How To Get The Most Out Of Your Apple Watch

If you've got an Apple Watch but aren't quite sure what to use it for other than messaging and tracking your steps, you've come to the right place. Today I'm breaking down how to get the most out of your Apple Watch.

Whether you're a new owner or have had your watch for a while now, if you're not aware of all of its capabilities, it can be overwhelming. Maybe you haven't had time to explore the device or maybe you're nervous you might mess something up if you check out something new. Or maybe you're like my brother and don't even use it anymore because you think all it's good for it checking the time and getting message alerts - "I have a watch and a phone for that."

Regardless, I've put together a little guide that I hope will help you in getting the most out of your Apple Watch experience...

How To Get The Most Out Of Your Apple Watch (The Basics)

Tracking Your Activity: On your watch, you have the ability to track your activity. Your activity is broken down into 3 categories: move, exercise and stand. This feature helps motivate you to maintain an active lifestyle and allow you to track your progress. You can earn different awards and badges for closing your rings and creating streaks.

• Move - Your move goal calculates the active calories that you burn throughout the day. You can set this move goal to what you'd like. Your watch will send you notifications throughout the day to keep you updated on your progress and help you to follow through.

• Exercise - Your exercise goal is always set to a minimum of 30 mins per day (the minimum recommended time to actively exercise everyday to ensure a healthy lifestyle). The cool thing about the exercise goal is that you can track your workouts while you do them. There is a library of workout options to choose from (running, walking, yoga, hiking, rowing, etc) and throughout your workout, you can track things like time, heart rate, active calories vs total calories burned, how far you're going, altitude and more.

• Stand - Your stand goal is always set at 12 (the minimum recommended amount of times to actively stand throughout the day to maintain a healthy lifestyle). This is especially awesome if you are someone who tends to sit at a desk and work most of the day. Your watch will remind you to stand in order to maintain the goal.

Noise: Your Apple Watch is equipped with a built in noise detector. You can see how loud (in dB) your environment is and your watch will be able to tell you whether or not you are in danger of potential hearing damage. It will also automatically alert you if you are in a situation where dB's exceed a safe level.

Breathe: We live in such a busy world. Sometimes we forget to just breathe. Your watch has an app that will help to remind you to take a moment to breathe - all it takes is 1 minute per day to help ease stress and aid in your focus.

Timer/Stopwatch/Alarm: There are a fair amount of watches that have this capability. Just know you have it on your watch as well (and it's super user friendly)!

Walkie-Talkie: This app on your watch allows you to use it like a walkie-talkie. The best part? You do not need service to use it. This feature saved my butt one time when I had to drop Tyler off at work and he accidentally left his phone in my car. I was able to communicate with him via the walkie-talkie until I was able to get his phone back to him.

Camera: For any of y'all who want to get everyone in the photo but whose arms aren't long enough for a selfie. You can set up your phone, facing forward, and not only see what your phone camera sees on your watch, but also take some timed photos as well.

Calculator: Yup, you got it, just like your phone except on your watch!

Compass: You never know when you're gonna need one of them - perfect for hiking.

ECG (electrocardiogram): There is an app on your watch that can now check for atrial fibrillation (AFib) at higher rates or let you know if your result is inconclusive due to a poor recording. You can also do self-checks through that app. It will automatically notify you if you are experiencing irregularities and let you know if you need to go to the hospital. Because of this feature, a parent of a close friend knew when he had to go to the hospital due to AFib (something he had never experienced earlier on in his life).

Blood O2: Your watch has capabilities of checking your blood oxygen levels and notifying you if they are lower than normal and/or if you need to seek medical help. This was huge with COVID.

Period Tracker: Ladies, you already have this capability on your iPhones but it sinks right up to your watch for a more convenient experience.

Hand Washing: You can set a hand washing timer on your watch that will be able to sense when you are washing your hands and make sure that you wash for 20 seconds. (My only complaint about this timer is that sometimes it turns on when I'm trying to wash the dishes lol)

Track Your Sleep: If you wear your Apple Watch to bed, it will track the amount of time that you're asleep, providing insight into how long you're in bed, how much of that time you spend sleeping, and your heart rate.

...And this is just the tip of the iceberg!

I hope this helps you to get a bit more use out of your Watch. Let me know what you think in the comments below! Here's to a great weekend ahead : )

Sending love always,

J.S.