Wristwatches have been true extensions of people’s personalities for much of the past century. Besides their impact on our social standing, researchers have also claimed that wearing a smartwatch may be associated with being more idealistic and humane. While that’s contentious, watches have largely been replaced by smartwatches. Customization, especially the ability to change watch faces frequently, is among the biggest allures of owning a smartwatch — besides the ease of having a reduced version of a phone on your wrist.
For Android users, the Samsung Galaxy Watch is already one of the most popular and widely used options — especially since the Korean brand adopted Google’s Wear OS almost three years ago. Whether you use the newest Galaxy Watch 6 or the older Watch 5 or 4 models, setting a new watch face not only brings a sense of novelty but also reflects your choices and likings; it can even be a great conversation starter.
For this reason, we have picked out some of the best Samsung Galaxy Watch faces for newer watches running Google’s Wear OS. All of them are available from the Google Play Store or the independent watch face apps such as Facer.
The best Samsung Galaxy Watch faces
Choosing a watch face is the easiest way to customize your Galaxy Watch to your liking. But the sheer number of options can overwhelm you with choice fatigue. That is why we have curated a list with some of our favorite watch faces for the Samsung Galaxy Watch 6 and the older generations running on Wear OS.
To make the list easier to scan, we have categorized these watch faces based on their sources of availability. All of these watch faces are available for the Galaxy Watch 6/6 Classic, Galaxy Watch 5/5 Pro, and Galaxy Watch 4/4 Classic.
Official Galaxy Watch faces
Here’s the first batch featuring the official Galaxy Watch faces by Samsung. Most of these watch faces offer a high degree of customization and are optimized for minimum battery consumption. Most importantly, all of these options are free.
Info Brick is a great watch face for those who want to access loads of information right from a single glance on their Galaxy Watch. With this watch face, you can make granular changes to how it looks and make it very personal. It lets you choose from 10 different background colors and dozens more accent colors, change the clock’s font, and add up to five different complications. The watch face can display a diverse and practically boundless ambit of information, including watch conditions such as battery, quick access to features such as your phone dialer, weather, or health statistics such as heart rate and sleep duration. My favorite option is to set the compass as the bottom complication when hiking, which helps me if I’m ever feeling lost or unaware of my surroundings.
Perpetual is a dandy watch face for astronomy enthusiasts. It’s an analog watch face with a classic interplay of black and white elements — although you can change the accent color for the indexes surrounding the dial. It supports two animated backgrounds; the first shows a partially lit moon based on the phase and the time of the day with twinkling stars in the background, while the second one displays the image of a star constellation from the Zodiac family based on the month of the year. Besides the background, you can change the shape of the watch hands as well as the colors of the indexes and the hands. You can’t add any complications to the watch face, so if you are looking for an analog face with complications, this is what we suggest.
Analog Dashboard, as the name suggests, is another analog watch face with a clean design. To keep the watch face simple, Samsung limits the background colors to black and white (with a black background on the always-on display, irrespective of your choice). You can, however, choose different colors for the complications, creating either a monochrome or a multi-colored layout. The watch face allows you to add up to four complications, including a digital watch, so you get the best of both worlds. Overall, it feels very classy and offers you a host of information right from the home screen. Samsung also offers a “Digital Dashboard” with similar functionality but with a digital watch if you fancy that instead.
Photos can be a great way to cherish your loved ones — or reminisce an iconic meme from TV — every time you check the time. You can add an unlimited number of photos from your personal gallery (or Google Photos) to set them as the background for the watch face. Every time you unlock the watch, a new photo from that lot shows up. You can tweak the looks of each photo — by editing the exposure, saturation, contrast, etc. — to improve the visibility of the clock and other text on the watch face. Additionally, the watch face lets you choose from a range of different clock positions and types, including both digital and analog, with the option to pick from a range of colors. Lastly, you can add any four complications in four quarters along the periphery of the dial, based on your liking. The only shortcoming here is that all photos must have similar color schemes for the contents on the watch face to be properly visible. It is also worth noting that using the always-on display with a custom image may drain the battery on the Galaxy Watch faster.
