the bill? The fastest way to send money to friends and family is with your Apple Watch.

👀 You can pause timers, track your Uber, and pause music without even opening an app on your Apple Watch!

How does your step count measure up? 👟👟🤔

One of the most popular features of the Apple Watch is the ability to accurately track your daily steps. How many steps does the average person take a day?

1. 🚶2,000–3,000
2. 🚶🚶 3,000–4,000
3. 🚶🚶🚶4,000–5,000

🏆 Did you get it right? Click the answer to find out! 🏆

In recent updates, Apple took a few capabilities from its Assistive Touch feature called Hand Gestures and repackaged them as something called Double Tap. I was initially unexcited, but recently changed my mind about this feature.

👌👌 What to know about Double Tap & Hand Gestures

• Double Tap is intended to help the average user perform a limited number of simple tasks on their watch by double tapping their thumb and index finger together.
• Hand Gestures is an accessibility feature that lets users perform almost any task on their watch without touching the screen by tapping their thumb and index finger together or clenching their fist. It is both more powerful and more complicated to use than Double Tap.
• You can’t use Hand Gestures when Double Tap is enabled and vice versa.
• Double Tap is only available on the Series 9 and 10 and the Ultra 2.
• Anyone with a Series 4 or later can get similar capabilities by using Hand Gestures.

Why I changed my mind about Double Tap

When Apple first introduced Hand Gestures, I was intrigued by the possibilities. But after playing around with it, I concluded that while Hand Gestures is an amazing accessibility feature, using it is unnecessarily complicated for anyone who doesn’t struggle to interact with their Apple Watch screen.

So when Apple released a simplified version of Hand Gestures for the Series 9 and Ultra 2 called Double Tap, I just shrugged. But then watchOS 11 came along and gave us the ability to use Double Tap while Water Lock is turned on, and I decided it was time to give this feature another look.

Double Tap does a lot less than Hand Gestures, and that’s a good thing

Hand Gestures does everything Double Tap does, plus 1,000 other amazing things. It also requires learning a whole new way to interact with your watch if you want to use it fully.

Double Tap is just that: A simple, repeated gesture that lets you control playback and Smart Stacks and select the primary button in a supported app. And while there are slight variations in how it works in different apps and menus, that's pretty much it.

It may seem counterintuitive to make a feature less capable. But I’m actually much more likely to use finger taps to control my watch if I can use one gesture to do a few simple tasks than if I have to think about using two taps versus three and remember what each set of gestures does.

And there are all kinds of simple but handy ways (sorry not sorry) to use Double Tap. So, once you have it enabled, check out the list I put together of things this feature can do.

(If you want to use Double Tap but have an older Apple Watch, don’t let my initial dismissal of Hand Gestures stop you from using it. You can choose to only use it in the ways listed below for using Double Tap, plus any other ways that you think will be helpful. Check out our article on how to set up and use Hand Gestures.)

Cool ways to use Double Tap

• Opening Smart Stacks and then scrolling through them. Or selecting the first item in the stack.
• Controlling audio playback. You can enable Double Tap to start and stop music, podcasts, and audiobooks. Or skip ahead. But not both.
• Pausing and resuming timers. And then stopping them when they end.
• Snoozing alarms. But not turning them off. It’s probably a good thing it’s not too easy to turn alarms off though.
• Scrolling through workout views. Say goodbye to awkwardly trying to swipe up and down on your watch screen mid-workout.
• Scrolling through and then clearing notifications. Shuffle through your notifications when your hands are full or you don’t want to draw attention to what you’re doing.
• Taking photos when using your watch as a camera remote. Don’t worry about having to quickly lower your arm and pose after hitting the shutter button. This is especially helpful when you want to quickly take a series of photos.
• Answering and ending phone calls. The struggle to answer calls on your Apple Watch by tapping the screen is real.
• Starting a workout when you get a workout reminder. This is great if you are in a pool with Water Lock on or holding on to your bike’s handlebars when you get notified that you forgot to track your workout.
• Changing flashlight modes. Your watch’s flashlight is meant to be used with the screen facing down. Double tapping to change modes is much easier than raising your watch to do it manually.
• Using your watch when Water Lock is on. No need to unlock it!
• And probably a lot more. If you’re curious about what else you can use Double Tap for, open any app or menu on your watch and see what happens when you tap. If Double Tap isn’t supported for that app, you’ll see a double tap icon jiggle at the top of the screen.

