Five Apple Watch faces make the most of the upgraded displays from the Series 10

The Apple Watch Series 10 is the first model to refresh your seconds hand even while the always-on display is dark. Previous models, including Series 5 to Series 9, only the hours and minutes of the time are updated when the display goes dark. However, at the time of release there were only three clock faces that supported this new feature.

Flux and reflection are the first two. Both continue to show seconds of a few seconds even when the screen becomes dark.

Flux represents a line that rises vertically, representing a few seconds for each minute. Reflection offers the hands of traditional analog watches, sweeping when the screen is fully turned on, and checking once per second when it gets dim. Reflection also comes in two styles: a full-screen layout and a circular version with four intricate slots.

The third is the Activity Digital update. Since Series 5, this face had an option to display a few seconds, but it disappeared earlier when the display went dark. In Series 10, the Watch is always updated once per second in on mode, so digital seconds continue to count in both view states.

Unfortunately, Apple has not brought this improved display behavior to other existing watch faces. However, since the launch of the Apple Watch Series 10, support has been added to two new faces, with two new faces released.

The 2025 Unity Rhythm Face arrived in January and features an analog hand that updates seconds like a reflection. Recently, Apple introduced the Watchos 11.5 and the Pride Harmony Face for 2025. It also uses analog hands to support updates in dim seconds.

This will bring you to 5 total watch faces optimized for the Apple Watch Series 10 display. Meanwhile, over 40 watch faces do not yet utilize new hardware. After 10 generations, the Apple Watch will ultimately be able to match the second real-time update of a basic analog or digital watch, but 90% of the watch faces do not support this level of timekeeping.

Hopefully, Watchos 12 brings seconds of support to every face. Standard analog clock designs for hours around dials like utilities and California worth this feature, especially if Apple doesn’t plan on updating each face individually. Every face must take advantage of the full functionality of the hardware.