Breathe is the watch face for you if you are looking for some respite from the constant barrage of notifications and more information than you inherently need. True to its name, the simplistic and straightforward Galaxy Watch face from Samsung reminds you to breathe consciously and stay present. You can simply follow the blessing and receding flower on the watch face or tap anywhere to start a one-minute-long guided breathing exercise. Vibrations and audio cues accompany the exercise so you can close your eyes while focusing fully on your breathing and recover from stress better. Unlike the rest of the options, however, there are no customization options for this watch face, which may be disappointing for some people.
Samsung Galaxy Watch faces on the Google Play Store
Besides the watch faces offered by Samsung, you can try hundreds of other options from the Google Play Store. Some may be free, while most are paid. In this list, we will look at some of the best Wear OS watch faces you can download and apply to your Galaxy Watch straight from the Play Store.
Concentric is an unofficial rendition of the similar-looking watch face launched with the first-generation Google Pixel Watch. The most satisfying aspect of the watch face is that instead of a second hand, it uses an index that spins along the dial. Besides porting features from the original watch face, the developer has added functionality such as the ability to choose from 30 accent colors and a customizable complication. With this watch face, you can also customize the indexes and the always-on display to your liking. Thanks to a black background, the watch face also reduces battery consumption despite the animations. Most importantly, it is free to download.
Download: Google Play Store (Free)
Ustwo is not a single watch face but rather a collection of minimal watch faces for the Galaxy Watch — all available for absolutely free. The app brings some of the most unusual (and whacky) watch faces, including one named Domino with 60 tiles that shift from backward- to forward-leaning as each second passes, or Parallel with three concentric circles (for hours, minutes, and seconds) with parallel lines across each. With each of these, you can also use the area in the center to add a complication, such as a quick shortcut for a workout, battery, heart rate, etc.
Download: Google Play Store (Free)
SH020 is a hybrid watch face that offers functionality to customize nearly every aspect. You can change the indexes, the shape of the clock hands, and the colors of the shapes, as well as the digital clock. The watch face also lets you add up to five complications, which can be information about the weather, health statistics such as your step count, heart rate, etc., or shortcuts for apps or settings. You can also place three more shortcuts over specific spots, such as the date, battery, and heart rate. This one will cost you $1.99.
Download: Google Play Store ($2)
Acro Genix Digi Rev is inspired by classically revered (and still adorned) digital watches, especially those made by Casio. Besides the classic gray from retro watches, you can also customize the background colors when using this watch face on your Galaxy Watch. Besides crucial elements shown with a calculator-like digital font, parts of the watch face also emulate the physical spacers used in retro watches, and these spots show information such as the weather, a second clock, or alarm settings and can be used to trigger apps or actions. You can also add a background with a metal-like flare to the area emulating the LCD screen — and choose from 22 accent colors.
Download: Google Play Store ($1)
Voyager WorldTimer is an absolute must-have watch face for Galaxy Watch users who prefer analog watches. The developer has added a hyper-realistic 3D depth to the different visual elements, making it easy to mistake for a physical dial and hands. You can choose between light and dark backgrounds and play around with visuals, including the colors of the hour and minute hands. You can also pick special backgrounds to match holidays such as Christmas without revoking the realistic visuals. In addition, you can also add a complication over the smaller day dial on the top of the watch face, where you can display any crucial information or add a shortcut — or replace it entirely to display the complication more clearly.
Download: Google Play Store ($1.79)
Game Festival is embellished with visuals that look like colorful 8-bit games and is bound to spark interest in anyone with a glance. The watch face is inspired by the international gala of the same name, which has been celebrating indie games since 1998. Whether you’re a staunch supporter of PCMR supremacy or just a casual gamer, this watch face will elevate your game with its colorful and animated elements.
Download: Google Play Store ($3)
Flowers Purple is a highly admirable watch face with soothing floral visuals and light pastel colors that will be a perfect companion for a lavender-colored watch band (or, better, a lavender Galaxy Z Flip phone). You can also change the background color to one of the dozens of other light pastel colors. The watch face easily resembles a Withings hybrid watch where slots for chronographs are replaced with circular areas that look like digital displays on an otherwise analog dial. These screens can be used to add up to three complications — other than heart rate, which is fixed — to the watch face.
Download: Google Play Store ($1.49)
S4U RC One resembles a unique motorsports edition of classic analog watches made by luxury brands such as Omega and Tag Heuer. The watch face has dozens of differently designed and multi-colored backgrounds. Irrespective of the background, the watch face has a shallow depth effect that, along with the chronographs, makes it look very realistic. Despite that, you can customize up to nine spots on the watch face for triggers and complications and choose colors for the clock hands, both when the watch face and the always-on display are active.
