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Watch Faces

How to design your own Apple Watch face with colors and gradients

In the Watch Faces Designer tab, choose a Color or Gradient background, set the time to Top, Center or Hidden and pick its Text Color. Export the result and set it as the background of Apple's Photos face; the watch keeps drawing the live time and complications on top.

3 min read · Updated 2026-09-16

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What can you customize on an Apple Watch face?

Apple lets you change the style, color and complications of its own faces, but it won't let you invent a new one. What you can do is make your own background for the Photos face, and that's the part Watch Faces actually handles: the colors, the gradient or image behind the time, and where the time itself sits.

How to create a custom Apple Watch face, step by step

  1. Open the Designer tab and tap your watch size at the top. Tap the Apple Watch icon next to the sizes to show or hide a bezel mockup, and the colored dot to change its color.
  2. Optional: tap the grid icon at the top left. Select Template shows Featured and All Templates; each template is a starting color or gradient with the time at the top.
  3. Tap Background, then Color or Gradient.
  4. For a solid color, use Background Color or one of the preset swatches.
  5. For a gradient, choose Linear or Radial under Gradient Type, set 2 to 5 colors with Add Color and Remove, and turn the Angle: slider (15° steps). Or tap one of the Presets: Sunset, Ocean, Forest, Fire, Night or Royal.
  6. Tap Time and choose Top, Center or Hidden under Time Position.
  7. Tap Colors and set the Text Color of the time, or choose a preset under Color Scheme.
  8. Tap the three-dot menu, then Save and give it a Design Name. Then Export it.

Gradient Apple Watch face tips

  • Dark colors at the top keep a white time easy to read. Monochrome, Vibrant and Dark set the time to white; Pastel and Light set it to black.
  • A Radial gradient puts a glow in the middle, which frames a Center time nicely. It's a good default choice.
  • The Angle: slider starts at 135°. At 0° the first color sits at the top of the preview and the last at the bottom.
  • Linear gradients can come out reversed in the exported image versus the preview, as can happen on a Sunset template. Check the saved picture in Photos; if it's flipped, add 180° to the angle and export again.
What the Time Position choice does to each kind of export
ExportTop or CenterHidden
Export to Photos / Share (image)A clock is drawn into the picture and stays at the export timeClean background, the watch adds its own time
.watchface fileSets where the Photos face shows its timeWritten as Top
Save as Live PhotoNot usedNot used

Custom Apple Watch faces with complications?

Complications come from the watch, not from the background. Once your picture is set on the Photos face, add or change complications there as usual. A couple of template names here, like Fitness Tracker or Nature Explorer, sound like they might include live readouts. There aren't any: every template is just a color or gradient with a digital time, nothing more.

In the Colors panel, only Text Color changes what you see. Primary Color, Secondary Color, Accent Color and Use Global Tint are stored with the design but not drawn anywhere.

Saving and reopening designs

My Designs in the three-dot menu lists what you saved; tap a card to load it, or long-press for Load Design and Delete. On the free plan the first save is free; after that the Save this watch face sheet offers Watch an ad and save or Get Premium. Deleting a design does not give the free save back. Designs stay on this device only.

Questions and answers

Can I make an analog Apple Watch face?
Not with this app. It makes backgrounds, and the Photos face draws a digital time. If you want an analog dial, choose one of Apple's analog faces on the watch.
Does the time color carry over to the watch?
Only in an image exported with the time at Top or Center, where the clock is part of the picture. A .watchface file carries no time color; the watch uses its own.
Do I have to start from a template?
No. The designer starts on the first template, but you can replace its background and time settings right away. Templates are just quick starting colors.

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