Apple Watch Ultra 4 release date, price, specs, and must-know features
Apple Watch Ultra 4. | Image by Apple
What’s changing vs Apple Watch Ultra 3:
Release timeline:
- New Health Sensing System with the most accurate heart rate sensing in a wearable
- New readiness score based on activity, training load, vitals, and sleep
- Audio Intelligence features: Sound Recognition, Live Rewind, Siri Recap, and Shazam
- S11 chip
- Up to 50 hours everyday battery life, up to 84 hours in Low Power Mode
- Extended Workout mode: up to 25 hours with full GPS and heart rate
- Faster charging: 15 minutes adds up to 18 hours of battery life
- Natural and black titanium finishes
- Siri AI via watchOS 27
- September 9, 2026 – alongside the iPhone 18 Pro, iPhone 18 Pro Max, and iPhone Duo. Available September 18.
- Apple has held the Ultra line at $799 for three consecutive generations, and the Apple Watch Ultra 4 also starts at $799.
Apple Watch Ultra 4 release date
Apple announced the Apple Watch Ultra 4 on Wednesday, September 9, 2026, at Apple Park in Cupertino, California.
| Device family | Announcement | Market release |
|---|---|---|
| Apple Watch Ultra | September 7, 2022 | September 23, 2022 |
| Apple Watch Ultra 2 | September 12, 2023 | September 22, 2023 |
| Apple Watch Ultra 3 | September 9, 2025 | September 19, 2025 |
| Apple Watch Ultra 4 | September 9, 2026 | September 18, 2026 |
Pre-orders are open now, with availability beginning Friday, September 18. The Ultra 4 is available through Apple directly and all major carriers and retailers, including AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile.
Apple Watch Ultra 4 price and deals
Apple Watch Ultra 4 starts at $799 – the same price as the previous three generations.
| Apple Watch model | 49mm GPS + Cellular |
|---|---|
| Apple Watch Ultra | $799 |
| Apple Watch Ultra 2 | $799 |
| Apple Watch Ultra 3 | $799 |
| Apple Watch Ultra 4 | $799 |
Apple Watch Ultra 4 deals to expect
- Apple: Apple typically offers trade-in credit between $30 and $295 toward a new Apple Watch purchase, with Apple Card holders earning 3% Daily Cash back on Apple purchases.
- AT&T: AT&T has consistently run a buy-two-save-$300 promotion tied to a new line and 36-month installment plan for Ultra launches – something similar is expected this cycle.
- Verizon: Verizon typically brings trade-in discounts of up to $300 off with an eligible device, with occasional buy-one-get-one offers when adding a line.
- T-Mobile: T-Mobile generally takes $300 off a second watch when buying two, with around $200 off a single device on a qualifying line activation.
Apple Watch Ultra 4 design
Apple Watch Ultra 4. | Image by Apple
The Ultra 4 carries the same overall form as its predecessors – titanium case, flat sapphire crystal glass, Digital Crown on the right, Action Button on the left. It is available in natural and black titanium.
A new band lineup accompanies the hardware. Trail Loop comes in dark umber, sand, and burgundy. Alpine Loop comes in desert, dark olive, and burgundy. Ocean Bands are now made from translucent silicone in three colors: translucent gray, translucent kelp, and translucent black.
Apple Watch Ultra 4 display
The Ultra 4 carries over the Always-On Retina display from the Ultra 3, built on LTPO 3 technology with a 1Hz floor when inactive and 3,000 nits of peak brightness, protected by sapphire crystal glass.
A new heart rate watch face complication displays your current heart rate at a glance throughout the day. A new Steps complication tracks your step count in real time from the watch face.
Apple Watch Ultra 4 battery
Battery life has increased significantly from the Ultra 3's 42 hours standard and 72 hours Low Power Mode figures:
- Everyday use: up to 50 hours
- Low Power Mode: up to 84 hours
- Extended Workout mode (full GPS + heart rate): up to 25 hours – 25% more than the previous model
- Max Extended Workout mode (outdoor runs, walks, hikes with GPS readings every second): up to 45 hours
Apple Watch Ultra 4 features and software
Health Sensing System
The Ultra 4 gets the same Health Sensing System as the Series 12 – redesigned optical and electrical heart sensors, heart rate measured every five seconds throughout the day, and HRV tracked up to 24 times more often than before.For athletes, the more frequent HRV data is particularly useful: Recovery HRV gives a daily read on stress and recovery, while Overall HRV tracks broader cardiovascular trends over time. Higher variability points to better recovery; lower variability signals stress.
Readiness
Readiness is the feature most relevant to anyone with a structured training schedule. It pulls from recent activity, training load, vitals, and sleep to produce a single 0-10 score with one of four recommendations: Recover, Pace Yourself, Ready, or Go For It.
The score updates throughout the day – a hard workout mid-morning will shift it – and tapping in shows which factors are driving the number. The algorithm was developed using data from the Apple Heart and Movement Study alongside exercise scientists and physicians at Apple.
Audio Intelligence
- Sound Recognition: Alerts users who are deaf or hard of hearing to important sounds – sirens, alarms, doorbells, a baby crying – even without iPhone nearby. Processed on-device.
- Live Rewind: A double press of the Digital Crown pulls up the last 15 seconds of a nearby conversation as a text snippet. Useful for catching something missed in a noisy environment. Plays an audible chime and shows an on-screen indicator when active.
- Siri Recap: When turned on, generates a brief title and key points from a conversation after it ends, stored in the Siri app. Not a transcript – a high-level summary, designed to exclude sensitive information. Arrives in beta later this year.
- Shazam: Detects music playing nearby and surfaces the song and artist in the Smart Stack.
Redesigned Health app
A redesigned Health app for iPhone is coming later this year. It adds a Longevity tab with Health Age – showing how your metrics compare to your actual age – and an Insights tab that surfaces timely health data throughout the day.
WatchOS 27
New grid layout for the Apple Watch. | Image by Apple
watchOS 27 also brings a Dynamic App Grid that automatically pushes your most frequently used apps to the top of the app view. The Siri AI app anchors the center of that layout, keeping recent conversations accessible without hunting through menus.
Apple Intelligence is being threaded through most first-party watchOS 27 apps. The Health app is also gaining perimenopause and menopause tracking as part of Apple's continued push on women's health features.
The established Ultra feature set is expected to carry over intact: advanced workout tracking, Emergency SOS and satellite connectivity, dive and outdoor navigation tools, sleep tracking, ECG, blood oxygen monitoring, wrist temperature sensing, and hypertension notifications – with the last potentially expanding in scope.
Apple Watch Ultra 4 hardware and specs
The Ultra 4 runs on Apple's S11 chip – the same chip as the Series 12. It powers the Health Sensing System, the higher-frequency heart rate and HRV measurements, the Audio Intelligence features.
Apple Watch Ultra 4's specs:
- CPU: S11
- Battery: up to 50 hours everyday, up to 84 hours Low Power Mode, up to 45 hours Max Extended Workout
- Size: 49mm
- Materials: Titanium
- Connectivity: GPS + Cellular, satellite SOS
- Storage: 64GB
- Colors: Natural Titanium, Black Titanium
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