Download: Google Play Store ($1.49)
Camping watch face for Wear OS is especially designed to match your outdoorsy spirit. It offers eye-catching digital illustrations featuring different trucks in inspiring poster-like visuals that can be set as backgrounds. Besides these drawings, you get a standard layout of the digital clock and other health and fitness-related information. Despite the exciting visuals, a higher price without many customization options can prickle a little.
Download: Google Play Store ($3)
Samsung Galaxy Watch faces on Facer
Facer is one of the largest and most reliable sources for downloading watch faces, with thousands of free and paid options for smartwatches with Wear OS as well as the Apple Watch. Being a dedicated marketplace for watch faces, Facer offers a a higher quality of watch faces for the Galaxy Watch as compared to the Google Play Store. All watch faces are easily managed using the Facer app for Wear OS smartwatches, including the Galaxy Watch. While there are plenty of free watch faces to begin with, Facer has a lot more premium options available for $2 each. You can also upgrade to a Premium subscription for $5 a month or $40 a year to reap unlimited access to all premium watch faces on the platform — but with one caveat: you still don’t own the watch faces and your access to premium watch faces will be restricted if you cancel your subscription.
Despite this condition, the $5 monthly or $40 yearly subscription is an attractive deal for long-term smartwatch users. Even after canceling your subscription, your watch face history remains intact in your account, just in case you wish to reactivate it later. That said, we have listed out some of the most unique and exciting watch faces that you can download onto the Galaxy Watch using Facer, including both free and paid options.
Reitling Bentley is a free watch face for aviation geeks. It features an unusual chronograph design inspired by luxury watchmaker Breitling, with three smaller dials aligned horizontally instead of a triangular orientation. With a black background, the watch face uses silver for the minute’s markings, white accents for the indexes and the minute and hour hands, and red for the seconds hand. The two dials on the left and right show temperature and step count (with a 100x factor) using analog markings, being inspired by meters in a vintage aircraft. The central dial shows the available battery percentage. Unfortunately, there isn’t an option to customize the watch face other than switching between imperial and metric units. But if it’s any saving grace, the always-on display only shows the hour and minute hands and the date, helping you save battery while using the watch face with your Galaxy Watch.
Download: Facer (Free)
Calendar Full Date White is best suited to users who want a vintage-looking watch face without any fuss. It has a simple “porcelain” background with black hands and Roman letter markings, giving it a very antique appearance. The watch face has smaller dials for the day of the week, date, and month and a dedicated aperture for the moon’s phase at the bottom of the dial. Despite getting the basics right, the watch face offers no customization options.
Download: Facer (Free)
CLV-Dask is for those who want a similar vintage appearance from their Galaxy Watch but with information displayed digitally. The watch face offers plenty of insights, including heart rate, step count, temperature and humidity (complemented by fitting icons), date, and battery percentage. The periphery also serves as an indicator of the day of the week. In contrast, a tiny red indicator moves around the outer circle, giving the impression of a concealed second hand. The retro color theme and digital elements strike a balance for a perfect modern theme.
Download: Facer (Free)
Fisherman is your perfect reminder to unwind and engage in relaxing activities like fishing. Every time you glance at your wrist, the soothing colors and hooking visuals remind you of the small joys of life. Despite the minimal interface, the watch face doesn’t lack crucial details and shows you essentials such as daily steps, heart rate, calories spent, battery percentage, and weather. You also get a nice, toned-down, always-on display to save on battery.
Download: Facer (Free)
LCARS 2.0 is Facer’s official adaptation of the eponymous computer system in Star Trek, making it a must-have watch face for Trekkies who own a Galaxy Watch. The colors and design of the elements are true to the original inspiration. The more exciting bit, however, is that it has four watch faces in one. You can easily tap the “Mode” button under the Star Trek logo to toggle between detailed views for modes such as time, weather, fitness, and science (which has a compass and information about altitude, wind speed, and air pressure). All of these screens are animated, but to minimize battery consumption, the watch face eliminates all colors and limits itself to only white outlines on a black background.
