By Jason Snell

September 15, 2020 9:21 AM PT

Apple Sept. 15 event – Live Updates

Note: This story has not been updated since 2020.

Apple’s special event live stream began at 10am Pacific and lasted about an hour! We posted some live thoughts at the @sixcolorsevent Twitter account, and that text is also appended below.

Shortly after the event concludes, you can hear Dan discuss it live with Lex Friedman and John Moltz on The Rebound and at approximately 1:30 Pacific I’ll be discussing it live with Myke Hurley on Upgrade.

The best part of these pre-recorded events is that they always start on time. Rolling on the floor laughing —DM

Hey, it’s Tim! There are really exciting announcements this morning, apparently. Tim talks about how inspiring it is that people have adapted (and of course used Apple products).

There it is, up front, Apple Watch and iPad updates coming today.

Tim really closing his Move ring walking around Apple Park, apparently. —DM

Tim’s telling us stories about people whose lives the Apple Watch has saved.

Mount Sinai is using Apple Watch to study mental health effects of COVID-19 frontline workers. Singapore offer incentives for Apple Watch to stay healthy and active.

Jeff Williams, all the way across campus in the Steve Jobs theater (hi Craig!) to talk about Apple Watch and watchOS 7 (automatic hand wash detection, sleep tracking, and full range of VO2 max).

Coming later this year, you can get a notification if VO2Max drops to lower level.

Here’s the new Apple Watch Series 6. Looks like gold is back, updated sensor on the bottom, new watchface that looks like it was inspired by Knvies Out.

Most colorful lineup ever. Blue aluminum case, gold stainless steel, new gray-black stainless steel “Graphite” and new Apple Watch Product(RED). New health sensor that enables a new capability: looks like blood oxygen monitoring.

Measure blood oxygen from wrist. New sensor shines red and infrared light and measures amount of light reflected back. Algorithms calculate amount of oxygen present. New blood oxygen app lets you measure in just 15 seconds. Captures periodic background readings in Health.

Sumbul Ahmad Desai, VP of Health, talks about the importance of blood oxygen, key to breathing and circulation. Blood oxygen saturation is good measure of overall respiratory and cardiac health. Blood Oxygen app on Series 6 lets you measure for fitness and wellness.

Three new health research studies based on longitudinal blood oxygen measurements: better manage and control asthma; metrics including blood oxygen affect heart failure; COVID-19 interplay with influenza. Each partnered with universities and healthcare systems.

The S6 SIP powers the Series 6. Dual core processor based on A14 bionic. 20% faster than previous gen. Other new features for when you’re out and about. Better always-on display. Easier to read watch on sunny days without waking your watch. 2.5x brighter. Always-on altimeter.

Next up, watch faces! New designs introduced by Alan Dye. GMT face, multiple timezones at once. Countup face lets you start tracking elapsed time from any point. Chronograph Pro face with multiple timescales and tachymeter. Typograph face, numerals in 3 custom types/4 scripts.

Unique piece of art with a different image every time. Memoji face. Moves and reacts to touch. Stripes face, includes pride, or let you support favorite team or color code to your outfit.

Developers can build more specified watch faces in watchOS 7. (Mainly the ability to have multiple complications, I believe).

Now we’re talking watchbands. Something completely different. The Solo Loop. No clasp or buckle. Just one piece from liquid silicone. Stretchable so you can slip it on and off. Durable and swimproof. Available in range of sizes. Comes in seven colors. Braided Solo Loop from yarn!

New take on the new Leather Band. And updates for Nike Sport Band/Loop, and a new Nike watch face. New band for Hermes in single and double loop styles.

Making Apple Watch more available. Deirdre Caldbeck talking about making it more accessible for families. Family Setup for Apple Watch. Parents can use their iPhone to pair watches for kids, or for other people with no iPhone, but have own number and account.

You can specify which contacts kids can talk with. Automatic location notifications. Kids can track movements and use other Activity/Workout in a specified way. Create Memoji with just watch. School Time mode has Do Not Disturb, restricted communication, and special look.

Family Setup requires a cellular watch, available with certain providers in certain countries.

New model combines elements of Series 6 with most essential features at a more affordable price: Apple Watch SE. Like Series 6, uses largest and most advanced watch display. Uses the S5 chip, 2x performance than Series 3. Offers cellular models.

Same accelerometer, gyroscope, compass, and altimeter as Series 6. Supports fall detection. Starts at $279, financing via Apple Card at $12/mo over 24 months.

Apple Watch Series 6 isn’t a huge update, but seems to advance the ball in a bunch of small areas, including health, CPU, and display. Throwing in new color options also will help boost sales, smart for a minor update.-J.S.

Lisa Jackson here to talk about environmental impact of Apple. Everything runs on 100% renewable energy. Cut comprehensive carbon footprint. Going further by promising to be 100% carbon neutral end-to-end by 2030, including supply chain and products.

For Apple Watch, this means 100% recycled aluminum in watches. Series 6 is using recycled rare earth elements and tungsten in Taptic Engine. Apple Watch is free of BFR, PVX, Beryllium, Mercury, and display glass is without arsenic.

