Ahead of its likely release this fall, there are plenty of rumors and a few clues about what’s expected to be called “Apple Watch Series 6” hidden in the latest WatchOS 7 beta.
Vanessa Hand Orellana for CNET:
Chances are, this year’s Apple Watch will look a lot like its predecessors: a squarish body with rounded edges and an OLED screen that curves at the sides.
The big health feature for the Series 6 this year could be SpO2 tracking, or the ability to monitor oxygen saturation in the blood.
According to 9to5Mac, iOS 14 code snippets suggest the next Apple Watch will be able to not only detect blood oxygen levels, but send an alert if it detects levels below what’s considered a “healthy” threshold, similar to what the watch already does with the high and low heart rate alerts. Blood oxygen levels are generally measured using a pulse oximeter on the tip of the finger, and to do this on the wrist, it’s very likely Apple would need to add new hardware to the Watch, making it a Series 6 exclusive.
This would be good timing, because some doctors are recommending pulse oximeter devices to monitor COVID-19 symptoms, and people have begun buying pulse oximeters during the coronavirus pandemic.
MacDailyNews Take: A long-desired Apple Watch feature is finally coming with watchOS 7: Sleep tracking. A new Sleep app from Apple leaked last fall. At the time, reports said Apple’s sleep-tracking feature would be able to monitor sleep quality via sensors within the Apple Watch that would log a user’s movement, heart rate, and noise data. The new Apple Watch Series 6 could make sleep tracking even better by improving battery life and tracking blood oxygen levels at night.