New GMT face

I think the way Apple's GMT watch face works is confusing (and different to most GMT watches). Many of the responses on this thread are not quite right and people are unnecessarily confused by the implementation.

Below I will refer to the alternate time as GMT (it could be any alternate time choosable).

The way most GMT watches works (and how I think the Apple GMT Face should work) is like this:

• Separate bezel numbered up to 24
• The GMT bezel doesn't have to move (and usually doesn't)
• The GMT hand indicates the 24 hour time
• If it is12 noon GMT the GMT hand would point straight down (to regular the regular 6 is)

Currently the Apple GMT Watch Face GMT bezel rotates (apparently to indicate offset from your current time zone) and the GMT hand only goes between 1 and 12 with the colour of the GMT bezel used as a guide as to whether it would be night or day (am/pm).

Apple could rectify the issues by changing to the regular method I have described or at least providing the option to have a fixed or offset GMT bezel in the face options.

An important user group of watch faces like this are pilots who use UTC for precise, reliable and consistent time sharing. For pilot's the world over the time is the same (UTC time) and it is stated in 24hr format. Apple, please label the GMT bezel up to 24 or have the number in the circle (at the end of the GMT hand) going from 00 up to 23. eg. 15 minutes after midnight UTC is zero zero one five (WATCH should show 00) and 1045pmUTC is 2245 (should show 22). Hopefully you get the idea.

Examples:

The red hand points to the current hour in the time zone you’ve selected. For example, as I write this the local time on my watch (hour and minute hand) are reading 5:04 p.m. I’ve selected UTC (by tapping the watch face and using the crown to select “UTC”), so the red hand is pointing to 9 p.m. on the outer bezel, indicating 9:04 p.m. (or 21:04, in 24-hour time) in that time zone.

My watch was also missing UTC as a choice in the GMT face timezone list, but after I went into World Clock on my paired iPhone and added the UTC zone to my list of selected zones there, UTC suddenly appeared on the list on the watch.

If you tap on the watch face, you turn the crown in order to turn the bezel so that the "GMT" hand is pointing to the correct time. Either there is a limitation to the tool kit or whoever designed the watch face has never owned an analogue GMT watch but the 24-hour hand's position on the Apple GMT watch face reflects local time, not UTC. It will point straight up at midnight local time, not 0:00 UTC. It's a "feature" of the watch face.

Yes what wagonpilot said. The confusion lies in the fact that this does not act like a true gmt watch. The red hand should point to the 24hr indicator for the second time zone. With 12 being midnight and 6 being noon. The outer bezel should only rotate for a third time zone.

I can’t see a GMT or UTC option in the location list. I could use London but I then have to allow for daylight saving time. Ponta Delgada is the only location showing true GMT.

I wouldn't have thought to turn the crown to turn the bezel so the "GMT" hand points at the correct time. It's kind of a cheap shortcut on the watch face design to move the bezel rather than the hand. On mechanical GMT watches, the 24-hour hand will generally be pointing straight up at midnight UTC and, if the bezel turns, that's used for keeping track in yet another timezone.

Happy to be of assistance and I agree with your assessment. Being poor, my GMT watch is a Glycene but I, too, am used to being able to read Zulu by glancing at the dial. The Apple watch face requires that you look closely (once you've adjusted the bezel).

I’m no expert — and I’m not sure I understand the question — but the outer bezel should line up with an hour in most cases, not a half-hour.

If your local time on the inner dial is PST and you have the outer bezel time zone set to EST, the outer bezel’s “3” should line up with midnight on the inner dial (indicating that the outer bezel is set to a time zone three hours ahead of local time).

How to Read a GMT Watch:

https://youtu.be/n54Oab-tlls

Something is missing. Ideally, we should be able to set the red hand as a 2nd time zone AND then be able to rotate the bezel to effectively see a 3rd time zone. Like a Rolex GMT (which it aesthetically is attempting to duplicate).

Summary:

1. Primary hour and minute hand. Sourced from phone time. [typically set to local time]. This works. Default.
2. My wish: red-hand would be a setting via the face configuration to pick a different hour/offset. [typically set to GMT time]. Missing feature.
3. Then be able to use the current crown functionality to rotate the bezel to align the hour with the red-hand to show a 3rd time zone. [used to calculate a 3rd time zone; in an auto-time-set situation, you would typically show your destination or upon arrival, show your home time zone]. This works.

Here is another obvious error on the GMT face in my opinion: what should be 60 minute/second hash marks on the 12 hour inner dial are not, there are 120 of them, so they are pointless with respect to the minute and sweep seconds hands on the 12 hour dial which is where they appear. They are purposeless marks making 10 marks within every 5 minutes/5 seconds. So the minute and sweep seconds hands never line up with a specific minute/second, unless pointing to one of the 12 numerals. I can only guess the designer was trying to make them look aligned with the 24 hour marks on the outer GMT bezel, but for what purpose, they are on the 12 hour dial for the minutes and seconds hands! A complete error it seems, so now if the minute hand is ever pointing between two of the numerals, say 13 min after the hour, all you can visually see is that it looks to be about 12-14 ish minutes after, because none of the tiny 120 hash marks equates to one of the 60 minutes, until it lines up with the 3 numeral and then you can see it is exactly 15 after for a minute, lol. So annoying. Did no one really notice this in the design process? It seems like such an obvious mistake I wonder if it was intentional to make the design just different enough from a real GMT watch design (or really any real watch with a second and minute hand on a 12 hour dial) to help prevent any copyright infringement issues?? If not I hope Apple corrects this quickly.

Maybe that’s an issue for someone with a lot more experience wearing a GMT watch. Personally, I’d just tap the Apple Watch face to bring up the complete list of time zones and check as many as I want — then tap the “X” to return to my face as I’d originally set it up. Maybe not useful for every use case, I guess.

I know I keep saying this, but I’m no expert. From what I can tell, tho’, you’d look at the red hand and see it’s about halfway between the arrow (00:00) and 01:00, so you know it’s about 01:30 in London. For the precise time, I’d expect you’d have to tap the face or do a little mental math.

If it were me and I needed the precise time in London while my watch was set to Kathmandu local time, I suspect I’d set up a digital complication on a different watch face. I don’t guess even the fanciest analog Rolex GMT watch would offer an elegant way to display the way unusual time zones like yours, those in India, Australia, New Zealand, etc., when they’re not aligned on the minute hand.