Review: Apple Watch Series 6 and Apple Watch SE

Every year, the Apple Watch comes with a vaunted and vetted new health feature.

Some of these debut to universal acclaim. For example, closing your activity rings is still the best, and simplest, fitness game—enough to make my 5-year-old gasp and urge me to close my red ring before she goes to bed. Others, like 2018’s electrocardiogram on the Series 4, are met with more measured reactions. Will it help people? Will it hurt?

This year, Apple includes an optical blood oxygen sensor, which measures oxygen saturation in the blood (SpO2). Other fitness-tracker manufacturers, like Garmin, have had this capability on its watches for years. Assuming the sensor on the new Apple Watch Series 6 isn't wildly inaccurate—and my readings haven't been—it can be a useful tool. You do need a doctor to formally diagnose sleep apnea or asthma, but if you know you have those health problems, it can be useful to keep an eye on it with this sensor. It’s also useful if you’re an athlete hoping to reap the benefits of training at altitude.

I don't use the SpO2 measurements enough to strongly recommend an upgrade if you already have last year's Series 5. But it does bring the Series 6 ever closer to being a comprehensive fitness tracker. I have a bone to pick with the Apple Watch SE, though. Given Apple's consistent push to bring health features to everyone, I find it odd that it would yank them on the new midrange watch in the same year it announces Family Setup for WatchOS.

Would it really have been so hard to continue selling the Series 5 at a lower price? Sheesh.

Photograph: Apple

When I line up last year's Series 5 and the new Series 6 and SE in a row, they all look pretty much the same.

The Series 6 does have a brighter display that makes it easier to read outside, a new processor, and Apple's U1 chip, which makes the watch more accurately detectable relative to other devices around it. But it doesn’t feel much faster than the Series 5. The U1 chip, with the ultra-wideband antennas powering it, is also only useful in theory at this point, unless you’re one of the lucky (rich) people in line to buy a 2021 BMW compatible with Apple’s new CarKey feature.

The most useful upgrade, I found, is a much faster recharging time. The Series 5 took well over 2 hours to juice up. I took it off every night, placed it on its inductive charging stand, and wished it sweet dreams.

But the Series 6 is much faster. Every morning, it takes me about an hour to recharge it, which is especially important now that WatchOS can track your sleep, meaning you have to wear the watch all night. I can put it on the charging stand when I wake up at 7 am, and it’s at 100 percent by the time I feed my kids, take a shower, and sit down at the computer around 8 ... OK, maybe 8:30 am.

This will probably be a much harder routine to keep up once we all have to commute again, but also, who knows when that will be! And if you are already returning to the office (or never stopped going in), you might need a backup charger.

If you’re going to use a blood oxygen monitor, it’s helpful to keep in mind that like every health sensor, it won’t be 100 percent accurate, 100 percent of the time. Also, your body won’t have a consistent level of oxygen saturation for 24 hours a day. For example, your blood oxygen saturation normally drops a little bit while you're sleeping.

Apple’s Health app is still a little hard to navigate (which is puzzling in a company that so highly prizes good, utilitarian design), but you can swipe through the Blood Oxygen section to check both your saturation range and your range over time. Mine usually fell to around 90 percent at midnight but stayed consistently over 96 percent while I was awake. I verified all these readings with a fingertip pulse oximeter.

I should mention I didn’t use the Solo Loop. Apple’s newest accessory is a fastener- and buckle-less silicone handcuff to hold the watch on securely. It comes in nine different sizes. You can use Apple’s printable tool, or a fabric measuring tape, to find your size.

I'm a size 4, and Apple sent me the correct loop, but I just didn’t like it. The correct size held the watch on just a little too tight for comfort. I used the nylon sport strap instead and didn’t get any erratic or worrisome blood oxygen readings. And unlike with the Fitbit Sense, you can take your own readings throughout the day. It also periodically monitors it with no prompting.

I also tested a few of the other features. I had the cellular-enabled version, so I called my spouse, who was mildly bemused that I was calling him with a watch from the park behind our house (“You’re not calling from a phone?”).

And then there's the Apple Watch SE, which is basically a Series 5 without a few of the latest health features, like the electrocardiogram and blood oxygen measurements. Earlier this year, Apple announced that WatchOS would have Family Setup to make it easier to set up watches for children or older relatives who don’t have an iPhone of their own. I assumed I’d be able to buy a Series 5 at a lower price, or hand off my own to an older relative.

But Apple just discontinued it! If all you need is a basic fitness tracker that integrates seamlessly with your iPhone, you can still buy a Series 3. But if you have older family members—especially ones at risk of getting sick from a respiratory illness that is associated with cardiac complications—you’ll probably still want the ECG and blood oxygen monitoring only available in the Series 6.

I know it's more affordable, but conceptually, the SE feels like a cop-out. And I realize how entitled this sounds, but I did really miss the always-on display. I’ve always used my wearable as a watch, not just as a fitness tracker. Not being able to glance down and check the time made me feel as primitive as an early hominid swinging a bone as a weapon.

Photograph: Apple

But, oh, battery life! When I turn everything on—the brighter, always-on screen, sleep-tracking, blood oxygen tracking, the location-based hand washing reminders, two GPS-enabled workouts per day—the watch barely lasts a full day. In fact, since it needs 30 percent of the battery to track your sleep, I occasionally have to top it up before I go to bed.

Charging a watch twice a day is ridiculous, but it may become a habit. Some of the features that I was most excited to try with an Apple Watch, like an automatic car key fob or the all-in-one workout streaming Fitness+ platform, aren't available yet.

Maybe it's better to think of the Apple Watch as less of a wearable and more of a tiny iPhone you wear. When you're Slacking and emailing and texting all day, no one finds it surprising that you may have to charge your phone more than once a day.

Many of the most exciting features of WatchOS are still available on older Series 4s and 5s, so if you already have one of those, I wouldn't rush out to get the latest. But if this is your first Apple Watch, I'd still say the Series 6 is worth it. If you have an iPhone, of course.