Apple unveils the Apple Watch Series 9 and Watch Ultra 2
The iPhone 15 series was not the only new products that Apple introduced yesterday. The Cupertino company unveiled the Apple Watch Series 9 and Watch Ultra 2, here's what the wearables are capable of.
Apple Watch Series 9
The Apple Watch Series 9 is powered by a new chipset called the S9, which happens to be the first chip upgrade since 2020. Apple says that the S9 SiP (system in a package) offers improved performance, i.e. it is faster than the previous S6 SiP. The S9 chip has 5.6 billion transistors, which is 60% faster than the series 8's CPU. The screen on the watch has a peak brightness of 2000 nits, which is twice as much as on the previous-gen model.
The device runs on watchOS 10, which brings a handful of improvements, redesigned apps, new watch faces, and more. It also introduces a Smart Stack that shows relevant widgets based on context. The Watch Series 9 supports Name Drop for sharing contact information with another Watch user easily.
Normally, Siri commands that the user initiates are processed via the internet, using Wi-Fi or cellular networks. The Apple Watch Series 9 can process Siri requests on device, without having to ping the internet. Apple says that the offline processing of commands will result in quicker responses from the digital assistant. So, you can use it to start timers or workouts faster. The new 4-core Neural Engine in the wearable offers up to 25% more accurate results for dictation.
Siri on the Apple Watch Series 9 supports the Health app, which allows users to ask the digital assistant questions related to their health, such as how many hours you slept, and it will provide the information for you. It can also be used to log health data like their weight. This can be useful for accessing important data without having to take out your iPhone.
Apple has introduced a new gesture called the "Double Tap Gesture" in the Watch Series 9. When you are wearing the watch, you can just tap your index finger and thumb twice, to trigger the gesture's action. It is enabled by the Neural Engine in the new watch models.
The gesture controls the primary button in the current app, so you can use it to stop a timer, play/pause music, snooze alarms, answer a phone call, end a call, or to take a photo using the Camera Remote app. The gesture can be useful for one-handed usage such as when you are cooking, working, etc.
Double tap can also be used to access watchOS 10's Smart Stack navigation. A second double tap will let you scroll through widgets.
The Apple Watch Series 9 is equipped with a second-generation Ultra Wideband (UWB) chip, that supports Precision Finding with the iPhone 15. The UWB chip provides the distance and direction, along with visual, haptic, and audio guidance to locate your misplaced iPhone.
The UWB chip supports HomePod integration, so when you move within 4 meters of a connected Homepod, the watch will display the Smart Stack with media suggestions for you. Apple says that the Watch Series 9 will offer up to 18-hour battery life.
The Apple Watch Series 9 is available in 2 sizes: 41mm and 45mm. The aluminium case versions come in a variety of colors including Starlight, Midnight, Silver, (PRODUCT) RED, and Pink. The stainless steel models of the watch come in three colors: gold, silver, and graphite.
The new Apple Watch SE supports Activity tracking, heart rate monitoring, Emergency SOS, Crash Detection and Fall Detection in an affordable package. It is available in 40mm and 44mm aluminum cases in three color options: Starlight, Midnight, and Silver.
Apple Watch Ultra 2
Apple also introduced the 2nd-gen Watch Ultra, called the Apple Watch Ultra 2, which presents displays real-time information like the seconds, altitude, or depth on the outer edge of the screen. The display on the watch has a peak brightness of 3000 nits.
Like the other new wearables that the Cupertino company announced, the Apple Watch Ultra 2 also has the S9 SiP, U2 Ultrawide band, and the other features that you can find on the regular model of the Watch Series 9. However, the Ultra 2 has an exclusive watch face called the Modular Ultra. The rugged watch supports a variety of sports and physical activities including kite surfing, wakeboarding, recreational scuba diving (up to 40 meters) and free diving. It supports 36-hour battery life with regular use, and up to 72 hours in Low Power Mode.
Apple says that it tested the wearable in extreme conditions like 500 meters below sea level, and in high altitudes up to 9,000 meters above sea level. The Watch Ultra 2 has an Action Button similar to its predecessor, and it is customizable. The Apple Watch Ultra 2 is available in a single size, 49mm. It comes in 3 styles: Alpine Loop (blue, indigo, olive), Trail Loop (orange/beige, green/gray, blue/black), and Ocean Band (blue, orange).
