Opinion: Four months in, here’s where I was wrong about the Apple Watch Ultra

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Four months after Colin Jenkins’ initial review of the Apple Watch Ultra, a lot of his opinions have changed and many of the issues that first bothered him have turned out to not be so bad. At the same time, there are also features Jenkins thought were great, but have since ended up being more cumbersome than useful for him.

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My biggest criticism about the Apple Watch Ultra, in terms of being a sports watch, was the lack of any useful navigation. Apple’s new compass with waypoints felt (and still feels) terrible to use… However, long after my review I eventually found an app that solved this problem: Footpath. With Footpath, you can create, save, and download offline routes and get turn-by-turn directions. And importantly, unlike others I tried, you can utilize this navigation feature while tracking your workout with other workout apps.

One thing I didn’t touch on too much in my initial review was the Apple Watch Ultra capability to make calls, texts, and play downloaded music/audible without a phone. While I mentioned it, I was so disappointed with the sports functionality that I didn’t really get to enjoy as much of these “smart watch” features.

The more I’ve used the Apple Watch Ultra, the more useful I have found all of this to become. I don’t like to run with my phone if I don’t have too, but I often will in case of an emergency (or in a lot of cases because I want to listen to continue listening to an audio book). Unlike other sports watches, I can do all of this seamlessly with Apple, and this deserves a lot more praise than I originally gave it…

After four months of use, I can definitely say that the Apple Watch Ultra is growing on me. While I still prefer a Garmin for running with navigation, and prefer a WHOOP/Oura for HRV and Recovery tracking, I find the Apple Watch Ultra best for pretty much everything else.

Via: Connect The Watts