The Apple Watch features a touchscreen display that requires you to actually touch the watch to interact with it. However, to expand on its accessibility features that will make the Apple Watch more accessible to people with disabilities, Apple announced a new feature for the smartwatch called AssistiveTouch.
According to Apple, “Using built-in motion sensors like the gyroscope and accelerometer, along with the optical heart rate sensor and on-device machine learning, Apple Watch can detect subtle differences in muscle movement and tendon activity, which lets users navigate a cursor on the display through a series of hand gestures, like a pinch or a clench.”
Basically through various gestures made by clenching your fist or pinching your fingers together, you’ll be able to control the Apple Watch. This is obviously ideal for people who have disabilities, but even if you don’t, some of these gestures can be useful, especially if your hands are full doing something else, or if your hands are dirty and you don’t want to dirty your watch screen. You can see some of the examples in the video above.
The feature isn’t live yet and will come in the form of a software update later on, so do keep an eye out for it if this sounds like something you might be interested in.