Apple Watch SE, Series 9 and Watch Ultra 2 prices around the world
Australia
Apple Watch SE - 40-mm A$ 399 / 44-mm A$ 449
Apple Watch Series 9 - Aluminium - 41-mm - A$ 649 (GPS) / 45-mm - A$ 699
Apple Watch Series 9 - Stainless Steel - 41-mm - A$ 1,199 / 45-mm A$ 1,1279
Apple Watch Ultra 2 - A$ 1,399
Europe
Apple Watch SE - 40-mm 279 € / 44-mm 309 €
Apple Watch Series 9 - Aluminium - 41-mm - 449 € / 45-mm - 479 €
Apple Watch Series 9 - Stainless Steel - 41-mm - 799 € / 45-mm 849 €
Apple Watch Ultra 2 - 899 €
India
Apple Watch SE - 40-mm - Rs. 29,900 / 44-mm - Rs. 32,900
Apple Watch Series 9 - Aluminium - 41-mm - Rs. 41,900 / 45-mm - Rs. 44,900
Apple Watch Series 9 - Stainless Steel - 41-mm - Rs. 70,900 / 45-mm - Rs. 75,900
Apple Watch Ultra 2 - Rs. 89,900
Turkey
Apple Watch SE - 40-mm - 9,499 TL / 44-mm - 10,499 TL
Apple Watch Series 9 - Aluminium - 41-mm - 14,999 TL / 45-mm - 15,499 TL
Apple Watch Series 9 - Stainless Steel - 41-mm - 33,499 TL / 45-mm - 34,999 TL
Apple Watch Ultra 2 - 39,999 TL
United Kingdom
Apple Watch SE - 40-mm - £219 / 44-mm - £249
Apple Watch Series 9 - Aluminium - 41-mm £399 / 45-mm - £429
Apple Watch Series 9 - Stainless Steel - 41-mm - £699 / 45-mm - £749
Apple Watch Ultra 2 - £799
United States
Apple Watch SE - 40-mm - $249 / 44-mm - $279
Apple Watch Series 9 - Aluminium - 41-mm $399 / 45-mm - $429
Apple Watch Series 9 - Stainless Steel - 41-mm - $699 / 45-mm - $749
Apple Watch Ultra 2 - $799
All three Apple Watch models are available for pre-order today in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, India, Japan, the UAE, the U.K., the U.S., and more than 40 other countries. The wearables will start shipping from next Friday, September 22.
Apple will release watchOS 10 to users on September 18, along with iOS 17, and iPadOS 17.
Really the only thing I dislike about MacOS as a whole is the way Apple updates the OS with huge update file downloads. Actually 700Mb is small compared to some Apple has released which are in the gigabyte size. These large file sizes also translate to long update times as well.
I like Emre, Onur, Shaun and Eray’s articles more, Ashwin and Martin are always complaining about something instead of getting excited and sharing their excitement with the world.
Ever since I started bookmarking their pages my mood has been so much better, I’m glad to be free of the depressing vibe the two of them have. Damn it feels good to just enjoy life and not look for things to complain like I used to while I were under their influence.
Personally I really like @Ashwin and @Martin articles both equally. Please respect the authors.
You realize that none of the authors you like are real people, right? They are AI bots ‘writing’ articles that are basically taken from product advertisements (e.g., “Get Protected the Right Way With Avast Free AntiVirus” Really?) So, yes they are excited, but the excitement comes from advertising copy. No real world negativity from those sources.
My approach is to use a UBlock Origin filter to block all the articles except those by Martin and Ashwin. It has made the site readable again for me.
I would like to achieve that as well. Mind sharing some UBlock tricks & tips? :)
@ Anonymous,
Go to this link from yesterday https://www.ghacks.net/windows-11-update-stuck-fixed-for-good/#comment-4573146 and scroll down to the post by “Anonymous said on September 2, 2023 at 1:33 pm” He (or she) posted instructions on how to skip articles written by users other than Martin and Ashwin.
You might want to consider changing your name before you post to make it easier for users to identify your comments.
@Herman Cost
You can add this to your rules in uBlock Origin:
ghacks.net##.hentry,.home-posts,.home-category-post:not(:has-text(/Martin Brinkmann|Ashwin/))
@John World. Than you dude. So much better.
