Repurposing The Apple Watch’s Side Button

Jack Arendt writing on Medium:

When Apple introduced the Apple Watch, they highlighted the lock button looking button as a way to bring up friends. The touted features such as “digital touch” or “tap to send your heartbeat.” Outside of the first couple days of having of having my watch, I’ve never really used them. And the only time I hit that button is on accident. In fact I use Apple Pay on my watch multiple times a week, and I have to double click to activate that, where I have to only single click to activate something I rarely use. To me, the Apple Watch would benefit greatly from reprioritizing how many clicks opens what feature. And I also think that giving developers access, or at the very least the workout apps, to the side button would be incredibly beneficial. Now I no longer have to force touch the screen and hope to God I hit the right button. I can simply press the side button, my workout will pause, and then I can tap it again to resume. I still want Apple Pay as a double click, and then lets move the friends page to a triple click during workouts. Because honestly, if you’re making a phone call while working out, you’re not working out hard enough.

This is an interesting thought. I too am not always a fan of having to Force Touch the display in order to do certain actions. I also think that Digital Touch has been somewhat of a failure so far. I’ve asked quite a few people with Apple Watches if they “touch” either either and most of them say they don’t. Maybe it’s too early, but so far Digital Touch seems like an interesting idea that just hasn’t gotten much traction.

This makes me wonder what the future is for the side button. I, without question, use it most to enable Apple Pay. But boy would I love if I didn’t have to do anything at all. How great would it be if I could just lift my wrist and pay for things without having to use my other hands? This is one of the reasons why sometimes I default to using the iPhone for Apple Pay. Rather than need both arms to enable and pay, with the iPhone you only need one.

I’m going to be interested in seeing what Apple does with the side button in watchOS 3 and with the second-generation Apple Watch which is rumored to hit later this year.