Apple Seeds Second Beta of watchOS 4.3.1 to Developers

Apple today seeded the second beta of an upcoming watchOS 4.3.1 update to developers for testing purposes, two weeks after releasing the first watchOS 4.3.1 beta and three weeks after releasing watchOS 4.3.

Once the proper configuration profile has been installed from the Apple Developer Center, the new watchOS 4.3.1 beta can be downloaded through the dedicated Apple Watch app on the iPhone by going to General --> Software update.

To install the update, the Apple Watch needs to have at least 50 percent battery, it must be placed on the charger, and it has to be in range of the iPhone.

Shortly before watchOS 4.3.1 was introduced, Apple stopped allowing developers to update Apple Watch apps built on the original watchOS 1 SDK. In watchOS 4.3.1, there's an alert when launching a watchOS 1 app that warns that the app may not be compatible with future versions of watchOS. This suggests Apple may drop support for watchOS 1 apps entirely in the future, just as it did with support for 32-bit iOS apps in iOS 11.

Code hidden within watchOS 4.3.1 suggests Apple is working on introducing support for custom third-party watch faces, but this is likely a feature that would be introduced as part of a major watchOS 5 update rather than through watchOS 4.3.1.

There were no other new features discovered in watchOS 4.3.1, which is unsurprising as this is a minor 4.x.x update. It's likely this update focuses primarily on bug fixes to address issues discovered since the release of watchOS 4.3.

Apple does not provide detailed release notes for watchOS, so we may not know what's included in the update until it sees a public release.

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Top Rated Comments

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eyeseeyou

11 months ago

Sure if it had been a goal. But I'm sure there has been a lot of internal debate about whether to do it or not which stalled implementation.

Honestly for me, I'd prefer always-on display than 3rd party faces (of course I'm not implying these are mutually exclusive)

My guess is they had planned on doing more high end luxury brand watch face collaborations but couldn’t come to terms with enough high end brands.

With my brief experience with android wear that was one of the first things I’ve noticed was the amount of 3rd party brand faces you could use with your watch.

Even allowing your own wallpaper with complications would be appreciated.

Rating: 3 Votes

Shanesan

11 months ago

3rd party with faces...

So so so far behind android wear in this feature yet so easy to implement.

Easy to implement? I wouldn't be so sure. Apple is a stickler for battery management on the Watch as well as security. Those are their top concerns on the Watch. A watch face could be a disaster for both of those.

Saying that, it's been several years now, and all this should have been well thought out for execution by WatchOS 4.

Rating: 3 Votes

Mad Mac Maniac

11 months ago

Saying that, it's been several years now, and all this should have been well thought out for execution by WatchOS 4.

Rating: 2 Votes

eyeseeyou

11 months ago

3rd party with faces...

So so so far behind android wear in this feature yet so easy to implement.

Rating: 2 Votes

Merode

11 months ago

People saying that 3rd party watch faces will drain batteries faster are wrong. Apple could easily introduce battery consumption metrics (just like those already in OS X and probably under the hood of iOS) and simply include them in approval process. If your watch face consumes too much power, it is denied access to app store.

Just take a look at all custom Pebble watch faces. I know it ueses different panel and all of them would look better on AW, but just realize the potential and ideas. Some of them are really great. I wouldn't look at Android wearable store as this platform never took off and most of watch faces are copy-paste knock offs submitted by kiddies.

Rating: 1 Votes

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