Apple Unveils The Apple Watch Ultra 4
At yesterday’s “Surprise and Shine” event, Apple unveiled the Apple Watch Ultra 4. Although our review of the original Apple Watch Ultra is starting to show a little age, I still believe it holds up if you are considering purchasing one, but just a little unsure. It’s a solid outdoors watch, especially if you're already invested in the Apple eco-system, and each year Apple continues to iterate on it and make incremental improvements. This year is no exception with improved heart rate sensing, powerful new insights including readiness, and longer battery life.
“The new Health Sensing System and S11 chip take Apple Watch Ultra 4 — our most rugged and capable Apple Watch — to the next level, delivering longer battery life, faster charging, and the most accurate heart rate sensing in a wearable. With powerful health and fitness insights including readiness, new intelligent features, and its large, bright display, Apple Watch Ultra 4 is designed to support you wherever you go, from your workouts, to adventures, to everything you tackle in a day.”
For everyday use, Apple Watch Ultra 4 now offers more than two days of battery life, up to 50 hours. In Low Power Mode, it offers up to 84 hours of battery life. Charging is now faster than ever: Just 15 minutes adds up to 18 hours of additional battery life.
Apple Watch Ultra 4 is re-architected to provide continuous high-fidelity health monitoring using the Health Sensing System, featuring new optical and electrical heart sensors. Using this system and the S11 chip, Apple Watch Ultra 4 offers the most accurate heart rate sensing in a wearable. A scientifically rigorous study on a diverse population of over 1,000 participants compared the new heart rate sensing accuracy on Apple Watch against leading wearables, with Apple Watch showing the highest accuracy across devices.
With larger, power-efficient green LEDs on the optical heart sensor, Apple Watch Ultra 4 now measures heart rate every five seconds, all day long. This continuous passive measurement delivers deeper insight into a user’s fitness and physiological state while making Exercise and Move Activity rings even more accurate. Users can view their real-time heart rate at a glance throughout their day on a new heart rate watch face complication.
Apple Watch Ultra 4 comes in sleek and durable natural and black titanium options. It is available to pre-order today, with availability beginning Friday, September 18th, 2026.
