Google has announced the alpha release of the Jetpack Tiles library which allows third-party developers to create custom Tiles on Wear OS smartwatches. Since 2019 when Tiles were brought to Wear OS, users have had to make do with just six tiles but this will soon change.
While developers can now get to work on their own custom Tiles, users will have to wait for a platform update to Wear OS which Google plans to release later in the spring. Once developers get to work on their own custom Tiles, they’ll enable users to interact with various apps on their watch or phone in a much quicker manner than is possible today.
Explaining Tiles a bit more Developer Relations Engineer Jolanda Verhoef said:
“Tiles can be designed for many use cases, like tracking the user’s daily activity progress, quick-starting a workout, starting a recently played song, or sending a message to a favorite contact. While apps can be immersive, Tiles are fast-loading and focus on the user"s immediate needs. If the user would like more information, Tiles can be tapped to open a related app on the watch or phone for a deeper experience.”
If you want to begin working with Tiles, you should head over to the Android Developers page which contains all you need to get started. If you want some inspiration, Google has created a GitHub repository with plenty of code examples.