{"id":900181,"date":"2026-09-21T14:48:12","date_gmt":"2026-09-21T14:48:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/900181\/"},"modified":"2026-09-21T14:48:12","modified_gmt":"2026-09-21T14:48:12","slug":"apples-brand-new-watch-appears-to-be-missing-a-health-feature-that-six-older-models-still-support","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/900181\/","title":{"rendered":"Apple\u2019s brand-new Watch appears to be missing a health feature that six older models still support"},"content":{"rendered":"

Earlier this month, Apple unveiled its new range of products set to be released during its annual phone event, which this year was known as \u2018Surprise and shine\u2019.<\/p>\n

During the address, the tech<\/a> giant shared information about its new iPhone 18 Pro<\/a> and Pro Max, the company\u2019s first foldable device known as the iPhone Duo, and its latest wearable<\/a> – the Apple Watch Series 12<\/a>.<\/p>\n

However, while the device comes with a whole host of new features, there is one that is notably missing from the Series 12, which many Apple<\/a> fans have noticed themselves.<\/p>\n

The feature in question is the handwashing timer which users have taken to social media<\/a> to discuss its absence.<\/p>\n

On Reddit<\/a>, one person wrote: \u201cJust bought the AW4 I noticed that handwashing timers don\u2019t come up anymore, and the setting disappeared. Apple\u2019s website confirms also that the feature is not supported on new watches, lol.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"AppleApple unveiled its new Apple Watch Series 12 (Apple)<\/p>\n

Another said: \u201cPersonally I use it to deal with my OCD. Without it I wash my hands way too long and way too many times. With it it\u2019s much easier for me to wash once and be done when the timer is up. I don\u2019t know why but it works.\u201d<\/p>\n

A third user commented: \u201cThe people who actually need a handwashing timer will never care enough to turn the feature on, and the people who don\u2019t need a handwashing timer will continue not needing a handwashing timer.\u201d<\/p>\n

And a fourth added: \u201cwell guess I don’t need to wash my hands anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n

How to turn on handwashingGo to the Settings app on your Apple Watch.Tap Handwashing, then turn on Handwashing Timer.<\/p>\n

‘When Apple Watch detects that you\u2019ve started washing your hands, it starts a 20-second timer. If you stop washing in less than 20 seconds, you\u2019re encouraged to finish the job’<\/p>\n

Apple’s website says the following models support the handwashing feature:Apple Watch SE 3Apple Watch Series 9Apple Watch Series 10Apple Watch Series 11Apple Watch Ultra 2Apple Watch Ultra 3New accessibility feature available on the Apple Watch Series 12<\/p>\n

However, there are still plenty of new features coming with the new Apple Watch including the Live Rewind option.<\/p>\n

This is part of Apple\u2019s new Audio Intelligence, which lets you double-press the Digital Crown and retrieve a short snippet of what was just said, which could be handy if you missed a sentence or didn\u2019t quite catch what someone said.<\/p>\n

\"TheThe handwashing timer is no longer available on the new Apple Watch (Dmitrii Marchenko\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n

Apple explains: \u201cLive Rewind only activates when you deliberately double-press the Digital Crown. It only shows the last 15 seconds of speech as a text snippet on your display. It doesn’t continue to transcribe in the background, nor does it save the text unless you choose to ask Siri about the content or save it to the Siri app.\u201d<\/p>\n

When you deliberately activate Live Rewind with the Digital Crown, the Watch can use the temporary audio data to produce the information you were looking for.<\/p>\n

Apple\u2019s wider Audio Intelligence system also includes features such as Siri Recap, which can create summaries from conversations and other audio, but the firm has said that these features have been designed around keeping raw audio from becoming a permanent recording.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Earlier this month, Apple unveiled its new range of products set to be released during its annual phone…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":900182,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[1337,16556,64,63,44,16523,105,21622],"class_list":["post-900181","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-technology","tag-apple","tag-apple-watch","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-news","tag-tech-news","tag-technology","tag-wearable-tech"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/900181","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=900181"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/900181\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/900182"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=900181"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=900181"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=900181"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}