Ability to delete first-party apps landing later this year
Apple Watch owners will soon be able to get rid of the company’s own built-in apps from their smartwatch.
It’s already been possible to ditch third-party Apple Watch apps simply by pressing and holding on the app icon on your Watch and hitting ‘X’ to get rid. Now, you’ll be able to do the same for apps like Remote, Alarm, Timer, Stopwatch, Breathe and Apple’s ECG app.
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The ability to do that will be introduced in watchOS 6, which launches later this year. It’s not a feature currently supported in the live watchOS 6 beta, although the feature has been described to TechCrunch by people familiar with the new software addition.
One of the reasons it’s not possible to do this on current Apple Watches is down to the fact that there is no app equivalent that lives on your iOS device. That will change for watchOS 6 when those native Watch apps will now feature inside of Apple’s App Store letting you delete and reinstall if you so wish.
It seems that not all of these first party apps will be deletable, though, with Heart Rate and Messages apps among the apps that can not be removed.
The decision to offer Watch owners more control over what lives on their smartwatch coincides with the introduction of an on-device App Store, which Apple unveiled would be added in watchOS 6 at its Worldwide Developer Conference earlier this month.
Along with the new App Store, Apple is set to introduce new first party apps including Audiobooks, Voice Memos and Calculator. It’s also gong to roll out a Cycle Tracking app for women’s health tracking and a new Noise app to help protect you hearing.
If none of those new additions sound all that appealing though, it’s good to know you’ll now be able to decide whether they should take up space on your Apple Watch.
