Over 880 days ago on 24th April 2015, I received my original Apple Watch (recently dubbed Series 0), I have worn it every day since. I use it mainly for fitness and media playback control, but nothing else.

The main reason is that my Apple Watch was too slow to use any apps and even the ones that I do use had some performances issues, e.g. the timer in the workout app struggling to display smoothly on screen.

Performance

watchOS 4 has been a huge improvement – performance seem so much better, apps launch quicker, the interface is more fluid, everything seems much more reliable. As an example, my app Departure Board launches more faster, and it even updates its location using the GPS on the phone much quicker. I’d even argue that it has crossed the threshold from unusable to usable. watchOS 4 has really given a new lease of life to my aging, scratched watch.

Media Control

Since I got my AirPods in December and I lost the ability to control the volume on my headphone (I had been using Jabra Revo Wireless for years), I have been hoping the Now Playing screen would be available as a complication. The Now Playing screen lets you control the device volume with the digital crown. Having it as a complication would let me access it with a single tap, rather then pressing the side button and scrolling to find it, then selecting it.

With watchOS 4, Apple went one step further and displays the Now Playing screen whenever media is playing on your iPhone. As soon as I start media payback on my phone, the watch face is replaced with the Now Playing screen.

What’s next?

I was almost convinced that I would be upgrading at a Series 3 with LTE this year. However this performance improvement may help me defer this purchase for another year or until Series 4. In addition to this my carrier, Three, is not supported yet and podcast playback over LTE is also not available yet as far as I know.