Control your Pixel Watch with hand gestures

Take photos, control media playback, scroll through incoming notifications, send Smart Replies, and more with two new simple hand gestures on your Pixel Watch.

Your Pixel Watch will give you an interactive tutorial to help you get familiar with hand gestures. A “What’s new” notification may appear on your watch after you update it, which guides you to the tutorial. A “Day 1” tutorial for the feature may also appear on your watch 24 hours after an update.

Important:

This feature is only available on Google Pixel Watch 3 and 4 with WearOS version 6.1 and later.
Ensure apps are updated on your Google Pixel Watch.
Helpful hints will appear where double pinch gesture is available to use.

Double pinch: Tap your index finger and thumb together twice to take control on Pixel Watch.
Wrist turn: Quickly turn your wrist away from you and back.

You can also learn more about gestures at any time on your Pixel Watch by opening the tutorial on the watch:

In Pixel Tips

On your Pixel Watch, tap Settings General Pixel Tips.
Under “Tap to learn more,” tap Hand gestures.
Tap Continue. Your watch will then ask you to do the hand gestures for the tutorial.

In Hand gestures

On your Pixel Watch, tap Settings Gestures Hand gestures.
Under “Education,” tap Hand gestures .
Tap Continue. Your watch will then ask you to do the hand gestures for the tutorial.

Use hand gestures on your Pixel Watch

Scroll through notifications & send the first Smart Reply

Double pinch to scroll through alerting notifications and send the first available Smart Reply. Close the expanded notification with a Wrist turn.

Scroll through alerting notifications (Double pinch)

Send first Smart Reply, where available (Double pinch)

Close expanded Notification (Wrist turn)

Manage your timer, stopwatch, or snooze an alarm

	Snooze a firing alarm or stop firing timers (Double pinch)
	Start and stop ongoing timers and stopwatch (Double pinch)

Snap a photo using the Camera app

Double pinch to take a photo or start and stop video recording.

Take a photo (Double pinch)

Start or stop video recording (Double pinch)

Play and pause media while you’re moving

Play or Pause music (Double pinch). While on the go, you can do a double pinch gesture to play or pause media.

Turn one-handed gestures on or off

One-handed gestures are turned on by default, but you can manage it manually in your settings.

In your Pixel Watch app on your mobile device

Open the Google Pixel Watch app .
Tap Settings Gestures Hand gestures.
Turn Double pinch and Wrist turn on or off.

On your Pixel Watch

Swipe down on your screen.
Tap Settings Gestures Hand gestures.
Turn Double pinch and Wrist turn on or off.
Tip: To set how frequent gesture hints appear, scroll down and select Always, Daily, Weekly, Monthly, or Once based on your preference.

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