One of the great things about modern smart devices is that they’re gifts that keep giving, thanks to their frequent software updates. Whether it’s a phone, a watch, or even a TV, chances are the device you’re using today isn’t quite the same as the one you bought three or four years ago.
That’s equally true for the Apple Watch . When Apple releases its watchOS 12 / watchOS 26 update, many Apple Watch owners will have an even more powerful wearable than the one they originally purchased.
It won’t be long before Apple reveals watchOS 12 / watchOS 26 to inform us about what we can expect, but in the meantime, here’s what we’ve heard so far.
Will watchOS 12 actually be called watchOS 26?
According to prominent Apple tipster Mark Gurman, Apple is preparing a major shake-up to the nomenclature of its operating systems.
He says Apple will bring all of its operating systems in line with the same numeric handle, relating not to the version number of the software, but the year.
Much like the auto industry and major sporting game franchises, such as Madden and EA Sports FC, Apple will opt for the upcoming full year rather than the year the software is announced.
It means we could be introduced to watchOS 26, rather than watchOS 12, today.
When will we see watchOS 12 / watchOS 26?
For years, you’ve almost been able to mark your calendar for when Apple unveils its new operating systems, and we don’t expect this year to be any different.
Apple tends to show off its entire line-up of operating system updates during its annual Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC). This year, WWDC 2025 kicks off on June 9, with the keynote presentation starting at 10am PDT / 1pm EDT.
You can follow our WWDC 2025 live blog for all the latest on the from the keynote presentation, and if you want to keep a closer eye on proceedings, here’s how to watch the WWDC 2025 keynote .
Apple hasn’t officially announced a time for the keynote, but if past years are any indication, we can expect it to kick off at 10:00 a.m. PT (1:00 p.m. ET), where Apple is expected to unveil watchOS 12 / watchOS 26 alongside iOS 19 , iPadOS 19 , macOS 16 , and more.
The first developer beta of watchOS 12 / watchOS 26 will likely be released the same day, followed by a public beta sometime in July. The final release of watchOS 12 / watchOS 26 will come in September, alongside the new Apple Watch models that Apple typically releases in the fall.
What the rumors say about watchOS 12 / watchOS 26
So far, the rumor mill has been pretty quiet about what we can expect in terms of new software features in watchOS 12 / watchOS 26 — at least for those things that will apply to existing Apple Watch models.
Instead, sources are focused on what the Apple Watch Series 11 and Apple Watch Ultra 3 will bring to the table. These 2025 wearables will ship with watchOS 12 / watchOS 26 out of the box, so it will need to support whatever Apple has in store for those models.
Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman, who usually has some pretty reliable insights, has suggested this could be the year that high blood pressure monitoring comes to the Apple Watch.
Apple has been trying to crack this nut for years, and while previous reports suggested it was having trouble getting clinically accurate readings, recent information indicates that it will likely give up on precision and simply market this as a hypertension detector, similar to the sleep apnea detection feature that Apple introduced in watchOS 11.
This would alert users when abnormally high blood pressure was detected rather than providing continuous measurements or specific systolic and diastolic readings.
With sleep apnea detection, Apple surprised us by also bringing it to the older Apple Watch Series 9 in watchOS 11. However, that isn’t likely to happen with blood pressure monitoring, as this feature is believed to require a new hardware sensor. By comparison, sleep apnea detection used a new AI algorithm to analyze data from the existing sensors, and therefore only needed a processor that was powerful enough to handle the computations.
Along similar lines, the Apple Watch Ultra 3 is expected to get 5G and satellite connectivity as part of watchOS 12 / watchOS 26. However, hardware requirements will almost certainly make it exclusive to that model.
watchOS 12 / watchOS 26 AI-driven health features
Beyond that, most of the reports around watchOS 12 / watchOS 26 are primarily educated speculation at this point. Apple’s AI ambitions for the iPhone, iPad, and Mac suggest that it may plan to bring some more advanced Apple Intelligence capabilities to the Apple Watch, but nobody is quite sure what form those would take.
In May, Gurman said the Apple Watch isn’t expected to receive onboard Apple Intelligence, but it will still get useful AI-powered features. While the Apple Watch isn’t receiving a major overhaul, Gurman says it will get some new interface elements and give users a “smaller taste of the big shifts underway at Apple.”
With this in mind, it’s doubtful we’ll see standalone AI features in watchOS 12 / watchOS 26, as existing watches lack the horsepower needed to run Apple Intelligence. However, Apple has reportedly been looking for new ways to leverage the iPhone to analyze health and fitness data. In this regard, it’s been lagging behind rivals like Samsung’s Galaxy Watch 7 and Google’s Pixel Watch 3 , both of which provide AI-driven health insights that can deliver things like Readiness Scores and Energy Scores that let you know how your body is doing at a glance.
These summarized health insights are something that’s been sorely missing from Apple’s Health initiatives. The Apple Watch can track a lot of data and provide you with all the metrics around it, but it’s up to you to figure out what it means. There’s plenty to read in the iPhone Health app to help you understand your health data, but the analysis is up to you.
Gurman has previously revealed that Apple is working on an AI health coaching service code-named “Quartz” that may address this need. He hasn’t said anything about when this is coming but says it’s expected to focus on preventative health care rather than what sources call “post-sick health care.” In other words, Apple hopes to build algorithms that will keep you from getting sick in the first place.
