Must have aviation apps for Apple Watch

AggieMike88

AggieMike88

Touchdown! Greaser!
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The original "I don't know it all" of aviation.
It has been a while since we have discussed our favorite aviation apps for Apple Watch. I’m curious if there are any of your favorites that I am not aware of and should consider...

My list to get things started:
  • AeroWeather Pro (like it’s complication)
  • ZuluTime (also used as a complication)
  • Sporty’s E6-B
 
You can try WatchMETAR for a bit more intelligent complications (they will prioritize important things to fit the space).

Disclaimer: I’m the developer.
 
Altimeter for Aviators. Wouldn’t use it as a flight instrument, but interesting to mess around with.
 
Don't have an Apple watch, so I'm not sure how it would be used. When I think of what an Apple Watch could tell you that nothing else could, what about O2 levels? Some warning about hypoxia?
 
Have a METAR/TAF app for my Garmin Vivoactive 4S. Don’t know if it’s available for Apple. It does also O2 sat, but not sure I’d trust it over a finger pulse ox for flight. Altimeter not uncommonly puts me below the ground at KCDK.
Love the Vivoactive BTW...less expensive than Apple and actually attractive. I really dislike the look of square watches.BB7CC75E-DFA5-4928-AF51-AF13D0874926.jpeg
 
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I just bought a Galaxy watch 3 it does O2 as well as EKG supposed to do BP at some point. I would think O2 and other health functions would be fairly useless in flight as you need to be fairly still to get them to read well.

I basically have used the stop watch since I don't have a hobbs, altimeter just for fun, and world clock for GMT.
 
EugeneR said:
You can try WatchMETAR for a bit more intelligent complications (they will prioritize important things to fit the space).

Disclaimer: I’m the developer.
Click to expand...
Oooh! I have WatchMETAR as my main display complication on my watch. It shows the weather at my local airport at a glance in just the right format. THANK YOU!!
 
I just downloaded WatchMETAR. It shows up in my App list, but doesn’t show up on the list of things I can add as a complication. Any ideas?

Never mind. Just had to restart the watch and phone.
 
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Great. Now I have to get an Apple Watch for this flying thing. Not that I’d be using this as an excuse to get one anyway.
 
EugeneR said:
You can try WatchMETAR for a bit more intelligent complications (they will prioritize important things to fit the space).

Disclaimer: I’m the developer.
Click to expand...

Great little app - thanks!

Hate to bug you, but even with KTYS set as a favorite, or with the app set to “Nearest”, the display says “No station set - Configure on phone Or tap to reload”. Tapping does bring up KTYS. Is that normal or am I missing a step in setup.
 
EugeneR said:
You can try WatchMETAR

Disclaimer: I’m the developer.
Click to expand...
Are you still actively working on the project? The Apple App store doesn’t show any updates since version 2.5.1 over a year ago...
 
Aeroweather question. The functions on my watch don't work like they used to for setting complications. Now some days my complication remains updated and others it's expired by several hours. What am I missing? How do I get it to remain current?
 
FastEddieB said:
Great little app - thanks!

Hate to bug you, but even with KTYS set as a favorite, or with the app set to “Nearest”, the display says “No station set - Configure on phone Or tap to reload”. Tapping does bring up KTYS. Is that normal or am I missing a step in setup.
Click to expand...

Usually tapping forces complication update even when refresh quota is exceeded (Apple is very strict with their quotas). Have you tried to restart the watch?
 
AggieMike88 said:
Are you still actively working on the project? The Apple App store doesn’t show any updates since version 2.5.1 over a year ago...
Click to expand...

Not at this moment. All features that I initially planned to implement are there as it was supposed to be just a simple and fast METAR/TAF app. I may add a few minor features that were requested by many users such as ability to display time in UTC and temperatures in Fahrenheit (for those who prefer it).

The only other feature I wanted to add at this point was winds aloft.

However, between my day job, family and flying I don’t have time for any significant feature development now, but I do maintain the backend and fix bugs when found. I use it every day myself.
 
EugeneR said:
Not at this moment. All features that I initially planned to implement are there as it was supposed to be just a simple and fast METAR/TAF app. I may add a few minor features that were requested by many users such as ability to display time in UTC and temperatures in Fahrenheit (for those who prefer it).

The only other feature I wanted to add at this point was winds aloft.

However, between my day job, family and flying I don’t have time for any significant feature development now, but I do maintain the backend and fix bugs when found. I use it every day myself.
Click to expand...
Thanks for information....

a suggestion? You might respond to some of the App Store reviews to indicate you’re still alive and supporting the app. Otherwise, it looks like you have abandoned the project.

PS. After using it for a few days, I like the complication design.
 
Stewartb said:
Aeroweather question. The functions on my watch don't work like they used to for setting complications. Now some days my complication remains updated and others it's expired by several hours. What am I missing? How do I get it to remain current?
Click to expand...

