It’s that time of year again: time for Apple to unveil its new slate of products, and for you to consider whether you really need to upgrade your iPhone, or resort to one more year of jiggling chargers and waning battery life. I’ll admit, this year’s crop is cooler than usual, with the iPhone Duo finally coming to fruition and giving us one more foldable phone option. But this is a watch website, so naturally our focus was on the reveal of the Apple Watch Series 12 and Ultra 4, the latest in Apple’s now long-running collection of smartwatches. They weren’t first to the market with the original Apple Watch—now ten years old, if you can believe it—but like Kleenex and Band-Aid before it, the Watch has now become synonymous with the smartwatch category, and every new model brings massive hype and speculation.
So, what are the facts? First, let’s look at the Series 12. Starting at $499 with GPS and cellular ($399 with just GPS), the Series 12 brings back most of the beloved features of its predecessors, with a shiny new S11 chip inside. According to Apple, it carries up to 24 hours of battery life, Siri AI and Audio Intelligence, advanced health tracking, and more, all upgrades over prior versions. The heart rate, sleep apnea, and hypertension sensor and notifications are a big draw with the health crowd and those who need health monitoring, making the Apple Watch a one-stop-shop solution for most people. And while I am not the intended audience for a smartwatch, I can see why it’s so appealing: rather than purchasing expensive medical equipment to keep a loved one safe in the event of a fall or medical emergency, the Series 12 has insanely impressive (and proven) medical monitoring pedigree. It’s not all serious business, though, and the 5G capabilities allow for texting, playlist-surfing, Apple Pay integration, and more. The Series 12 comes in eight colors, from shades of bronze to dark blue, and can be had in aluminum or ceramic finishes.
The Ultra 4, meanwhile, takes it up a notch in both price—bumping up to $799—and battery life. It seems to be advertised as even more of fitness tool than its base model brethren, with up to 50 hours of battery life with normal use and 84 in low-power mode, added durability via the titanium case, WR100-rated 40-meter water resistance, and a tactile action button for physical control of workout, flashlight, and more customizable functions. The Ultra series is both an upgrade path from the regular Apple Watch, and a more rugged option, and interesting two-pronged approach that has worked well for Apple over the past few years of Ultra models, and it should continue to appeal heavily to the “get outside” crowd.
Siri AI is all-new, and banks on the AI hype (or hate), promising to utilize the built-in microphone to make summarizing charts, accessing the internet, and more easier. The Sound Recognition feature, for instance, is designed to notify the wearer when a familiar sound—like a doorbell, siren, or alarm—goes off, helping those who may be hard of hearing. This has the potential to be a life changing feature, though the other AI-focused uses of the microphone make me wary.
All-in-all, the Apple Watch Series 12 and Ultra 4 should continue the tradition of ubiquity and utility that their predecessors started; in year ten of the Apple Watch, it’s clearly here to stay. Apple
