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Samsung finally starts Wear OS 5 rollout for older Galaxy Watches

Samsung finally starts Wear OS 5 rollout for older Galaxy Watches

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The update will come to the Galaxy Watch 6 first and includes features like Energy Score and sleep apnea detection

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Person wearing both the Galaxy Watch 6 and Watch 6 Classic
The update will first come to the Galaxy Watch 6 before arriving on previous Wear OS models.
Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

There’s good news if you’ve got an older Samsung Galaxy Watch: the company announced today that it’s finally begun rolling out One UI 6 Watch to its older Wear OS smartwatches.

One UI 6 Watch is Samsung’s take on Wear OS 5, and brings with it a host of new features. On the health and fitness front, that includes AI-powered health tips, FDA-cleared sleep apnea detection, and Energy Score, a new metric for gauging recovery from exercise and physical stress. (You can read more about how these three features work in our Galaxy Watch 7, Galaxy Ring, and Ultra reviews.) Meanwhile, the new Workout Routine feature allows you to create a custom workout by combining various activity types. Also included is the Race feature for runners and cyclists, which lets them compare current and past workouts.

Outside of health tracking, One UI 6 Watch will also offer new watch faces, as well as better interoperability with other Galaxy devices. People with Galaxy phones will be able to use AI-generated suggested replies and the double pinch gesture. The pinch gesture was previously available as an accessibility setting, but this brings it more front-and-center in the main interface.

That said, you might not see the update right away. Samsung says it’ll first arrive on the Galaxy Watch 6 before coming to the Galaxy Watch FE, Galaxy Watch 5, and Galaxy Watch 4 models over the next few weeks.