Google is releasing a new Wear OS 5 smartwatch operating system into developer preview. One of many updates from the Google I/O 2024 developer conference, this most recent version emphasises better battery life and other performance enhancements, including more effective exercise monitoring. Along with the new Wear OS tile and Jetpack Compose versions for developing wrist applications, developers are also receiving enhanced tools for generating watch faces.
Enhancements to certain software enable the main change that users will value: battery life. With the exercise tracking improvements, for example, Google claims that completing a marathon consumes 20% less power than it did with Wear OS 4.
To assist developers in creating more effective applications, the business is also publishing a handbook.
Updates to the Face Designer, which now powers 30% of watch faces on Google Play, follow the introduction of watch face formats as part of Wear OS 4 last year. Google says it will now impose publishing restrictions on watch faces created with AndroidX or the Wearable Support Library, as well as limit certain data sources for complications created with these libraries, in an effort to encourage more developers to adopt the format.
The release of Jetpack Compose for Wear OS version 1.3 emphasizes improvements that allow developers to create for Wear OS and other form factors.
In the meantime, the now-alpha version 1.4 of the Jetplack Tiles library offers preview support for Android Studio to assist developers in creating Wear OS Tiles, which are the swipeable displays that provide information or access to activities for a WearOS programme. Additional enhancements will enable developers’ applications to identify which of their tiles are being used, as well as assist with the text and other data arrangement on the tiles.
Two additional upgrades are a new sensor panel to evaluate how well an app uses Google Health Services and new recommendations for creating adaptable Wear OS applications for a variety of screen sizes.
Android Studio Koala Feature Drop (Canary) will release some of the new tools.