Why does Martin even allow this garbage to ruin his website. Every single article not written by martin and ashwin reads like sensational clickbait, I don’t care about if I should buy the latest apple product every week, new roblox cock rings that don’t pull your pubic hair, elon musk’s new body spray or whatever bullshit these bots can come up with.
I think he means your filters
+I like Emre, Onur, Shaun and Eray’s articles more
you’ve made my day
It’s not the EU’s fault that Bing is such a crappy search engine. In any event it’s built into the OS and Microsoft does its best to convince users to adopt it over Google by making it the default search tool. A great Many Windows 11 users are not technically minded and don’t know how to switch to another search engine and just accept their lot.
In any event I hope the EU Commission doesn’t allow Microsoft to pull the wool over their eyes.
Both Google and Bing are now worthless. Nowadays, Yandex is the only search engine that finds anything I’m looking for.
Try https://sear.be.
Yandex is Russian and under Putin’s control. Search results you get may not be accurate and possibly manipulated to give you a false sense of security depending on what you’re looking for.
Bing is absolutely a gatekeeper. Except for countries such as China and Russia that have their own search engines (Baidu and Yandex), most of the world’s searches relies on just two search engines: Google and Bing.
Alternative search engines overwhelmingly get their search results from Bing. DuckDuckGo, Ecosia, Qwant, Swisscows, Excite, Lycos, Yahoo, You, etc. all use Bing behind the scenes for their results.
StartPage originally used the Google search engine for it’s results, but have also started using Bing as well recently.
Microsoft also use Bing as the default search engine in Windows (such as the Start menu search, Taskbar search, desktop search bar, Edge sidebar, etc.) and use Bing as the default search engine in Edge – which is the default browser on Windows. Windows has greater than 70% desktop market share and is used by more than two billion people.
Not to mention Microsoft’s anti-consumer efforts when it comes to Bing. They have a history of malicious intent by aggressively trying to trick users who use a different search engine and browser into resetting their default search engine and browser back to Edge and Bing (by displaying unscrupulous popup dialogue boxes and full screen pages prompting the user to change their settings back to the “recommended settings” – which is Edge and Bing).
@ ECJ,
Microsoft’s Bing has managed to sidestep the EU’s Digital Markets Act for now arguing that it doesn’t qualify as a gatekeeper: https://www.computerworld.com/article/3705935/eu-lists-gatekeepers-to-be-regulated-opens-imessage-and-bing-investigations.html
The easiest way to avoid Bing is never to use Edge. It’s not mandatory and you’re free to use which browser you wish. I use Floorp myself which is a Firefox fork with many extra privacy configurations. https://floorp.app/en/download/
“A report claims that Apple is developing an affordable MacBook series”
Its is time to stop posting Rumors as reports.
Apple has already a Chrombook killer. It is called : iPad.
I can see Apple getting concerned about losing sales to Chrome OS devices. Given that K-12 kids have probably been using Chromebooks and would be familiar with that platform going off to college. I remember when Apple ruled K-12 computer rooms and because they simply out priced the educational sector. Google managed to take a huge bite out of educational market especially with COVID. I never thought iPads worked in a K-12 setting, and mac’s are too expensive. I doubt Apple can really make a MacBook below $500 which would compete with Chromebooks.
I managed hundreds of ipads for schools when I worked at an MSP – ipads are certainly OK, and boy are they hundreds of times better than Android tablets. Chromebooks suck so much, their market penetration into school system became real when schools received a bunch from government
Apple has always had great diffculty grasping what “low cost” means. I don’t have much faith in them ever generating anything that can compete with a Chromebook, but I’ll buy it if they do. I don’t want a Google OS, Windows is getting painful, and I’m tired of hearing how great Linux is from people who don’t use it.
I agree with the posters above about the usefulness of using a uBO filter to limit the posts I see on this site to those from Martin and Ashwin.
While Apple has patched iOS 16 for this, they haven’t yet indicated if they’re going to for supposedly-still-getting-security-updates iOS 12 (the latest OS option for the millions of still-in-use iPhone 6) and iOS 15 (still in use on millions of iPhone 6s to 8, which can’t be upgraded to 16).
I hope they do. Long-term support is one area where Apple phones crush Android, and it’s the #2 reason I use them (#1 is because not a privacy nightmare).
Apple has now released security updates for iOS 12 and 15 to address this issue. This is how you keep loyal customers.
