Google asked for patience from those eager to model new watch faces on the Android Wear platform, as unofficial designs could negatively affect parts of the software's context streams.
Now the search engine company has made good on its promise to enhance the Wear application programming interface to support new watch faces.
As developers gained more familiarity with Wear, independent teams and large companies alike released software that brought new watch faces to the platform and enabled wearers to customize designs. Now Google has released an official update that better supports custom watch faces and decreases the potential performance impact.
"Some [watches] are traditional, others are sporty. And that's exactly the point," says David Singleton, director of engineering for Android Wear. "With different shapes and styles, it's really easy to make your watch your own. So by all means -- wear what you want."
The updated Wear API brings an expanded set of developer tools, as well as a hefty selection of finished face designs. Google is said to have worked out new face designs by partnering with companies such as Porsche, Hugh Turvey and Surfline.
Along with new designs and tools, Google is expanding the Wear platform to make watch faces more flexible. Now faces can be set into different modes to account for sunlight or low light.
The new watch faces are available in the Google Play Store and can be downloaded just like any other app. The Wear app for smartphones has also been updated to make navigation and downloading easier.
While Google has worked to patch problems with the Wear platform, the search engine company had asked wearers to temper enthusiasm to avoid degrading their experience with the software. It required a "fair bit of tweaking" to make custom watch faces before the latest update, according to July comments made by Wayne Piekarski, senior developer advocate of Android and Wearables at Google
"[Custom watch faces] have some special considerations due to interactions with the stream and always-on ambient mode -- including using a shorter peek card, moving the status indicators for battery and mute, and rendering the faces differently in ambient mode," stated Piekarski.
