Apple Watch faces are great fun. The Apple Watch Series 6 is the latest Apple Watch offering and is herald as the most feature-rich smartwatch on the market today. Whilst the watch is attractive on its own, you can take it further and make it your own with the countless personal touches you can add. Along with the countless third-party accessories and bands, the Apple Watch comes with an abundance of awesome watch faces to choose from. Apple Watch faces are lots of fun and switching faces is very easy with a long tap and then a swipe to pick your favourite watch face for the day.
Today, there are three Apple Watch models that you can buy. The newest Apple Watch 6, the Apple Watch SE, and the surviving Apple Watch 3. The best part is that the watch faces we’re about to recommend are all downloadable on any Apple Watch running on Watch OS 7.
Apple has an existing library of faces which are designed for certain occasions. In fact, there are so many the choice can be overwhelming. So we’re here to help you find and tailor a face to your unique style. We’ve written a guide on the best Apple Watch faces in 2021 so you can pick the best one for your lifestyle.
Newest Apple Watch faces in 2021
Almost as if they planned it, Apple added 7 new watch faces with bespoke options along with the release of Watch OS 7.
- Typograph
- Chronograph Pro
- GMT
- Stripes
- Memoji (including Animoji)
- Artist
- Count up
To make a new face, all you have to do is swipe left until you see the word ‘New’. Now, use the digital crown to scroll your choices and tap the one you like.
Plus there’s a new feature that allows you to share your faces!
How Apple Watch faces work
You will notice some interface differences if you compare Watch OS 6 to Watch OS 7 in terms of the personalisation options. If you’re running OS 6, use either 3D or haptic touch to customise. However, if you’re on OS 7, simply long-press and tap on ‘edit’ when it pops up. Next, swipe left and tap to access the feature you want to customise and use your digital crown to choose your favourite colour, shape, complication and anything else your heart desires.
If you want to remove a watch face, press down on the face then swipe up. After that, tap ‘remove’ and it’ll delete.
To share a face, press and hold, this will access the controls where you’ll find the ‘share’ button. You can then either verbally dictate or write a message, choose your recipient and send.
Without further ado, let’s look at the best Apple Watch faces of 2021.
Typograph
This is a beautifully uncomplicated watch face designed for minimalists. No complications to speak of, just four large numbers taking up the real estate on the face. However, it’s still highly customisable. For instance, you can change the fill colour so you can match it to your outfit, mood, or whatever you like! More, you can keep the four numbers or opt for a traditional dial with modern, classic or rounded styling with Arabic, Arabic Indic, Roman or Devanagari symbols.
California
The California Apple Watch face has been around since Watch OS 6. It’s clean and simple with an abundance of elegance. It resembles a more traditional watch face. You have the option to pack it with features or leave it uncluttered. So, it’s totally up to you what you choose.
As for the time display, you can alter the shape and numerals and add complications around the dial. This is a superb alternative to the rounded Infograph. It’s particularly advised for the Apple Watch 3 users.
Gradient
Gradient came along with the Series 4 and is a sophisticated choice. There are shaded areas, denoting the hour and minute markers, and a second hand that sweeps. You can strip this all back to just a single second hand, plus change the colours. This can be a full screen or a circular face, with or without complications.
Stripes
Stripes is new to Wear OS 7 and is really fun, making it one of the best Apple Watch faces for 2021. It’s wonderfully-customisable. You can amend how many stripes there are, between 2 and 9, for starters. Pick and re-order the colours in a sequence of your choice.
Rotate the strips in any angle you like from 0 – 345 degrees, including horizontal and vertical. There’s a full-screen version which does not like complications, but the rounded version does.
Photos
If you like the personal touch, you can use photos from your library for your background. This is super easy to configure. Open your Apple Watch app on your iPhone, head to Face Gallery. Next, scroll down to photos. Now go to favourites and sync that album, pick up to 10 photos for the carousel function. Then go back to your Apple Watch to change the face. You can still add complications to your face if you’re using photos.
The best Apple Watch faces for work
Perhaps you’re looking for something that will help you gt through your workday.
We’ve picked a couple here.
