15 Cool Apple Watch Features You’re (Probably) Not Using

The Apple Watch is the perfect companion for you and your iPhone. Not only do you get notifications right on your wrist, but there are also many cool features to make the most out of your wearable. You can do things like monitor your heart rate and keep track of all your workouts in a flash, but there's so much more your Apple Watch can do.
If you haven't played around with all the Apple Watch settings available to you, you're missing out.
Whether you're a new Apple Watch user or you just haven't gotten the time to check out everything your Apple Watch is capable of, read on for 15 amazing features you might not have discovered yet.
Track Your Sleep
Sleep tracking is a fairly new feature that came to the Apple Watch a few years ago. As you can guess by its name, you can use it to track how well you sleep every night and get insights for your day, week, or month.
What's great about the Apple Watch's built-in sleep tracking feature is how well it works with other Apple Watch features.
For instance, you can also keep track of your heart rate throughout the night and even keep track of your respiratory rate and the oxygen levels in your blood, but we'll talk more about that in a minute.
Sure, there are many other apps that can also track this, but with the integration of sleep schedules and sleep goals, as well as automatically being able to trigger your Focus modes, your Apple Watch's sleep tracking is one of the best ones you can use.
Plus, you can use all of these features at no extra cost.
Track the Level of Oxygen in Your Blood
Besides being able to track your heart rate, you can also track the levels of oxygen in your blood.
Granted, this has been an issue for Apple recently, leading to this feature being disabled on new models sold in the US due to a patent dispute. However, you can still find it on new Apple Watch models sold in other countries, and some sold in the US from third-party retailers like Amazon and Best Buy — just be sure you check the model number before you buy.
Except for most Apple Watch Series 9 and Ultra 2 models sold in the US since January 18, blood oxygen monitoring is available on the Apple Watch Series 6 or later and Apple Watch Ultra models, although it's not a feature of the lower-cost Apple Watch SE.
With this feature, you'll get a pretty accurate reading of your blood oxygen levels. Generally speaking, anything above the 90% mark is considered healthy, but remember to check with your medical provider.
Detect Your Falls
Your Apple Watch comes with a feature you hopefully won't ever have to use. It's called Fall Detection, and as you can guess by its name, your Apple Watch can know whenever you fall down and ask you if you're okay.
Fall Detection works really well most of the time, but if you have an older model or if you do a lot of extreme sports, you might trigger it by mistake.
Once your Apple Watch detects that you fell, you'll get a notification asking you if you actually fell down and if you need to call for help. If you don't respond to this notification, your Apple Watch will assume you're unconscious and automatically make a call to emergency services and notify your emergency contacts that you're in trouble.
Control Your Apple Watch With One Hand

