Introducing Apple Watch Series 12

One of the biggest updates to Apple Watch Series 12 is the new Health Sensing System, which brings together updated optical and electrical heart sensors with the S11 chip. Together, they allow Apple Watch Series 12 to measure your heart rate more frequently and provide a more detailed picture of your health and fitness throughout the day.

Apple says Series 12 offers its most accurate heart rate sensing in a wearable. A study involving more than 1,000 people compared Apple Watch with other leading wearables, with Apple Watch recording the highest heart rate accuracy across the devices tested.

The optical heart sensor now uses larger, more power-efficient green LEDs and measures your heart rate every five seconds throughout the day. Because the measurements happen more frequently, Series 12 can provide a clearer picture of how your body responds to activity and rest. It also helps make features such as the Exercise and Move rings more accurate, while a new heart rate complication lets you see your current heart rate directly from your watch face.

Heart rate variability (HRV) is another area where Series 12 takes things further. HRV can provide useful insight into how your body is responding to stress, activity and recovery, and Series 12 measures it up to 24 times more frequently than before.

There are now two ways to look at HRV. Recovery HRV is designed to help you understand day-to-day changes in stress and recovery, while overall HRV provides a broader view of your health, including cardiovascular health.

Series 12 also brings Recovery HRV into overnight vitals, where your measurements are compared with your personal baseline. This makes it easier to spot changes that might otherwise be difficult to notice.

A new daytime vitals view adds another layer of context, allowing you to switch between your overnight and daytime measurements. This could help you notice changes in your metrics during the day, rather than waiting until your overnight data is recorded.

Taken together, these updates make Apple Watch Series 12 better at turning individual measurements into a more useful picture of how you're doing, whether you're keeping an eye on your fitness, managing your activity or simply getting to know your health a little better.

Apple Watch Series 12 introduces Readiness, a new feature designed to give you a clearer idea of how prepared your body is for the day ahead. It looks at factors including your recent activity, training load, vital signs and sleep to give you a single score from 0 to 10.

Rather than leaving you to work out what all that data means, Readiness turns it into a simple recommendation: Recover, Pace Yourself, Ready or Go For It. Whether you’re planning a tough workout, heading into a busy day at work or deciding when to take things a little easier, it gives you another way to understand what your body might be telling you.

Your Readiness score can change throughout the day as new information comes in. For example, an intense workout or a change in your daytime vitals can affect your score. You can also see which factors are having the biggest impact and tap through for more detail.

The feature’s scoring system was developed using data from the Apple Heart and Movement Study, alongside input from exercise scientists and physicians at Apple. The result is a simple daily snapshot that helps turn the wealth of health and fitness data collected by Apple Watch into something you can actually use.

Apple Watch Series 12 gives you up to 24 hours of everyday battery life, with up to 10 hours during an outdoor workout, a 25% improvement over the previous model.

Charging is faster too. Just 15 minutes of charging can provide up to 12 hours of additional battery life, giving you a quick way to top up before heading out, starting a workout or getting ready for bed.

So whether you’re tracking a long workout or simply getting through a busy day, Apple Watch Series 12 gives you more time to use the features you rely on, with less time spent waiting for it to charge.

Apple Watch Series 12 makes it easier to keep track of how much you’re moving throughout the day. Its updated motion tracking uses the S11 chip and new machine learning to improve the accuracy of both step counts and distance, including during indoor walking and running workouts.

That means your activity data can give you a more reliable picture of your movement, whether you’re heading out for a walk, working towards a daily step goal or tracking an indoor workout.

There’s also a new Steps complication, so you can see your step count directly on your watch face without opening the Activity or Fitness app. It’s a small addition, but a useful one if you like having your progress visible throughout the day.

Apple Watch Series 12 collects a lot of useful information about your health, and the redesigned Health app on iPhone is designed to make that information easier to understand.

A new Insights tab brings together relevant health information and highlights things that may be worth paying attention to, while a new Longevity tab looks at your health data over time to give you a broader view of how things are changing.

One of the new features within Longevity is Health Age, which compares certain health metrics with your actual age to give you another way to understand how your measurements are tracking.

The Health app also adds new movement evaluations, using data from Apple Watch alongside vision-based AI on iPhone to assess areas such as flexibility, strength and balance.

Together with the health and fitness tracking already available on Apple Watch, these updates make it easier to see individual measurements in context and get a better understanding of your health over time.r workout.

Apple Watch Series 12 introduces new Audio Intelligence features designed to help you stay aware, remember important moments and stay engaged in conversations.

With Sound Recognition, your watch can alert you to sounds such as alarms, sirens and doorbells, even when your iPhone isn't nearby. Live Rewind can help you catch something you missed in a conversation, while Siri Recap can provide a quick summary to refer back to later.

You can also use apps like Shazam directly from your wrist to identify music playing around you, making it even easier to discover a song, all without reaching for your iPhone.

Apple Watch Series 12 has been designed with a focus on reducing its environmental impact. 40% of the materials used are recycled, including 100% recycled aluminium in the aluminium case and 100% recycled titanium in the 3D-printed titanium case.

Apple has also focused on renewable energy throughout the manufacturing process, with electricity used to make Apple Watch Series 12 sourced from renewable sources such as wind and solar.

The packaging is 100% fibre-based, making it easy to recycle at home. These steps form part of Apple’s wider goal to become carbon neutral across its entire footprint by 2030.

Apple Watch Series 12 brings together more accurate health tracking, deeper fitness insights and useful new features that make it easier to understand your day.

From Readiness and improved heart rate and step tracking to faster charging and new Audio Intelligence features, Series 12 is designed to give you more useful information without getting in the way of everyday life.

Whether you're working towards a fitness goal, keeping an eye on your health or simply want a smarter way to stay connected, Apple Watch Series 12 puts more helpful features right on your wrist.