Apple Watch Ultra 3
Designed to keep users more connected and safer wherever they are with built-in satellite communications, Apple Watch Ultra 3 allows users to text emergency services, message friends and family, and share their location, all while they’re off the grid. The ultimate sports and adventure watch now features the largest screen of any Apple Watch, a display with a 1Hz always-on refresh rate, 5G cellular capabilities, the most accurate GPS in a sports watch, and up to 42 hours of battery life — with up to 72 hours in Low Power Mode.
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With Find My via satellite, users can send their location once every 15 minutes to contacts previously added to Find My. In addition, with Messages via satellite, users can send and receive texts, emoji, and Tapbacks to friends and family — including anyone they’ve been in touch with over the last 30 days — while keeping the messages end-to-end encrypted. Users can also send SMS messages via satellite.
Previously:
Update (2025-09-10): See also: Hacker News.
Update (2025-10-07): Matt Birchler:
We’re well past the era when year-over-year Apple Watch upgrades made any sense at all, and I’d argue that even if you bought the original Apple Watch Ultra three years ago, there’s still no real reason for most people to even entertain an upgrade to the brand new Ultra 3.
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Apple advertises 36 hours of battery life on the Ultra 2, and I would regularly get 40-48 hours on a charge. Apple has bumped their prediction up to 42 hours in the Ultra 3, and I routinely get 55-62 hours, or about 2.5 days.
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The “new” display here is basically the same screen upgrade the Series 10 got last year, so it’s not the most thrilling thing ever, but it is my low-key favorite thing about this model upgrade.
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One criticism I have here is that this 1-second refresh rate is not consistent across the experience. The time on the watch face updates every second, but complications still update once a minute.