What to do if Double Tap won’t work

• Make sure Low Power Mode is off
• Make sure your Apple Watch is unlocked
• Turn off Sleep mode if it’s on
• Turn off Assistive Touch if it’s on
• Raise your watch to wake it
• Use Hand Gestures if you have an Apple Watch Series 8 or older

This week’s question: What Apple Watch feature became your unexpected favorite?

Are you like me? If you’ve ever been too quick to write off an Apple Watch feature, only to realize later that you love it, email OnTheWatch@iPhoneLife.com to let me know what the feature is, and I might share it in an upcoming edition. Maybe we’ll all learn about some cool features!

From the last edition: What is the main way you use your Apple Watch?

As usual, On the Watch readers came through with some fantastic answers. As I went through your answers, three main use cases emerged.

The first was health and fitness tracking; almost everyone who wrote in said they liked the ability to collect and view this important information.

The second was safety and having the peace of mind that comes from knowing your watch will call for help if you need it. For several readers, it was the biggest factor in getting an Apple Watch.

The third was accomplishing all the small tasks you might otherwise have to pull out your iPhone for, such as setting timers, checking the weather, navigation, and getting notifications for things like texts or emails.

“I live alone and my deciding reason to buy an Apple Watch was for the SOS emergency alert if I fall. I gave up wearing my gold Rolex with a diamond face to have this feature. I also like the fact that I can have the day and date on the face and the weather.” - Gina R.

“Mostly I like my watch because I don’t have to carry my phone or purse with me all the time.” - Lillian S.

Here are the top ways that y’all use your watches in no particular order:

• Fitness/Health tracking
• Viewing notifications
• Navigation alerts
• Using Apple Pay
• Checking Mail and Messages
• Checking the weather/date
• Timers
• Emergency SOS and Fall Detection

I’m excited to cover these topics in more depth in future editions!

You asked and we answered: Water workout woes and live updates on your favorite teams

Hi, I use my Apple Watch almost daily for water aerobics and frequently look to see my heart rate in progress. Much of the time, the heart rate is dim and won’t show up. What’s up and can I fix this? - Carol L.

Hello Carol, as a fellow aquatic fitness enthusiast, I feel your pain. It’s really hard to check how your workout is going when you are wet, in the sun, and have Water Lock on. The best solution I’ve found is turning on the Raise to Wake feature so that simply turning your wrist to look at your watch will wake the screen and let you look at your heart rate. To do this, open Display & Brightness in your watch’s Settings apps and make sure Wake on Wrist Raise is toggled on. I hope that helps! - Olena

Can you help me get live sports updates on my watch to work? - Bruce A.

Hello Bruce, Apple recently came out with an app called Apple Sports (free). Make sure your iPhone is running iOS 18 and your Apple Watch is running watchOS 11, then download the Apple Sports app from the App Store on your iPhone. As long as you didn’t disable the feature that lets your Apple Watch automatically download the same apps that you get on your iPhone, Apple Sports will appear on your watch as well. On your iPhone, open Apple Sports, follow the on-screen instructions to select the teams you wish to follow, and the scores will automatically appear as Live Updates on both your iPhone and Apple Watch so you can check them at a glance. - Olena

New! Every so often I will feature a question from the private Facebook group where we answer questions from our premium subscribers

A reminder to record my swim came on when I was in the pool. Nothing happened when I tapped on it, and I couldn’t find any data for it after I got out of the water. Any hints? - Steffi F.

Hi Steffi, In your screenshot, it looks like Water Lock was enabled on your watch when you received this notification (indicated by the blue water drop icon in the upper right corner). Your watch screen won’t respond to touch when Water Lock is on. You would have had to either press the Digital Crown to turn off Water Lock or use Double Tap in order to select Record Pool Swim. Unfortunately, if you didn’t do this, then the workout was not tracked. - Sarah

✉️ Email your questions to OnTheWatch@iPhoneLife.com and we might answer them in a future edition! Questions may be edited for clarity and length.

• 🍎🧠 Get ready! Apple is finally rolling out the first Apple Intelligence features on October 28
• 🤯 These iOS 18 features will change your life
• 🔋⌚ Turning this feature off could double your Apple Watch battery life!
• 🔔 Is your Apple Watch crashing and acting buggy? Time to update it
• ⚠️ AI is here whether we like it or not. Here’s how to use it safely.
• 💻 Everything your need to know about Apple’s new M4 Macs

Missed the most recent editions? Now you can go back and read them!

• October 4 edition
• September 20 edition
• September 6 edition
• August 23 edition
• August 9 edition

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