The Apple Watch Series 9 and the Apple Watch Ultra 2 didn't bring a ton of new features to the table, but by far, the newest and coolest feature is Double Tap.
This feature lets you control your Apple Watch with just one hand. All you need to do is double-tap your index finger and your thumb, and you'll be able to use hand gestures and movements to control your Apple Watch.
Granted, this isn't a completely new feature, as the Apple Watch already has an accessibility feature that lets you use hand features to control your Apple Watch without touching it. But Double Tap feels more intuitive and works way faster.
Use Your Apple Watch to Find Your iPhone
Many of us tend to lose track of our iPhones from time to time. Most of the time, it's just annoying, but if you're outside and you lose your iPhone, it can give you a mini heart attack.
Fortunately, your Apple Watch has a way to find your iPhone with just one button.
This feature is called Ping My iPhone, and when you press that button, your iPhone will start pinging for a couple of seconds so you can find it.
If you want, you can press and hold the same Ping My iPhone button, and your iPhone will make a sound and start flashing for a couple of seconds to make it even easier to find.
Use Your Apple Watch as a Flashlight
Believe it or not, your Apple Watch can also work as a flashlight, although it's less effective than your iPhone.
Instead of using the flash of a camera, your Apple Watch will use its own display and turn it into a flashlight. What's cool is that you can tap your screen to make the light brighter or dimmer, depending on what you need.
Granted, this feature will work better if you have a more modern and brighter Apple Watch, but even on older models, it's still powerful enough to help you out in a pinch.
Use Widgets on Your Apple Watch
Before, the Apple Watch only had the ability to use complications, which were useful but not as useful as the widgets on your iPhone.
Fortunately, that changed with watchOS 10. Now, it's easier than ever to add widgets using a feature called Smart Stack, which is basically a place where you can store all your widgets so you can quickly access them by swiping on your watch face.
Granted, not every Apple Watch app has a widget just yet, but there are already a ton of options right now. Unfortunately, they work more like shortcuts than actual interactive widgets, but it's still a great way to keep your most used apps at your fingertips — and you can even call them up with Double Tap if you have one of the latest Apple Watch models.
Theater Mode
A useful feature that not many people know about is called Theater Mode. As you can guess by its name, this feature is perfect to use when you're at the theater or watching a movie.
This mode turns your Apple Watch screen completely off so it won't light up unless you tap it. This not only disables the always-on display (for those models that have one), but also prevents the screen from coming on when you raise your wrist, so it won't distract people who are sitting in a darkened room with you.
While in Theater Mode, you can still tap on your screen to wake it up normally, but you can also use the Digital Crown to ramp it up from the lowest brightness levels so you can check the time or your notifications without blinding yourself.
Other features like Walkie-Talkie status also become unavailable, and your Apple Watch automatically turns on silent mode. Needless to say, this is a pretty useful feature that you should already be using.
Change Your Apple Watch's Text Size
Some people might not know this, but you have the ability to change the size of the text on your Apple Watch, making it easier for those of us who wear glasses to see and read the notifications.
Granted, if you make the text size too big, all notifications and messages will be a bit awkward to read, but it's still better than having to squint to see what's on the screen.
To change the text size, you just need to press your Watch's Digital Crown, and then go to Settings > Display > Text Size, and use the Aa buttons to make the text bigger or smaller.
Use Your Apple Watch to Unlock Other Apple Devices
Your Apple Watch does way more than just telling the time and showing notifications; you can actually unlock your Mac and even your iPhone with it.
Of course, besides changing your iPhone and Mac settings, if you want this feature to work, you'll also need to make sure your Apple Watch is passcode-protected and has Wrist Detection turned on.
Additionally, you must be wearing your Apple Watch, and it must be unlocked for this to work.
Once you change the settings on your Mac, all you need to do is wake it up, and your Apple Watch will unlock it as long as it's in range. For the iPhone, you'll still normally unlock your device using Face ID; the Apple Watch only helps out when you're wearing a mask or your face is otherwise obscured.
Take Pictures With Your iPhone From Your Apple Watch
Another really cool feature of your Apple Watch is the ability to take pictures with your iPhone without even touching it.
By opening the Camera Remote app on your Apple Watch (the app that looks like the iPhone's Camera app), your iPhone will connect to your Watch and open the camera.
You can then use the controls on your Apple Watch to take a picture and even see the pictures you just took to make sure they look good.
You Can Swipe Watch Faces (Again)

When watchOS 10 came out, many of us were sad to see that Apple decided to ditch the ability to swap watch faces simply by swiping to the left or the right.
Fortunately, Apple heard our cries and decided to add the feature back in watchOS 10.2. Now, you can switch between watch faces with just one swipe.
Unfortunately, you'll now need to enable this feature first. To do this, you have to press the Digital Crown on your Apple Watch, go to Settings > Clock, and then enable Swipe to Switch Watch Face. Then, go back to your watch face and swipe left or right to see the other Watch faces available.
Of course, this will only work if you have other watch faces, so be sure to add some.
Pay With Your Apple Watch
If you've had an iPhone for a long time, chances are you already use Apple Pay, but did you know you can also use this feature on your Apple Watch?
In order to use it, you'll also need to add your credit or debit cards to your Apple Watch. But once that's done, you'll be able to pay with your wrist by quickly pressing the Apple Watch's side button twice.
Call Emergency Services With Your Apple Watch
If you're ever in a pinch, you can use your Apple Watch to call emergency services.
To use this feature, all you need to do is press and hold your Apple Watch's side button. Then, you can swipe Emergency Call, and your iPhone will automatically call emergency services and share your location with them. You can also keep holding the side button for about 5 seconds to automatically place the call, which could be handy if you can't swipe on your screen for whatever reason.
Once that call is done, your Apple Watch will also let the people you have as emergency contacts know your location via a text message. Of course, you can turn this off as soon as you finish the call, but it's a helpful feature to have.
Use the Dock on the Apple Watch
You probably know the Dock as the place where you can store your favorite and recently used apps on your Mac or iPad.
But as it turns out, your Apple Watch also comes with a built-in Dock you can use similarly.
You can customize the Dock to feature your favorite apps or to show your recently opened apps so you can go back to an app you just used immediately.
Before watchOS 10, you could easily access the Dock by pressing the side button on your Apple Watch. Now, however, you need to quickly press your Digital Crown two times, and the Dock will appear.