Key Takeaways
- Samsung has finally ended the One UI 6 Watch beta program for the Galaxy Watch 6.
- It has pushed the stable build for members of the beta program.
- The Wear OS 5 update should also go live for the Galaxy Watch 5 and 4 in the coming weeks.
Samsung has been running the One UI 6 Watch beta program for the Galaxy Watch 6 since mid-June 2024. So far, it has dropped nine beta builds, squashing all the reported bugs and addressing any performance issues. Now, after extensive testing, Samsung is closing the public beta program and has released the stable build of One UI 6 Watch for the Galaxy Watch 6.
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A leap forward in some key areas
If you are part of the One UI 6 Watch beta program, you should receive a new 136MB OTA update from Samsung for the stable build (via Reddit). The release notes highlight the end of the One UI Watch beta program and thank all participants for their feedback. The BXJ5 firmware contains the October 2024 security patch.
A new Wear OS 5 firmware update should go live in the next few days for Galaxy Watch 6 owners who are not part of the beta program. Do note that if you own the LTE variant of the Galaxy Watch 6, you might have to wait longer for the update. In the coming weeks, a stable One UI 6 Watch build should also go live for the Galaxy Watch 5 and Watch 4.
One UI 6 Watch brings several new features to Samsung’s smartwatches
Initially announced in late May 2024, One UI 6 Watch is based on Wear OS 5 and brings several new features to Samsung’s 2023 smartwatch. This includes a new Energy Score, which rates your physical and mental readiness after analyzing your sleep and physical activity.
One UI 6 Watch also brings Galaxy AI to Samsung’s wearable, giving more detailed sleep insights, including your heart rate, respiratory rate, and how long it takes to fall asleep after lying down.
Other minor but notable changes include faster horizontal scrolling, the ability to view all ongoing activities by tapping the bottom of the watch face, and new Universal Gestures. Wear OS 5 is based on Android 13, with Google promising smoother system performance and longer battery life. The skin also features a new, stylish system font.
All these features are already available on the Galaxy Watch 7 and Watch Ultra, as they shipped with Wear OS 5-based One UI 6 Watch out of the box.
