Today, Apple kicked off its 2017 Worldwide Developer Conference, where it announced new iterations of iOS, macOS, and watchOS. Following the keynote, developer preview builds were released, as they always are after the first day of WWDC.
Early betas aren't for the faint of heart though, and you should be aware of that. This build will likely be unstable, and unlike iOS, macOS, and tvOS, there's no way to roll back an Apple Watch without taking it to an Apple Store.
But if this is something that you just have to have now, then here's how you can do it, as the process is pretty simple.
- In Apple Developer, go to Develop -> Download.
- Locate the watchOS 4 beta and click the download link.
- The easiest thing to do is to download it on the iPhone that your Apple Watch is paired with and open it, but if you do it on a PC, just email it to yourself and open it on your iPhone.
- Follow the onscreen instructions to install the configuration profile. When it asks you to choose between your iPhone and Watch, choose the Watch.
- In the Apple Watch app, go to General -> Software Update.
- Follow the onscreen instructions to download and install watchOS 4.
Remember that once you install this, there's no going back unless you're willing to take that walk of shame into the Apple Store. You might want to wait for two weeks until beta 2 is released, just to be safe.
