You Can Try the New Apple Watch Series 9 Gestures Right Now
One of the best new features in Apple Watch Series 9 and Ultra 2 is the ability to control key functions using the new double-tap gesture. It allows you to answer calls, control music playback, reply to messages, etc. simply by double-tapping your thumb and forefinger.
But you don’t have to buy one of these new watches to try out this gesture. In fact, a similar double-tap gesture has been available in watchOS for some time.
How to Try Double Tap on Older Apple Watch Models
Like many good features, this one is hidden in the accessibility settings of your Apple Watch. If you have an Apple Watch Series 4 or later, you can try it out. To get started, go to the Watch app on your iPhone, select Accessibility, and turn on AssistiveTouch . Here, click on “Hand Gestures” and enable it on the next page.
Then select each of the gestures on the same page: Pinch , Double Pinch , Squeeze , and Double Squeeze , and match them to whatever action you like. You have options like opening Control Center, activating Siri, scrolling, launching shortcuts, and more.
Once you’ve done that, you can try all of these gestures to see if they work for you, or you can just focus all your efforts on matching the most commonly used double-pinch action and replicate the Series 9 or Ultra experience. 2.
Do I even need a new Apple Watch?
There’s a very good chance that Apple has tweaked double-tap for the Series 9 and Ultra 2, and that using it on the new watch might be a lot better than trying it through the accessibility settings on an older watch. Plus, you won’t have to fiddle with any settings since it will be enabled by default. Based on the promotional videos we’ve seen for the new watch, it looks like the double tap activates without issue and works well.
After using the Accessibility gesture on the Apple Watch SE, it’s easy to see that the feature isn’t as robust as we’d like. If you can’t trust that a gesture will work reliably every time, you’re much less likely to use it regularly. With the Series 9 and Ultra 2, Apple may have addressed this issue, and for some people that may be enough reason to upgrade.