It’s been a busy week at Apple with the drop of the latest iPhone 17 and the new Apple Watch 11. Amid the bustle of activity, Apple is also officially dropping watchOS 26. There are plenty of changes coming down the pipeline, and tucked in among all the other new features are four brand new watch faces.
Per Apple’s release notes when installing the update, the four new watch faces include nods to classic watches, and the incorporation of Apple's new Liquid Glass design language:
Exactograph is a modern re-imagination of a traditional regular watch which separates out hours, minutes, and seconds for more precise timekeeping.
Flow uses Liquid Glass numerals that refract a fluid orb of color that responds to your wrist movements.
Waypoint acts as a live compass that shows where you are in relation to saved locations in (Apple) Maps or points of interest (Available on the Apple Watch Ultra).
Hermès Faubourg Party features animated shorts that appear based on the time of day or your movements, with a series of characters (Available on Apple Watch Hermès).
As you may have surmised, the Waypoint watch face is exclusive to the Apple Watch Ultra while the Hermès Faubourg Party is exclusive to the Apple Watch Hermès. In addition to the new watch faces above, the Photos watch face has received a Liquid Glass makeover, so it’ll look new as well.
All Apple Watch users who upgrade to watchOS 26 will get the Flow and Exactograph faces. According to Apple’s website, that will include all Apple Watches from the Series 6 onward and all three Apple Watch Ultra generations. The Apple Watch SE 2 is also invited to the party.
The update will begin rolling out to the appropriate devices on Monday, September 15. Beta users should already have access to it now.
WatchOS 26 was initially announced at WWDC, so most of the new features have been announced already. Apple Watch users will be treated to a new Liquid Glass design, the new AI-powered Workout Buddy, and the inclusion of Live Translation in addition to a number of improvements of things like the aforementioned Photos watch face and the addition of a Notes app.
