Like the iPhone, the Apple Watch is stuck in a (very successful) rut. With the notable exception of the Apple Watch Ultra, a niche variant aimed at fans of massive watches, the watch we have today is almost indistinguishable from the ones Apple sold in 2018. There have been little nips and tucks since the Series 4 – minute changes in the size of the frame or the thickness of the watch – but you’d be hard-pressed to tell today’s Apple Watch from the one Apple sold 7 years ago.
Most of the updates have been to internal components. Faster, more capable processors, improved sensors, brighter displays, faster charging, and other welcome changes have kept the Apple Watch on top. It is the best-selling watch, all categories combined, in the world.
According to a post on Weibo by Instant Digital (with a mixed review), the Apple Watch is expected to receive another year of routine upgrades in 2026 and 2027. This contradicts an earlier report from DigiTimes (a source that also has a mixed review) which previously claimed that there would be a big redesign in 2026 related to some new sensors. This new source claims that the big design change is now two years away, aiming to arrive a year after the iPhone’s 20th anniversary, which is expected to arrive in late 2027.
At this point, it’s hard to know what to believe: Rumors of significant Apple Watch redesigns are quite common and never seem to materialize. The so-called Apple Watch In some cases, the term “redesign” is somewhat misinterpreted…what counts as a “redesign” ends up being a very minimal change, like a slightly altered digital crown or an almost imperceptible change in thickness.