By applying AI algorithms to this data, the health coach could offer users personalized insights into their activity levels, sleep patterns, and other health metrics.
Apple’s coaching service would utilize AI models to analyze data collected from an Apple Watch. This data, which is already available in the Health app in raw form, would be used to create personalized coaching programs tailored to each individual user’s needs, offering insights into activity levels, sleep patterns, and more. These programs could include exercise regimens and recommended diets and would likely adapt as a person’s health needs change.
There are indications that Apple wants to have this ready for watchOS 12 / watchOS 26 (and iOS 19 / iOS 26). However, some sources have hinted that it could become a new subscription service, either as a standalone “Apple Health+” plan, as part of Apple Fitness+, or rolled into an Apple One bundle. However, Apple has likely not yet settled on a pricing model or even a name. The holistic nature could lead Apple toward something like “Apple Wellness” instead.
What about Siri improvements for watchOS 12 / watchOS 26?
One thing we aren’t likely to see are any significant improvements to Apple’s beleaguered voice assistant. After all, Apple recently announced that the more personal Siri it had promised for the iPhone in iOS 18 will take longer than expected — possibly into early 2026 — and it hasn’t even made any such promises for the Apple Watch.
Apple made some Siri improvements in watchOS 10, moving to on-device processing on the Apple Watch Series 9 and later models, thanks to their more powerful chips. This also allowed users to call up and log health data via Siri — a feature that was previously unavailable due to Apple’s reluctance to process such sensitive data in the cloud.
Siri could previously report data from apps on the watch, such as sleep information, but couldn’t delve into deeper health data that was otherwise only available in the iPhone’s Health app.
If the rumors of Apple’s AI-driven health features are true, it’s likely that Siri will also provide a way to call up things like sleep and wellness scores and possibly even put them into a broader context. The groundwork for that was already laid in watchOS 10, so it’s just a matter of Apple giving Siri more data to work with.
watchOS 12 / watchOS 26 design and watch faces
While recent reports have suggested iOS 19 may get a fresh coat of paint , we’ve heard nothing that indicates such dramatic changes for watchOS 12 / watchOS 26. Unlike iOS, which has looked the same for over a decade, Apple did a big redesign in watchOS 10, so it’s unlikely to feel the need to change things again so soon.
However, each watchOS update adds new watch faces , and there’s no reason to believe that watchOS 12 / watchOS 26 will be an exception. We have absolutely no idea what to expect here just yet — and to be fair, they’re a surprise every year — but it’s a safe bet that this year’s release will add two or three new entries.
The watchOS 12 / watchOS 26 wishlist: what folks are clamoring for
Sadly, we’ve heard nothing to make us hope Apple will bring one of the most-requested customization features to watchOS 12 / watchOS 26 this year. Customizable or third-party watch face support is likely to remain as limited as ever.
In watchOS 7, Apple introduced the ability for developers to provide preconfigured versions of standard watch faces with specific complications for users to install, but that’s about as sophisticated as it’s gotten.
There’s a long list of other Apple Watch features that some folks have been requesting for years that have seemingly fallen on deaf ears in the halls of Apple Park. For example, watchOS still lacks a native Apple Notes app.
Full note-taking is obviously impractical, but the ability to more quickly dictate and view short notes would be quite useful. Some third-party apps fill this gap, but Apple Notes is popular enough on the iPhone to leave folks lamenting its inaccessibility from the Apple Watch.
We also often hear requests for enhanced health and fitness metrics. Apple does make minor improvements to these year-over-year, but if it does indeed embrace AI-driven health analysis, this could be the year that finally happens in a way that satisfies what many are craving: a more effective presentation and analysis of health data in a way that makes it much easier for everyday folks to understand and absorb.
Apple provides a lot of data, but it doesn’t do a good job of distilling it down to the key points. Last year’s Vitals app in watchOS 11 was a step in that direction, and many hope Apple will take that to the next level in watchOS 12 / watchOS 26 by making it more apparent to users what these numbers mean — and what they should do about them.
Third-party apps fill this void right now, and Apple’s HealthKit framework makes everything collected by the Apple Watch open to nearly any iPhone or Watch app you install and authorize. However, many prefer to keep their health data in the more private and secure Apple ecosystem.
Which devices will get watchOS 12 / watchOS 26?
We won’t know for sure which Apple Watch models will be supported by watchOS 12 / watchOS 26 until Apple unveils it in June, but we can make some educated guesses based on past releases.
It’s uncommon for Apple to drop support for older Apple Watch models with new watchOS releases. The Apple Watch Series 3, released in 2017 with watchOS 4, was supported until watchOS 9 was released in 2022. That put the Series 3 somewhat past its expiry date, as many folks reported problems running the newest software on that aging wearable.
The Apple Watch Series 4, which came with watchOS 5, made it to watchOS 10 before being dropped in last year’s watchOS 11 release. However, that also eliminated the Apple Watch Series 5 and the first-generation Apple Watch SE since all three models used essentially the same processor.
Since the Apple Watch Series 6 through Series 8 also share the same underlying chip (the S6, S7, and S8 are all just repackaged versions of the same T8301 silicon ), it’s very likely that watchOS 12 / watchOS 26 will continue to support the same Apple Watch models as watchOS 11.
