Got a tip for us?Let us know

a. Send us an email
b. Anonymous form

All Apple Watch Apps Must Be Native Apps Starting on June 1

Friday April 22, 2016 3:43 PM PDT by Juli Clover

Apple today informed developers that starting on June 1, 2016, all watchOS apps submitted to the App Store must be native apps built with the watchOS 2 SDK or later.

When the Apple Watch first launched, watchOS apps were reliant on the iPhone to run on the Apple Watch, but with watchOS 2, Apple introduced support for native apps. With native app support, developers can build apps that are able to run on the Apple Watch, allowing apps to open more quickly and work more smoothly.

Apple's June 1 deadline for native apps hits two weeks before the company's Worldwide Developers Conference, where it is expected to show off new versions of iOS, OS X, watchOS, and tvOS.

Related Roundup: Apple Watch Series 9

Buyer's Guide: Apple Watch (Neutral)

Top Rated Comments

Aluminum213

105 months ago

THANK YOU

This will help with the fact that 99% of watch apps are slow junk

Score: 29 Votes (Like | Disagree)

OneMike

105 months ago

But native apps are still slow...

Score: 21 Votes (Like | Disagree)

MMan5797

105 months ago

I wonder if this is in preparation for a next Gen Apple Watch that is less iPhone reliant to be revealed at WWDC?

Score: 18 Votes (Like | Disagree)

DFierce

105 months ago

Thank god. Slow apps make a really poor experience on the watch.

Score: 12 Votes (Like | Disagree)

Sirious

105 months ago

This is good news. I can't count how many times I've given up on an app due to its long load times and completed the task on my iPhone instead.

Score: 8 Votes (Like | Disagree)

Pakaku

105 months ago

So even Apple admits the iPhone crutch was a really stupid idea?

Score: 7 Votes (Like | Disagree)

Read All Comments

Popular Stories

Apple Announces 'Let Loose' Event on May 7 Amid Rumors of New iPads

Tuesday April 23, 2024 7:11 am PDT by Joe Rossignol

Apple has announced it will be holding a special event on Tuesday, May 7 at 7 a.m. Pacific Time (10 a.m. Eastern Time), with a live stream to be available on Apple.com and on YouTube as usual. The event invitation has a tagline of "Let Loose" and shows an artistic render of an Apple Pencil, suggesting that iPads will be a focus of the event. Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more ...

Read Full Article • 264 comments

Apple Vision Pro Dual Loop Band Orange Feature 2

Apple Cuts Vision Pro Shipments as Demand Falls 'Sharply Beyond Expectations'

Tuesday April 23, 2024 9:44 am PDT by Juli Clover

Apple has dropped the number of Vision Pro units that it plans to ship in 2024, going from an expected 700 to 800k units to just 400k to 450k units, according to Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo. Orders have been scaled back before the Vision Pro has launched in markets outside of the United States, which Kuo says is a sign that demand in the U.S. has "fallen sharply beyond expectations." As a...

Read Full Article • 404 comments

Apple Releases Open Source AI Models That Run On-Device

Wednesday April 24, 2024 3:39 pm PDT by Juli Clover

Apple today released several open source large language models (LLMs) that are designed to run on-device rather than through cloud servers. Called OpenELM (Open-source Efficient Language Models), the LLMs are available on the Hugging Face Hub, a community for sharing AI code. As outlined in a white paper [PDF], there are eight total OpenELM models, four of which were pre-trained using the...

Read Full Article • 59 comments

Apple Finally Plans to Release a Calculator App for iPad Later This Year

Tuesday April 23, 2024 9:08 am PDT by Joe Rossignol

Apple is finally planning a Calculator app for the iPad, over 14 years after launching the device, according to a source familiar with the matter. iPadOS 18 will include a built-in Calculator app for all iPad models that are compatible with the software update, which is expected to be unveiled during the opening keynote of Apple's annual developers conference WWDC on June 10. AppleInsider...

Read Full Article • 214 comments

iOS 17.5 Will Add These New Features to Your iPhone

Sunday April 21, 2024 3:00 am PDT by MacRumors Staff

The upcoming iOS 17.5 update for the iPhone includes only a few new user-facing features, but hidden code changes reveal some additional possibilities. Below, we have recapped everything new in the iOS 17.5 and iPadOS 17.5 beta so far. Web Distribution Starting with the second beta of iOS 17.5, eligible developers are able to distribute their iOS apps to iPhone users located in the EU...

Read Full Article