With Taptic Chimes, your Apple Watch can silently tap your wrist on the hour or half-hour.
The new Taptic Chimes feature in watchOS 6 uses Apple's custom vibrator, known as Taptic Engine, to make fast vibrations on your wrist at the top of the hour to help you keep track of your time without having to engage the computer.
Taptic Chimes are hourly taptic warnings that you feel on your wrist, similar to those helpful standalone reminders that go off every 50 minutes to remind you to get up and walk about.
Aside from having a silent taptic touch on your wrist every hour, if you have sound switched on, you can also hear a short chime in the form of a robin chirping.
The Taptic Chimes feature is only available on Apple Watch Series 3 and newer.
Kevin Lynch, Apple's Vice President of Technology, demonstrated the Apple Watch Taptic Chimes function on stage during the keynote address on June 3rd that kicked off the annual Worldwide Developers Conference, which took place June 3rd to 7th in San Jose California.
Do you like to hear a bird tweet once an hour? At the top of the hour, how about a gentle pulse on your wrist? You mean once every 30 minutes?
Learn setting up and using Apple Watch taptic chimes by following the steps below.
Using Apple Watch taptic chimes
To enable the Apple Watch taptic chimes function, follow these steps:
1) Launch the Settings application.
2) From the main menu, select Sounds and Haptics.
3) Select a schedule by sliding the switch next to Taptic Chimes to the ON position:
- Taptic Chimes would ring in the new hour on the hour.
- Every 30 minutes on the half-hour, taptic warnings will go off.
Apple Watch will now tap a short pattern on your wrist using its Taptic Engine according to your chosen schedule, allowing you to keep track of time without having to engage the system. If the sound is switched on, you can also hear an audible chime, as previously mentioned.
Taptic Chimes is a fantastic feature in watchOS 6, particularly when multitasking, so you don't have to look at your wrist to know when another hour has passed.
Additionally, if you unlock the new choice called Speak Time, you'll be able to keep two fingers on your current watch face to have your Apple Watch tell you the time out loud.
This is similar to the previous watchOS software's Tap to Speak Time environment, which was limited to the Mickey & Minnie Mouse watch faces and was removed in watchOS 6
Last but not least, the watchOS 6 update includes a setting called Haptic Time, which instructs your watch to display a haptic version of the current time on your wrist using Morse code to differentiate hours and minutes.
Compatibility with watchOS 6
With the exception of the original edition, watchOS 6 is compatible with all Apple Watch versions, much like watchOS 5. On the Series 1, Series 2, Series 3, and Series 4 watches, watchOS 6 works fine, but some features can require newer hardware.
Read Apple's press release or go to apple.com/watchos/watchos-preview for more details.