Siri
The Siri watch face presents tailored data throughout your day. It rolls through data that it picks up from your Reminders, Alarms, Calendar, News, Weather, heart rate, sound levels and more. If you need it, it’ll remind you at the times you need it to take a deep breath. You can turn any of these off if you want, using your iPhone. Once you’re set-up, you can use the face like any other, including adding complications.
Modular
If you need advanced data beyond what Siri can offer you; Modular is one of the best Apple Watch faces you’ll find. This is an especially flexible face, offering up to five complications, with a digital display. It’s tidy, which is a miracle considering how much information gets crammed into it.
Utility
The Utility face is another flexible option with up to four complications, four dials and your choice of colours. If you like a simple Apple Watch face that’s legible, Utility is one of the best options for you. You get important information without crowding.
Meridian
Another sleek and uncluttered offering that’s perfect for data at a glance. You can add complications like news, weather, the date, activity and air quality index. The dial is either black or white with many different accent colours to pick from.
GMT
This isn’t the most popular choice, and you can only get it on the SE and 6. This is mostly a great one for people who travel a lot or have colleagues in different timezones.
It has two dials, with the inner being a 12-hour one showing your local time. The outer dial is 24 hours, and you can set this to another place. You can select from a list of given cities or add one from your World Clock on your iPhone. You can choose the colours and customise it to your liking.
Fitness Watch Faces
Activity
Activity is a go-to face for those into fitness and works using your Activity rings. The Move (red) ring shows your calories burned; blue shows your standing movement and green indicates your activity. But you can configure this to whichever goal you’re most interested in, including a special ‘roll’ ring, for wheelchair users. You can add up to three complications.
Chronograph Pro
Tap your bezel on the 12-hour dial, and it’ll turn into a chronograph! This face has incredible detail, including tachymeter timescale, which measures speed based on either fixed distance or time travel. Cool, huh? This face is only for users of the SE and 6.
Count Up
If you have an SE or 6, you can track time elapsed. As above, tape the 12-hour dial and align your marker on the outer bezel to the desired minute hand. Turn the digital crown to set the length of time then tap your dial to start it. You can add up to five complications, and you can choose from a lot of colour options.
Fun watch faces
Vapor
This comes in four bold colours and demonstrates how colours combine. Pick from blue and green, black and white, orange and pink or a combination of all of the above. Opt for a rounded or square display.
Pride
If you’re part of an ally of the LGBTQ+ community, you’ll love the rainbow flag. To date, there’s one per year from 2018, so there are 3 to choose from.
Emoji
Featuring animoji, too! Choose from your favourite characters and colours. A dynamic and interesting face, though less informative.
Kaleidoscope
Kaleidoscope is one of the best Apple Watch faces for beauty. It shows mesmerising patterns that entwine with one another to give you a sense of relaxation. When you turn your digital crown, the designs will move too. The faster you turn it; the patterns move following the speed. If you find yourself having a bad day, this is a really neat feature for calming yourself down.
Motion
Motion is a glorious app that is reactive to your touch. It has three to choose from. Butterfly has 25 different species that fly around like the real deal. Each time you raise your wrist, you’ll be served a different butterfly. The Flower has 9 different animated flowers. Finally, Jellyfish has six species that show themselves when you move. Much like the above, it’s incredibly soothing to watch.
Numerals
If you like minimal features, this will definitely be one of the best Apple Watch faces for you. Numerals has a minute and second hands. The hour is displayed in the top left corner. You’re able to select the colour and font, and that’s about it, apart from the one complication you can add, so pick wisely.
X-Large
The Apple Watch is for users of all ages. If you want to get one for someone who needs larger text, this is the best face. It’ll display in bold and/or extra-large font that takes up the whole display. You can add a single complication; however, it does take up most of the centre of the display, which can be bothersome.
Conclusion
Hopefully, we’ve opened up the huge selection of watch faces for you so you know where to start!
Now, if you’re wondering what Apple Watch is going to be best for you, we recommend you look at our Apple Watch comparison, here.
If you have your Apple Watch, why not check out the best apps for Apple Watch in our article, here.
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Last Updated on February 1, 2021
Maygen is a multifaceted writer, proofreader and an experienced smartwatch industry writing and editing professional.
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