Apple’s watchOS and tvOS Are Getting More Personal

Both Apple’s watchOS and tvOS platforms will get several updates this year, all aimed at making them more, well, up close and personal.

The new watchOS 6 update will bring its own dedicated App Store that you can search through via Siri, scribble, and voice dictation. A few new Apple-specific apps are coming to the device, including a calculator app that can quickly calculate a tip and split bills with friends and a voice memo app for recordings on the fly.

There are new very personalized, and personal, Health and Fitness updates as well, such as long-term activity trends of how your fitness levels have changed over the past months and year.  Apple is also adding menstrual cycle tracking to the Watch for female health to get alerts on upcoming periods and when their fertile windows are.  There’s a new complication for noise levels to indicate the decibels of the room and give you a warning if you’re spending extended time in a room that could damage your hearing. That feature will also be made available on the Health app on the iPhone.

The new tvOS will obviously receive support for new TV-based services that Apple announced in March, but the update also brings a redesigned homepage that shows previews of TV shows and movies, similar to what you might find on Amazon’s UX on the Fire TV and Twitch. Ahead of Apple Arcade’s release, Apple also announced that the Apple TV will support more third-party game accessories like the Xbox One and PS4 controllers.

The new tvOS offers multiuser support as well to show personalized recommendations on shows and music based on the content you consume. The music playback UI now shows live lyrics that follow along with the song just like on iOS 13.

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