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Apple Watch Series 12 and Ultra 4: Their 7 biggest surprises

Macworld At the Surprise and Shine press event today, Apple announced a raft of new products including the iPhone 18 Pro , AirPods 5 , and iPhone Duo and thanks to pre-launch rumors, surprises were in short supply. Nearly everything was leaked accurately ahead of time. But one product that did manage to spring a few small surprises was the Apple Watch Series 12 . Ahead of launch, we were led to expect a tedious iterative update with a new processor, identical design, and maybe a few new health features. Some of that was true, but there were unexpected pleasures as well. Here are the 7 things we like best about the new Apple Watch Series 12 and its Apple Watch Ultra 4 sibling, which launched at the same time. 1. Stunning new materials Granted, the design hasnt changed in any fundamental way this year. (As I said on the live blog, the average member of the public would probably struggle to spot the difference between the Series 12 and the Series 4.) The leakers were right about that. But cosmetics matter too, and in that department Apple has done outstanding work with its watches this year. Firstly, Apple has refreshed the color finishes. On the aluminum models, Silver and Rose Gold are gone, replaced by Light Gold (nice) and Dark Bronze (my favorite Apple Watch color so far). On the titanium side, Gold has been replaced by Radiant Gold, a definite improvement. But the real aesthetic killer is the return of ceramic as a chassis material. The ceramic version of Series 12 comes in Night Blue and Pearl White, and theyre both gorgeous. You may think us shallow, but were pumped for the look of this years new watches. And watches, after all, are at least partly fashion items, so its okay to care about things like that. The stunning ceramic color options for the Apple Watch Series 12. Apple 2. Tougher screens The Series 11 had a tough screen if you went for the more expensive titanium version. But as of the launch of the Series 12, Ceramic Shield 2 is on the aluminum models too, bringing (Apple claims) a 60 percent jump in durability compared to the mere Ion-X protective tech on the baseline Series 11. This brings an important feature within reach of less wealthy customers. 3. More accurate, all-day heart-rate sensing This is one improvement we did know about ahead of the launch. What was surprising was the extent of Apples claims for the new devices. The Apple Watch Series 12, according to Apples internal testing, has the most accurate heart rate sensing in a wearable. And thats all down to a new sensor setup, combined with the powerful S11 processor. The redesigned (sorry, re-architected) sensors ensure better skin contact during ECG readings, Apple says. There are redesigned photodiodes and larger, power-efficient green LEDs. All of this enables the Series 12 and Ultra 4 to measure your heart rate every five seconds, all day long, to a high degree of accuracy, helping the device to produce better insights about fitness, stress, and overall health. Were excited about the updated heart-rate sensor. And also that bronze finish. Apple 4. Health software thats sophisticated but simple Apple spent a lot of the presentation talking about software features, which is odd for a hardware event. One would imagine that most of these are part of watchOS 27, which was demoed and released in beta as long ago as June. Are the new features available on existing watches, provided they can run watchOS 27? Apple didnt rush to make that clear in the keynote or its website, and its not hard to see why. Much better for customers to associate the features with the new hardware and pay for an upgrade. But I digress. What was exciting about the keynote was seeing how much work Apple has done to improve and expand the health software on the Apple Watch. For example, theres an entirely new app called Readiness, which analyzes a users recent activity, training load, vitals, and sleep score to offer insight into their capacity for the day ahead. Whats really nice is that it translates this complex analysis into a simple score out of 10 and a clear recommendation. What may capture more users imagination is the new Longevity tab in Health, which includes Health Age: again, a simple way of communicating a complex set of factors. The Heart Rate app, meanwhile, gets a new section for tracking HRV, a key indicator of stress and recovery, which was already tracked but is measured much more often on the new watches. This is typical of the expanded array of health data analysis you can enjoy on the Series 12 and Ultra 4. And, possibly, your existing watch. 5. Cool AI audio features Again, Apple didnt go so far as to specify that the new AI/audio features grouped under the umbrella term Audio Intelligence are only for the Series 12 and Ultra 4. But it strongly implied and later confirmed that theyre made possible by the power of the S11 processor (described as Apples most powerful wearable chip yet). What is clear is that these features have the potential to be very exciting. Sound Recognition alerts deaf and hard-of-hearing users about important sounds such as alarms and babies crying. Live Rewind, accessed via a double-press of the Digital Crown, displays the last 15 seconds of a conversation as text on your watch screenperfect when you miss something important. And Siri Recap creates summaries of conversations. That last one is maybe a bit creepy (though its all private and stored on the device), but its still an impressive concept. The new Siri Modular face could become a favorite thanks to the Apple Watch Series 12s new AI features. Apple 6. Longer battery life Heres an area where we werent expecting anything after last years unprecedented battery breakthrough . And sure enough, the baseline estimated battery life of the standard model remains at 24 hours. But the fact that battery life for outdoor workouts has gone up by 25 percent, now estimated at 10 hours, is a nice and unexpected bonus. And now look at the Ultra 4. Last year, estimated general battery life went up from 36 hours to 42 hours. But this year it gets an even bigger increase, from 42 to 50 hours. Theres a new Extended Workout mode promising up to 25 hours of usage, even when tracking workouts with full GPS and heart rate readings. And for extreme situations, theres Max Extended Workout mode, which can track outdoor runs and walks for up to 45 hours. All that, and charging for both models is faster too. What a nice surprise. 7. No starting price hike Arguably the biggest and nicest surprise of all: the starting price for the Series 12 and Ultra 4 are exactly the same as for the Series 11 and Ultra 3: $399 and $799. With RAM prices being the way they are, this was not something we saw coming. And the ceramic models, which previously started at over $1,249, now cost a much more palatable $899. Its not all good news in this area: certain upgraded models, such as the 46mm version of the Series 12, have gone up, albeit by small margins. But having the same baseline entry point is a major surprise.

10 Sep 2026 2:20 am