Wear OS 5 has killed Facer, Pujie, WatchMaker and all watch face creativity

For months, I’ve needed to sit down again and complain about the truth that the Pixel Watch 3 has fewer watch face choices than the Pixel Watch 2 and 1, and the identical is true of the Galaxy Watch 7 in comparison with the earlier Watch 6 . , 5 and 4. At present is lastly the day, so let’s check out what is going on on with our most beloved smartwatches and whether or not issues would possibly change quickly.

These restricted face choices have been an issue since each watches landed in late summer time/early fall, and it is all due to Put on OS 5. With this new model of the platform, Google made the Format obligatory Watch Face, which nerfed each customized Watch Face app on the market, like Facer, Pujie, KWCH, WatchMaker and extra. Months later, the problem remains to be there, with no decision in sight for the individuals who love this customization or the builders behind these apps.

In Might 2023, Google introduced Watch Face Format, an XML template for designers that permits them to create new watch faces that behave in addition to native ones. This preset was created to fight the multitude of poorly designed, poorly functioning watch faces that ate up hours of battery life, by no means displayed the correct stats, and required separate companion apps on our telephones to run.

It took some time, however the Watch Face Format (WFF) started to be adopted by many builders, leading to light-weight faces that combine instantly into the Pixel Watch app and Galaxy Wearables, suck up battery, and assist all the identical watch face problems. watch (a number of battery stats, steps and whatnot) like faces despatched on to your smartwatch.

The one drawback with WFF faces, as you would possibly guess, is that they do not enable for a lot creativity. Since builders must observe a template, there may be little room to transcend what Google permits. Animated backgrounds, for one, appear nearly unimaginable. The faces are a bit uniform and monotonous, and you need to dig round for some time to seek out some gems that handle to keep away from Google’s default heavy look. Nevertheless, over time, Google has added extra capabilities to the template and now you can discover some nice examples on the Play Retailer.

For a couple of 12 months, the Watch Face format and non-WFF faces coexisted. I may set up each varieties on the Pixel Watch 2 and have the very best of each worlds: optimized faces with a little bit creativity and non-optimized faces with numerous creativity.

Facer (10+ million installs), Pujie (100,000+ installs), WatchMaker (5+ million installs), and KWCH (10,000+ installs) fall into this latter class. They’re principally massive umbrella apps that allow you to create watch faces from scratch, import templates made by different customers, and/or purchase pre-made watch faces. This is a small sampling of a number of the free faces I used to be in a position to get from Facer in 2022. None of those had been excellent, however I really like how totally different and distinctive all of them had been!

All these purposes use their very own templates and design paradigms. And since their app primarily acts as a third-party face market, none of them are supported by the WFF, which requires every face to be printed individually to the Play Retailer.

How Put on OS 5 spelled the top of Facer, Pujie, KWCH and WatchMaker

With Put on OS 5, Google determined sufficient was sufficient — watch face builders both needed to play alongside and undertake the common template, or they would not be capable to get their creations on individuals’s wrists. Beginning with the Galaxy Watch 7 and Pixel Watch 3, you merely cannot set up a face in your watch except it was constructed utilizing the Watch Face Format. (In case your watch got here with Put on OS 3 or 4 out of the field and you’ve got up to date to Put on OS 5, you continue to retain entry to non-WFF faces, for now.)

Mainly this made it unimaginable to make use of any non-WFF faces I had beforehand bought or any apps like Facer, Pujie, KWCH or WatchMaker. On my Pixel Watch 3, for a number of months, the Play Retailer would even shut down fully if I dared to seek for “facer” or “pujie.” Now it both throws me extra watch face options or loops endlessly saying it did not discover any outcomes.

For those who’re persistent sufficient, you would possibly be capable to bypass this utilizing Put on Installer 2 and this trick shared by u/wowbyowen , however total, it is protected to say that non-WFF faces are going the way in which of the dodo on Put on OS.

Thus far, it is all been gloom and doom, and my preliminary analysis on the topic revealed an analogous pessimism from many customers and builders.

Frank from the KWCH workforce summed it up properly:

There’s nothing I (or another customized website just like the watch maker or face) can do about this, it needs to be mounted by the seller by permitting the customized watch face app to be put in.

However as soon as I dug in, I seen that different builders appeared extra optimistic – emphasis on the previous tense as a result of all these statements are from three months in the past. For instance, the Pujie workforce shared this on Reddit:

Pixel Watch 3, Galaxy Watch 7, and Galaxy Watch 7 Extremely solely assist watch faces made with the Watch Face format. Sadly, this format, because it at present exists, just isn’t appropriate for superior interactive watch faces like those you may make with Pujie, and may solely be put in from the Play Retailer.

Relaxation assured, together with different watch web page builders, I’m speaking to Google to see if there’s a resolution to this drawback. I hope I can replace this info quickly.

I can not discover any official phrase from KWCH, however u/acpjaydixis claims to have contacted them, and so they reiterated that they are additionally working with Google to discover a resolution. That was 4 months in the past.

We’ve been working with Google on this venture for 18 months and will definitely assist WFF as soon as that is attainable for market apps like WatchMaker.

Nevertheless, the clearest and most detailed reply comes from Facer. Given the recognition of the app and its big set up base of 10+ million gadgets, you possibly can think about how massive a loss it’s for the followers of this app in addition to the creators who use it as a platform to earn cash and to promote their designs, and the workforce behind Facer. In a prolonged weblog publish shared on its boards, the Facer workforce defined the problem with Put on OS 5 and Watch Face Format, mentioned it is working with Google to repair the problem, and promised to proceed to manually convert a few of its faces. his hottest within the WFF.

For Pixel Watch 3, Samsung Galaxy Watch7 and Extremely customers, we’re working onerous with Google to convey you Facer too, and till that occurs, we’ll be step by step bringing you a few of our greatest watch faces within the Google Play retailer. Yow will discover these faces right here.

As soon as once more, that was three months in the past. Since then there was radio silence.

I actually respect the Watch Face Format and the standardized necessities it has delivered to the Wild West of watch faces. I additionally need the format to develop into extra adopted, however I do not need it to return on the expense of the customization and complex creativity that apps like Facer and Pujie supply. I can solely hope that Google remains to be attempting to accommodate these builders to make their beloved apps out there on Put on OS 5.