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7 things you didn’t know your Apple Watch could do

Christian de Looper
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The Apple Watch is considered to be the best smartwatch out there, and for good reason. It offers excellent fitness tracking and a sleek and stylish design, and it integrates perfectly into the rest of Apple’s ecosystem.

But with so many excellent features available to you, it’s highly unlikely you know everything there is to know about the Apple Watch. That’s why we put together this guide. Here are seven things you probably didn’t know your Apple Watch could do.

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Use your Apple Watch as a viewfinder

You can actually use your Apple Watch as a viewfinder for your iPhone, which can come in handy, for example, if you’re taking a group photo or vlogging using the rear-facing camera. Doing so is very easy, too: Open up the camera on your iPhone, then open the Camera Remote app on your Apple Watch. After a second or two, a view of the image from your iPhone should show up on the display.

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Control your Apple TV

Missing your Apple TV remote? It makes sense, considering how thin it is. Thankfully, you can use other Apple devices as your Apple TV remote instead. Using your Apple Watch to do so is very easy: Simply open up the Remote app, tap the Apple TV button, and you can then control your Apple TV. For this to work, your Apple TV needs to be signed in to your Apple account.

Use your Apple Watch as an intercom

You can connect your family’s Apple devices to work as an intercom, making it easy to communicate quickly within the home. Unfortunately, you have to have a HomePod for intercom to be available as an option, but once you do, your Apple Watch can be part of that whole intercom system. To set this up, open the Home app and tap on the little house button on the top left. Then tap Home Settings > Intercom. Then, connected users can use Siri on their Apple Watch to intercom messages simply by telling Siri to intercom their message.

Take a screenshot

You can take screenshots on your Apple Watch, though you first need to enable it as a setting. This can come in handy — perhaps you want to show off your favorite watch face or your activity.

To enable the ability to take screenshots, you’ll need to open the Watch app on your iPhone, then head to My Watch > General. Then scroll down and hit the “Enable Screenshots” toggle. You can then take a screenshot on the device by pressing the crown and side button at the same time.

Unlock your Mac

If you’re wearing your Apple Watch and you’re near your Mac, you don’t have to type in your password all the time. Instead, your Apple Watch can communicate with the Mac, unlocking it automatically. It’s pretty easy to enable, too: Simply head to System Preferences on your Mac, then open the Security & Privacy settings and select Use your Apple Watch to unlock apps and your Mac.

Find your iPhone

You probably have your Apple Watch strapped to your wrist during the day, so you’re unlikely to lose it — but you may well misplace your iPhone. Thankfully, your Apple Watch offers a few tools to help you find it. Notably, if you scroll up to your quick settings and hit the little button that looks like an iPhone with sound waves coming out of it, your iPhone should make a sound to help you find it. This is mostly useful when you lose your iPhone around the house — if you lose it somewhere else, you may need to turn to Find My.

Put a call on hold

You can use your Apple Watch to take calls when your iPhone isn’t right next to you — but if you’re expecting to be on the phone for more than a minute or so, you may want to take the call on your iPhone instead. Thankfully, you can answer on your watch and then switch to your iPhone when you get to it. You can even put the call on hold while you get to your iPhone. To do so, hit the three-dot menu when you get a call, and then tap the Answer on iPhone button. The caller will hear a repeated sound until you answer on your iPhone. To use this, your iPhone will need to be paired, so it will need to be within Bluetooth range.

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Christian de Looper
Christian de Looper
Contributor
Christian’s interest in technology began as a child in Australia, when he stumbled upon a computer at a garage sale that he…
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