New Wear OS 7 widget system
Google announced a slew of third-party partners for Wear OS 7 | Image by Google
Google is rebranding Wear OS Tiles to Wear Widgets in the next version of its smartwatch OS. During the annual I/O 2026 conference, the company showed the new 2×1 and 2×2 widget layouts and lifted the curtain before some third-party partners, including Spotify, WhatsApp, Peloton, and Todoist.
The new Wear Widgets will have a better UI and save battery life
The new UI in action | Image by Google
Google also announced a new remote UI framework for the aforementioned Widgets, called Remote Compose. According to the company, this new system will deliver richer animations and interactions and also improve the battery life of Wear OS smartwatches.
Remote Compose can operate somewhat independently and handle simple interactions and animations without the need to power up the whole app in the background. This could have a big impact on battery life, especially if you’re a heavy widget user anyway.
The new Wear Widgets are backward compatible
For all Wear OS 4 devices and below, developers will have the convenience of full backward compatibility for the Wear Widgets APIs. This means simple updates will get most Wear OS devices up to date with the new Widgets system and let them reap all the benefits from the improved battery life and smoother animations.
Wear Widgets will work on Samsung Galaxy watches
Google also emphasized the fact that these new widgets will work inside the Multi-Info Tiles on Samsung Galaxy watches, giving Samsung users more options for customization and again letting them take advantage of the new Remote Compose system.
The Widgets are also coming to Android Auto later this year, so Android users will have a consistent UI experience across different hardware. You can deep dive and see all the new Wear OS 7 features in this article.
