The Apple Watch “Ultra”
Very much in quotes, which is a great thing…
I was sure it would be overkill. Like a beautiful brick on my wrist. Would I get arm fatigue just by wearing it? Would I look like a cyborg? If I happened to put on a glove, would I now look like I was wearing a Nintendo Power Glove?¹
As it turns out, the Apple Watch Ultra is not “Ultra” in the ways the name and initial framing suggest. Instead, it’s just “Ultra” in that it’s clearly the best version of the Apple Watch.
Now, your mileage will absolutely vary here. It basically boils down to how large your wrists are. For me, the Ultra is nearly the perfect size. It both feels right on my wrist (honestly, little different from wearing the non-Ultra larger screen Apple Watch day-to-day since day one), and shockingly seems to look right as well. I’m biased of my own beautiful wrists, of course. But I asked others. Basically anyone and everyone I could find. And everyone was either extremely polite or also surprised: the Apple Watch Ultra just looks nice on my wrist. Like a large watch that so many people wear. But not even as large as some of the largest watches you can buy. Just a really great, natural looking Apple Watch.
At the same time, I have talked to others who also bought the device and who have smaller wrists than I do. For them, it seems too large. At least for everyday wear, which is what I’m focusing on here, obviously. So my advice is to know thyself. Do you have small wrists? Then the Ultra may not be for you, day-to-day. This, of course, unfortunately will include many women. But if you have medium-to-large wrists, the Ultra will fit you well, I suspect. For the record, just judging from my eyes and my Apple Watch band sizes historically, I believe my wrists to be pretty medium-sized. Not small, but not huge. And again, the Ultra fits me perfectly.
It’s perhaps a bit weird to focus on this fit since Apple is decidedly not angling the Ultra as the everyday Apple Watch for most people — that’s what the two sizes of Apple Watch Series 8 are for. But I suspect that’s largely because Apple only did one size of the Ultra here, and knows such a move would alienate a huge portion of the population given the wrist size issue. And that’s too bad because this Ultra is a better version of the Apple Watch in pretty much every single way.
I was hesitant to get one not only for the size of the thing (again, now unfounded) but also because I don’t actually do any of the extreme activities this device was clearly being geared (and marketed) towards. But again, even without diving to the bottom of the ocean or climbing Mount Everest, this is the best Apple Watch overall. It’s everything you love about the “regular” Apple Watch, but upsized. Bigger screen. More buttons. And yes, better battery life.
The last one in particular is the killer feature here. Anyone who has had an Apple Watch over the years knows the pain of having to charge it — often multiple times a day because you can’t sit anywhere long enough to charge it all in one sitting. That’s especially true if you wear it at night, as I do — and as many increasingly likely do given the sleep tracking functionality. Apple Watch Ultra is the first version you don’t have to charge every day, even while wearing it all day. In my couple weeks wearing the Ultra, I find that one charge (not even all the way) every other day is more than enough. I could probably go a full two days. And with the new low power mode, I don’t doubt I could go for many days, if I needed to for some reason.
This is great peace of mind. Like with the recent M1 (and now M2) MacBook models, it’s great not to have constant “range anxiety”. The trade off with the Apple Watch Ultra is a larger battery and thus, a larger (meaning mainly taller/thicker) body. But again, to me this is easily worth it. It doesn’t add much weight (in regular, day-to-day use) and the height change fades in your mind quickly (Apple also did some clever design work to not make it look as tall as it is, thanks to a new ‘lip’ or ‘ridge’).
My second favorite feature is the new button. The ‘Action’ button. I’ll be honest that I’ve still not quite nailed what combination of the various button presses do on the Apple Watch to date, but the Action button makes it very simple. You set it for something you do all the time. In my case, I set it to record an outdoor walk — that’s how ULTRA I am. But you can set it for a number of things, though sadly not anything, at least not yet.²
I love this new Action button so much that I want one on the iPhone. I want one that will immediately launch the camera. Especially since iOS 14 seems to have badly crippled the swipe-to-camera lock screen functionality.³ I want a camera button that can also be a shutter button when the camera app is open (and yes, I know volume buttons can serve this particular purpose now — but I want one that every tourist you hand your phone to will understand). I want a button that will be on the top of the device when held in landscape to take said picture. And it can also be set to do another action if you prefer. This needs to happen tomorrow.
As for the other buttons on the Ultra, I’ll just note that while the screen “lip” makes sense, the big button side casing is a little weird. Presumably it’s to better protect the crown in extreme situations. But a fully exposed crown is just nicer.
As for the screen, it’s excellent. It looks and feels flatter than previous Apple Watch models because it clearly is. And I actually like it. It’s also just bigger, which of course is always better here. Though I do have to wonder if this isn’t the maximum size a screen can be on the wrist without starting to actually wrap around, or to creep up your arm in a way that would look less like a watch and more like a piece of armor. Or again, the old Nintendo Power Glove. I think this may be peak screen, size-wise, at least.
It’s also beautifully bright in broad daylight. No issues seeing anything on the screen, which has not always been the case.
Speed-wise, it feels the same as the last Apple Watch. That is, fast enough for anything it can do. Though it still takes longer to load certain content than I would like — such as new News items, for example. But I believe this is a connection issue and not a CPU issue. The only complaint here is that the state of Apple Watch apps has changed very little over the past many years. And really, not all that much since the original unveiling. I wish developers would start to revisit the wrist as a platform again.
Prior to the release of the Ultra, there was a lot of concern that it both wouldn’t work on some Apple Watch chargers, and the old bands wouldn’t fit. I’m happy to report that at least for the chargers and bands that I have, neither is an issue. Even the MagSafe Duo travel charger works well with my Ultra. And every old band I’ve tried (I have about a dozen now) works just fine. The bands made for the Ultra are undoubtedly better suited to its size.⁴ But other bands both work and don’t look ridiculous. Some even look great with the larger size device.
So there you go. A decidedly un-ultra review of the Apple Watch Ultra. I didn’t go mountain biking, I didn’t go climb a glacier, hell, I haven’t even taken it in a hot tub yet. But the reality is that I’m not going to do those things — well, except for perhaps the hot tub. I’m going to do day-to-day things. And the Apple Watch Ultra will handle those activities perfectly as well. Better than the non-Ultra Apple Watches have for me. Because the device will last longer, with a slightly larger screen that’s easier to see, and a new button that’s an excellent “International Orange” color, just like The Golden Gate Bridge I’m about to drive over.
In a regular car. Not a race car.⁵
¹ “I love the Power Glove, it’s so bad.”
² Though you can set it to run a Shortcut which you could set to do pretty much anything, I believe. Still it would be nice to more directly set it to do whatever you wanted.
³ Seriously, what the fuck, Apple? For many of us time-to-camera is the single most important feature of the iPhone. Certainly the one where speed matters most. And iOS 16 totally messed this up, presumably due to the new notifications-up-from-the-bottom element of the OS. You know what would fix this? An Action Button.
⁴ I opted for the Yellow Ocean Band, which is fun — and works well for rooting for Michigan #GoBlue — but is fairly comically large and not all that easy to get on and off (thanks to a second secure latch for, you know, actual diving in the ocean, not outdoor walks).
⁵ Fingers crossed that crash detection is not needed.