Can’t tell anything about AeroWeather, but sometimes that happens with WatchMetar too, so I suspect the reasons are the same.

Apple imposes quotas on all background refresh activities by allocating “budget” that is shared between all 3rd party complications on the screen. There is no way to tell programmatically how much of that budget is left, and if budget is exceeded, your next background refresh is just simply ignored by the system, and since there is no way to schedule a few refreshes beforehand, the complication stops updating.

Apple promises 4 updates per hour, but in my experience it is not guaranteed.

In WatchMetar, if your quota is over, you can force refresh (and resume updates) by tapping the complication.
 
AggieMike88 said:
Thanks for information....

a suggestion? You might respond to some of the App Store reviews to indicate you’re still alive and supporting the app. Otherwise, it looks like you have abandoned the project.

PS. After using it for a few days, I like the complication design.
Click to expand...

I usually respond to support requests via the support link, but rarely check AppStore reviews. I might have a look there.
 
EugeneR said:
I usually respond to support requests via the support link, but rarely check AppStore reviews. I might have a look there.
Click to expand...

Now I remember why I don’t like going to App Store page. It’s depressing. People give it one star without even bothering to reach out to support. Or that one person that gave one star because it’s US only. Well, I warn about that in the description and even don’t allow to install the app from non-US accounts. Still some people complain.

I mean this is a free app that I developed for my personal use and thought it would be nice to share with other aviators. It costs me time (not much at this moment) and money to keep the backend running. But it doesn’t bother me, I’ll still keep maintaining it. I try to respond to support requests right away, when I see them, but sometimes I get very busy and may miss some or respond later.

It’s not my my full time job or business. I just share my stuff for free. But people still come and complain.

/rant off.
 
EugeneR said:
Usually tapping forces complication update even when refresh quota is exceeded (Apple is very strict with their quotas). Have you tried to restart the watch?
Click to expand...

Thanks. Yep, restarted the watch and phone, and did software updates to both last night.

Don’t worry - a single tap to bring up METARS is really quite the trivial problem.
 
FastEddieB said:
Thanks. Yep, restarted the watch and phone, and did software updates to both last night.

Don’t worry - a single tap to bring up METARS is really quite the trivial problem.
Click to expand...

If you want, PM me with your email and we can troubleshoot together. Haven’t seen this issue yet. Usually when it happens a tap or restart resolves it, so something is not right.

Another option is to change something in WatchMetar settings on the phone (like add a favorite) and let it sync the configuration to the watch - it may help if the config got corrupted for some reason.
 
I don't think there is a single aviation app for the Apple Watch that is particularly compelling.

WDD said:
Don't have an Apple watch, so I'm not sure how it would be used. When I think of what an Apple Watch could tell you that nothing else could, what about O2 levels? Some warning about hypoxia?
Click to expand...

The Series 6 does have a pulse oximeter. That's a large part of why I upgraded even though I already had a 5. But, there's now way to tell it "Hey, I'm going flying now, can you please monitor it every few minutes instead of every few hours?" It's useful to check manually, but it's not going to save your bacon with a warning or anything.
 
flyingcheesehead said:
I don't think there is a single aviation app for the Apple Watch that is particularly compelling.



The Series 6 does have a pulse oximeter. That's a large part of why I upgraded even though I already had a 5. But, there's now way to tell it "Hey, I'm going flying now, can you please monitor it every few minutes instead of every few hours?" It's useful to check manually, but it's not going to save your bacon with a warning or anything.
Click to expand...
You can get your o2 while flying? Mine always errors out due to movement.
 
Salty said:
You can get your o2 while flying? Mine always errors out due to movement.
Click to expand...

I have, yes. I've also had the error you mention. Try to keep your watch from touching the airframe, and try to avoid bouncing around in turbulence. Sometimes easier said than done!
 
Thanks to Eugene for solving my problem - just a setting on the iPhone app I had missed.

51023473848_39e3da00e0.jpg
 
WDD said:
what an Apple Watch could tell you that nothing else could, what about O2 levels? Some warning about hypoxia?
Click to expand...

Too late now, but I guess it is telling you that you may have been hypoxic when you bought it.:D

Sorry apple folks, too good to pass up.
 
Looks like I have a new watch app. WatchMETAR
 
I can’t get the smaller complications to show up. I only see the big one.
 
Salty said:
I can’t get the smaller complications to show up. I only see the big one.
Click to expand...

It supports the following complication types:

1. Big one in Modular and Infograph Modular faces
2. Big bottom one in Utility and some others
3. Big top one in Infograph
4. Corner ones in many faces

Basically everything that can display a line or more of text.

It doesn’t support small circular ones as they don’t have enough space to display anything useful (other than flight rules). New WatchOS brought some features that could make them useful, so I may reconsider ;)
 
Ok we now know about the weather apps and associated troubleshooting above. Any other apps out there you find useful. Does Apple Watch compete with the Garmin D2Air X10
 
LogTen logbook app has a watch app which will record and send your flight into your logbook
 
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