An outdated Apple Watch turns out to be the ideal size to relegate to almost any drawer in your house. However, do you really want it to become part of that depressing assortment of weak adapters and misplaced trinkets (does anybody need three Palm styluses?)? Hell no.
There’s still a lot of life left in your old watch if you switched to a new Apple Watch Ultra 2 or a new watch recently because of its new capabilities. These nine suggestions can help you keep your old watch out of a drawer and in use.
Make this a committed exercise accessory
The Apple Watch is a premium timepiece that is designed to look well with whatever you’re wearing (thus the healthy ecosystem of watch bands), but it can also be a fitness companion that counts how and where you burn calories, from the gym to underwater. Sometimes these two worlds do not mesh properly.
Instead, use the old watch as your training watch; it doesn’t matter if it gets scuffed, scratched, dented, sweaty, or disgusting. (Just be sure to clean it properly at some point.)
Use it as a bedside clock
It’s normal to want to check the time when you wake up in the middle of the night, but do you want a bedside clock that illuminates the entire room with its massive LED numbers? (Maybe the clock woke you awake!)
When the Apple Watch is connected to a charger and placed on its side, Nightstand Mode displays the time, date, battery level, and next alarm. The screen remains off until you tap it or press one of the physical buttons, at which point it shuts off after a few seconds.
To enable this function, open the Apple Watch app on your iPhone, tap General, and then turn on Nightstand Mode. Or, on the watch itself, open the Settings app, go to General > Nightstand Mode, and activate the Nightstand Mode, switch.
Wake up without a blasting alarm
While sleep tracking is useful, wearing an Apple Watch at night also allows you to use it as a quiet alarm clock in the morning. Set an alarm using the Sleep app while keeping the watch in silent mode. You’ll awaken to a thrumming succession of taps on your wrist, which will not disturb a spouse in the same way that a loud, traditional alarm might.
Make it your dedicated sleep tracker
Sleep monitoring is one of the Apple Watch’s health capabilities, which not only counts the number of hours spent sleeping but also collects data on the quality of those restful hours. Anecdotal evidence shows that sleep tracking might aid in self-care, and scientific research supports sleep as an essential component of excellent heart and movement health. That is, if your watch’s battery lasts all night, you’ll need to recharge it throughout the day.
Instead of scheduling daily charging times, utilize an old Apple Watch as your nightly watch while your current watch charges. Set it up as a second watch, as detailed in “Make it a Dedicated Exercise Apple Watch,” and then exchange watches before bedtime. Health data is synced to your iPhone from any device. (With Nightstand Mode, your ordinary watch may also serve as a nightstand clock.)
Set up an Apple Watch for a kid or family member
Following the historical history of passing down outdated technology, an older Apple Watch may make an excellent accessory for a child or other family member. If you wish to keep it handled inside your Family Sharing group (the individuals associated with your Apple ID), you may use Family Setup to set it for one of them.
Make sure the watch has been unpaired and deleted, then hold it near your phone and select Set Up for a Family Member. Follow the setup instructions, selecting the individual in your Family Sharing group who will use the watch.
For youngsters, you may enable schooltime, a mode that restricts functions during specific hours. An Apple Watch Series 4 or later, as well as an iPhone 6s or later running iOS 14 or later, are required for setup, and not all capabilities are available when the Apple Watch is set up as a family watch.
Assist in caring for an older family member
Setting up an outdated Apple Watch for an older member of your Family Sharing group can provide peace of mind and help them in an emergency. Even if they only use the clock, fall detection can notify first responders and you (if you’re registered as a contact in the Emergency SOS settings) if they fall severely.
The watch also collects heart-rate data to calculate heart rate variability (HRV) and alerts the wearer when their heart rate lowers or jumps without a clear explanation, such as exercise. Unfortunately, key health functions, such as ECG, medications, and walking stability, are not available on Family Sharing watches.
Alternatively, you may pair the watch with their own iPhone rather than using it as a family-sharing device, enabling them to utilize every function of the model you’re giving them access to.
Use the Apple Watch as a remote for your smart home
Most likely, everyone in your home is set up to operate the security cameras, smart plugs, lights, and other HomeKit appliances, but what happens when visitors come to town? When someone flips a wall switch or turns off a lamp, the smart gadget loses power and becomes unusable.
Use the Home app to correctly handle your smart accessories, and set up an old watch on your iPhone to serve as a second watch or for a family member.
Have you ever accidentally confused a guest in your home due to smart lighting and appliances? It is not their fault if they are unaware of which lights are linked to smart plugs and which are smart bulbs. And nobody wants to be that person in an empty room, yelling at Siri or Alexa and hoping the machines hear them.
If, on the other hand, you still own an old Apple Watch, you have a fantastic little controller for your smart lights and gadgets. (As an added benefit, Find My lets you find the watch.)
To enable anybody in the home to use the Apple Watch, there are a few steps you’ll need to do, as it is initially intended to be an accessory for a single iPhone. Continue reading to find out how. See our reviews of the Apple Watch Series 9 and the greatest offers we could find for further information.
If the old watch isn’t already linked to your iPhone, couple it with someone else’s watch or use Family Sharing to set it up for you as a second watch. That may be a brand-new Family Sharing member you add just for this purpose (groups of up to six family members are allowed).
- Erase the watch by unpairing it from its current iPhone.
- Hold the watch near your iPhone and tap Set Up for a Family Member on the phone’s setup screen.
- Follow the setup steps and assign it to a family member.
To make sure the watch doesn’t need to be unlocked whenever it’s picked up, you’ll want to disable the passcode and make sure the screen doesn’t shut off too quickly:
- On the watch, go to Settings > Passcode and tap Turn Passcode Off.
- Go to Settings > General > Return to Clock and set that to After 1 hour so you aren’t presented with the clock each time you use it.
Select a watch style like Modular that allows you to put locations for the Home and Remote applications as complications in order to keep things simple. Additionally, you may want to delete any unnecessary programs from your system; however, Apple’s built-in apps cannot be removed.
Please note that the watch will display alerts, mail, and text messages if it is configured under your Apple ID as a second watch. Try navigating to Settings > Notifications in the Watch app on your iPhone, turning off Mirror My iPhone and then selecting Notifications Off for any applications other than Home and Remote.
From your Apple Watch, manage your home appliances
Open the Home app on your Apple Watch to see the controls you’ve configured for your household electronics.
You must allow access to the Home app’s controls on a shared watch:
- On an iPhone that’s already part of the household (presumably yours), open the Home app.
- Tap the + button and choose Add People.
- Choose the family member the watch is assigned to and tap Send Invite.
- On the watch, open the Home app and accept the invitation.
To fit on the small screen, the Home app displays a truncated view. Tap an icon to explore accessories and scenes you’ve made for a particular category, like lighting.
Tap the tile of a gadget to turn it on or off. If it has additional controls, such as dimmable light, you can alter it by dragging or tapping the three-dot button, or you may use the Digital Crown.
Inviting someone from outside your home to be a Resident in the Home app while they’re visiting is an additional option that isn’t exclusive to the Apple Watch. This enables them to use their own Apple devices to control the majority of their smart gadgets. But if you neglect to take them down after they’ve departed, they may still utilize the internet to take control of your home, which, as I can attest from personal experience, is like living with a cunning poltergeist.
You may also like to check out:
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- How To Add MagSafe To iPhone 11 And Older Models
- This Android Version Is the Most Widely Used At The Moment
- MacOS 11.3 Code Causes Alarm That Some Apple M1 MacBooks Could Lose Probably The Best Component
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