Released an update for iOS 15, yes; for iOS 12, no. It’s not clear from reading their release notes if this means iOS 12 is not affected, or if they’re just not bothering.
M3 won’t move the needle much on performance. Honestly, Apple has put itself in a bind making the M1 really good. Probably the first time when Mac users can have some real lasting performance. But that also means that many won’t be persuaded to upgrade as often either. I am using a M1 MacBook Air and a M1 Mac mini and have yet to even entertain upgrading to a M2 or even a future M3 model of either because I am very satisfied with the M1 performance.
I like iPhone in general have owned iPhones for many years. But I don’t see these Apple events inspiring me to want to upgrade and spend hundreds to get what few improvements offered up.
People still watch this nonsense? As I get older technology no longer excite me.
I love it – Apple took an objectively bad thing and turned it into something people don’t hate. “It’s not that our front camera/sensors cover up screen real estate, this is uhh, a dynamic island… Yeah! It’s a feature actually, you’re lucky to have it”.
@ bruh,
I like iPhone too, but you have to be a virtual millionaire these days to own one and I don’t have the kind of money required to purchase one I’m afraid.
2015??
“Sorry Series 8, Apple Watch Series 9 is as powerful as it is handsome”
“Apple to release iOS 17 and iPadOS 17 on September 18, and macOS Sonoma on October 26”
“Apple unveils the Apple Watch Series 9 and Watch Ultra 2”
“Apple Watch Ultra 2 packs a punch to the older generation”
“Does it make sense to upgrade to iPhone 15?”
“iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max with Ray Tracing, Action Button announced”
“Apple announces iPhone 15 series with USB-C port, Dynamic Island”
Seven Applespams, all pushed out within a few hours. You should rename this site “AppleHack”.
I can’t believe people waste their money on smartwatches. The world has truly gone insane.
A total waste of money. Thats why people can’t afford basic necessities anymore. They just keep falling for Apple’s BS every year.
That is, if you don’t mind paying for Apple and their US Gestapo friends reading your most intimate data to use it against you.
> Apple also updated the macOS Sonoma 14 web page to reveal the release date of its desktop operating system. Sonoma will be released on October 26.
This is not true. The website says September 29. I have no idea where your October 26 comes from.
> Rumors suggest that Apple could announce the first M3 Mac in October, though another reliable leaker quashed hopes for any new MacBooks.
I am not aware of any _current_ rumor that suggests that there will be a M3 Mac before 2024.
Is this again an AI written article?
Just an FYI on the USB C situation.
The iPhone 15 and 15 Plus only use the USB-C end-connector. The actual cable attached to it transfers data at the many years old Lightning cable speed, which is USB 2.0 based. (Max 480 Mbits/s in ideal lab conditions.)
If you want iPhone USB data transfer at true USB 3.0 speed, then you have to pay more to buy the iPhone 15 Pro or 15 Pro Plus, which transfers data at actual USB 3.0 speed (5 Gbit/s in ideal lab conditions).
Just another example of Apple using absurd (and very mean-spirited, IMO) down-grading of their lower-priced phone hardware. I mean, who else would sell an $799+ phone in 2023, using a data port that transfers at USB 2.0 speed?
The USB 2.0 spec was published in year 2000, 23 years ago.
The USB 3.0 spec was published in 2008 and the USB C connector spec was published in 2014, tho not widely adopted til paird with USB 3.2 in 2017, fyi.
Man, I find this stuff so cringy – but obviously, it appeals to a certain type of person. I have no issue with Apple, my only issue is that every other hardware and software manufacturer seem to just be trying to copy Apple, instead of coming up with original ideas & visions. I don’t blame Apple for “innovating” in whatever direction they feel necessary, I’m just annoyed that nobody else is,,,
Android is looking more like iOS, Windows 11 is looking more like MacOS, I had to set up a “premium” high-spec Dell laptop recently at work which just looked like a knock-off Macbook. It’s just sad.
People aren’t going to buy stuff that strays too far from the norm. Take for example foldables. I haven’t seen anyone personally that has one, nor are they “taking the market by storm”.
RE: Android looking more like IOS:
That ‘Material You’ garbage is thankfully nowhere near iOS. I think you might be referring to Samsung’s UI though. They try to keep things like Apple to win over Apple users (I think anyways). If it weren’t for Samsung’s UI though, Android would be totally a non-option for me, as Material You is just plain ugly.