Live Activities Taking Over Your Apple Watch? Here's the Fix
Source: MacRumors
Issue with Live Activities
In watchOS 26, the Smart Stack on your Apple Watch is clever: you can pull up a collection of widgets with a scroll of the Digital Crown, and it shows relevant information throughout your day. However, its eagerness to help can sometimes be overwhelming, especially when Live Activities automatically take over the display.
You might raise your wrist expecting to see your customized watch face, only to be greeted by media playback controls (if someone’s watching your Apple TV) or a timer you set earlier that’s still running. While Live Activities can be useful, having them automatically replace your watch face isn’t always ideal.
How to Disable Auto‑Launch
- Open Settings on your Apple Watch.
- Tap Smart Stack.
- Select Live Activities.
- Toggle off the switch next to Auto‑Launch Live Activities.
After disabling auto‑launch, Live Activities remain available in your Smart Stack, but you’ll need to scroll manually to see them instead of them popping up automatically.
Additional Granular Controls
- From the same settings screen, you can choose which Apple apps display Live Activities.
- Using the Watch app on your iPhone, you can manage Live Activities settings for third‑party apps, allowing you to keep useful notifications while preventing less important ones from interrupting your watch face.
- For Media apps, you can turn off Live Activities completely, or under Auto‑Launch select Off or Smart Stack for a more focused watch face experience.
Source
This article first appeared on MacRumors.com.