Download: Facer (Premium)
Evoque GR+ is a sleek watch face with a khaki background, perfect for outings in smart casual attire. The upper section has a spinning ring for seconds, along with a dedicated seconds hand, and you can change its background color to a dark gray for a contrasting look. There are three subdials for the chronograph, and for the bottom one, you can choose one of the three screens (calendar, digital clock, or heart rate). The watch face has smaller subdials to show the weather and the moon phase. The watch face allows changing the color of the second hand and the shape of the hour and minute hands.
Download: Facer (Premium)
How do I add faces to my Galaxy Watch?
The steps to adding new watch faces to your Samsung Galaxy Watch are easy and intuitive. You can either do it directly from the watch or use your phone. Below, we discuss both methods one by one.
Here’s how to add a watch face directly from your Galaxy Watch 4 or above:
- Unlock your Galaxy Watch’s display.
- Tap and hold the current watch face to open the list of recent watch faces.
- Scroll from left to right until you see a (+) icon, and then tap it.
- A list of watch faces already available on your Galaxy Watch will show up here.
- Choose any watch face.
- You will then be redirected to the recent list, where you will see a Customize button under the current watchface. Tap it to customize options such as the background, the clock type, size, font, and the supported watch face complications (which may differ with each). You can skip this step and long-press the watch face later to customize it later.
If you would rather change the options from your phone, here are the steps for you to follow:
- Ensure your Galaxy Watch is paired, and then open the Galaxy Wearable app on your phone
- Tap the Watch faces icon
- Here, you will find all the official watch faces Samsung offers, including the ones already installed on your Galaxy Watch and others available for download, sorted by category.
- Tap the watch face of your choice to apply.
- After applying it, you can tap the Customize button to tweak the watch face to your liking.
If you are using a third-party watch face or a service like Facer, setting the watch face requires additional steps, which the following section explains.
How do I get third-party watch faces?
There are a few more steps to getting a third-party watch face than just getting it directly from the Galaxy Wearables app, but they are fairly easy to conquer. Like the steps above, we look at how to add third-party watch faces on your Galaxy Watch both directly from the watch and using your phone.
First, here are the steps to adding unofficial watch faces straight from the Galaxy Watch:
- Unlock your Galaxy Watch and swipe up to open the app gallery.
- Scroll until you see the Google Play Store and tap its icon.
- Since watch faces are some of the most popular apps downloaded on a Wear OS device, a few of these are usually listed at the top of the Play Store. Underneath is a See More button to expand the list. Tap the See More button to explore some of the top options.
Alternatively, when you scroll a little on the Google Play Store, you will see a card that reads text related to watch faces or customization. (Google, unfortunately, does use consistent branding across all of Wear OS, and you may see different text on these cards.) Tap that card, and it will open up a mega-set of all watch faces curated by Google and arranged into different groups based on categories. - Tap the watch face you want to install on your Galaxy Watch to open its description page, and then tap Install. Some watch faces (or aggregators like Facer) might also require companion apps to be installed on your smartphone once it is installed on your phone.
The Galaxy Watch’s tiny screen can make this process somewhat cumbersome and exhausting, which is why you can use your phone to install third-party watch faces. Here’s how to go about the process:
- Open the Google Play Store on your phone and tap the Other Devices tab under the search bar.
- Select Watch to remove apps meant for other types of gadgets.
- Scroll a little, and you will see a card related to watch faces or customizations. Tap this card to unveil hordes of watch faces for the Galaxy Watch and other Wear OS watches.
- Go to any app listings and tap the downward triangle (▾) next to the Install button.
- Choose the watch you wish to install this watch face or app on.
- Make sure the Galaxy Watch is connected to Wi-Fi or your phone for the installation to complete.
For watch face aggregator apps such as Facer, you will need to set up an account and may need to add a payment method. You can also purchase the subscription directly from Facer’s website and save the portion of the fee Google charges on app purchases.
Lastly, to ensure third-party watch faces can read complication data, you need to enable permissions with these steps:
- Go to Settings on your Galaxy Watch and scroll down to Apps.
- Scroll further on the new open page and tap App list.
- Find the watch face (in the alphabetically sorted list) and tap its name.
- Enable all permission to sensors, location, and file accesses.
- Wait for the data to populate or restart your Galaxy Watch for updated data to show on the third-party watch face.