USB power adapters consume resources. This year, removing power adapter from Apple Watch. (Well, probably gone from the iPhone too when it comes.) Helps eliminate carbon equivalent of 50,000 cars from roads per year.

(Looking like about 30 minutes on Apple Watch, 30 minutes on iPad.)

Both Apple Watches up for orders today, and available starting Friday. On to a video.

The Apple Watch not including a USB adapter in the box is a sign of things to come, in terms of the iPhone. The casual way it was mentioned in the environmental section was a good way to downplay it. (People will still be mad.) -J.S.

Jeff is back to talk about something to inspire you more about fitness with Apple Watch. Here’s Jay Blahnik. New workouts, delivered by trainers. First fitness service built around Apple Watch: Fitness+.

New service for Apple Watch. Entire experience is powered by Apple Watch. Fitness+ you can choose the workout you want to do on iPhone, iPad, and Apple TV. When you start video, starts the correct workout in your Workout app on your watch, and sends metric to the screen.

All the data from your sensors is shown on Summary Screen after you finish your workout. Fitness+ is launching with most popular workout types: Yoga, Cycling, Dance, Treadmill Walk and Treadmill Run, Strength, Core, HIIT, Rowing, Mindful Cooldowns.

Each week, new workouts across range of times and instructors. Integrates music from Apple Music; if you’re a subscriber you can save the playlists. Brand new to Fitness or been a while, there’s an absolute beginner program. All workouts are in the Fitness app on the iPhone.

And there’s a new Fitness app on iPad and Apple TV. Personalized recommendations with intelligence suggestions and encourage you to discover new workouts and trainers. Designed with privacy in mind. On-device intelligence. $9.99/mo or $79.99/year. Available by end of year.

New Apple Watch purchasers get 3 months free.

New exciting Services news from Lori Malm. Today, introducing Apple One, all the services you want in one simple plan: iCloud, Apple Music, Apple TV+, Apple Arcade, also includes Apple News+, and Fitness+. Find the One Plan that’s right for you.

Back to Tim. We’re moving to iPad. Tim loves his iPad. (We know, Tim!) Emphasizes the increased importance of iPads today. It’s the 10 year anniversary of the iPad! It’s a big year for iPad. Already updated the iPad Pro. Today, we’re updating the rest of the full-size iPad lineup

Starting with most popular iPad. Ted Merendino here to talk about 7th-generation iPad. Cranking up performance in current design: 8th-generation. Uses an A12 Bionic. 40% faster CPU and 2x faster graphics than last year’s chip. Comparing speeds to competition.

8th-generation iPad gets the Neural Engine. iPad 8th-gen works with full-size smart keyboard and Logitech cases. Works with Apple Pencil. (So, it’s basically the 7th-gen but with the A12 Bionic in it.)

An iPadOS 14 demo showing the Pencil features in action, like handwritten text, shape recognition, smart selection, Scribble, and so on.

(Hey the 8th-gen iPad still comes with a USB power adapter). Starts at $329, or $299 for education customers. Orders start today, available on Friday.

Tim’s back! We’re going to talk about iPad Air. All new completely redesigned iPad Air, OOH COLORS.

Apple embracing color again makes me happy. -J.S.

The new iPad Air. Here’s Laura Legros. iPad Pro-inspired design. Five colors, including rose gold, green, and sky blue. Liquid Retina display, 10.9-inch of 2360×1640, 3.8M pixels. Full lamination, p3 wide color, True Tone, antireflective coating. New home for Touch ID.

Touch ID integrated into the top button. Display can extend on all sides. Same performance, ease of use, and security. Sapphire crystal lens, custom sensor, and a faster secure enclave.

Debuting a new chip in the Air. Here’s Tim Millet. It’s the A14 Bionic. First in the industry to use breakthrough 5nm process technology. Dimensions of these transistors are measured in atoms. 11.8b transistors in A14. Increase of nearly 40% over 7nm chip.

A14 bionic is a 6-core CPU. 4-high efficiency cores, 2-high performance. 40% increase over last Air. New GPU architecture, for max performance with best power efficiency. 30% faster graphics. 2x faster graphics.

16-core Neural Engine. 11 trillion operations per second. 2x machine learning performance. Second-gen machine learning algorithms on the iPad for the first time. 10x faster than previous Air. Plus latest ISP for higher quality video and photos.

Developer demos for new iPad Air: Algoriddim djay; War Robot game; Pixelmator (zoom and enhance joke, nice).

iPad Air gets USB-C. Improves data transfer speeds up to 5GB/s. 10x faster than previous Air. Cameras, drives, and external monitors. Includes a 7MP front FaceTime HD video, 12MP camera from iPad Pro on the back. New speakers, Apple Pencil 2, Magic Keyboard support.

New iPad Air picks up a lot of iPad Pro features. Apple hasn’t shied away from rolling pro features down to lower-end iPads. The question is, what’s next on the iPad Pro? -j.s.

iPad Air starts at $599, available beginning next month. (No storage tiers mentioned.)

Baaaaack to Tim. (Hi Craig! Guess you’re not here today.) Major OS updates coming tomorrow: iOS 14, iPadOS 14, watchOS 7, tvOS 14.

And that’s it! Tim says take care.

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