Apple’s release candidate for watchOS 11.4 came out today, providing an early look at some new features coming to the Apple Watch in the next few weeks. The OS update has some bug fixes, but more notably, it makes a change to the Apple Watch’s Silent Mode, allowing alarms to be heard while everything else is silenced.
Currently, with Silent Mode activated, the Apple Watch only delivers alerts to users through haptic vibrations. It helps keep notifications private, reduces distractions, and prevents the watch from making noise at inopportune times, like when you’re in a meeting.
The notes for the watchOS 11.4 release candidate describe the new feature as “an option to allow Sleep Wake Up alarm to break through Silent Mode.” Each individual alarm, including the one set in the Apple Watch’s sleep settings for waking up in the morning, will have a new option to “Break Through Silent Mode.” With it on, sounds and haptic vibrations will both play when an alarm goes off, according to 9to5Mac.
The change seems counterintuitive to Silent Mode, but even with the Apple Watch’s haptics set to Prominent, the highest possible intensity, I still frequently find myself sleeping through the vibrations of an alarm I’ve set. I refuse to turn Silent Mode off, which means I just don’t use my Apple Watch for any critical alarms, but that could soon change.
