You might have noticed the green light ON in your Apple Watch. Especially found under the case of your device. Though it is not harmful, there might be instances you would like to have it switched off. Please remember, the Apple Watches come with excellent sensors and all the features of the watch are beneficial.
But what is this Green Light for?
Before we could get on to the method to switch off the Greenlight, let us understand the purpose of the light on your Apple Watch. This shall give you a fair understanding of the watch’s operational functionality.
The Green LED light that is ON under your Apple Watch is to indicate that the device is measuring your heart rate. In fact, the App present in the watch is recording the measurements. It does happen continuously as it records the heartbeat with utmost accuracy.
Content
Is it Explicitly available in the Apple Watches for others to See?
Well, the Apple watches were manufactured with Optical sensors in-built in the system. They are present primarily to measure the heart rate. These optical sensors emit the LED light on your wrist and calculate the heart rate accurately.
You would have even noticed that the green LED light is ON even while not wearing it. Though it might be for a few seconds, the reason for the lights flashing is to indicate that the App for calculating the heart rate is still functioning. Moreover, the watches are designed to have the lights off when removed from the wrist.
How to Switch off the Green Light on the Apple Watch?
Of course, there might be many instances that you would like the Green Light to be off. Especially, while you are in a meeting, public gathering or any sort of function where it might grab attention and distracts you as well as the audience as well.
In such cases, you can conveniently have the green light Off. But the only way is by disabling the feature to measure the heart rate. Yes, as you do that, the watch stops monitoring your heart rate completely. You can enable the feature using the same method.
You can follow the instructions given below to switch off the Green Light.
Please note: We have also given an alternate method to switch off the Greenlight at the end of the article.
Step 1: Click open the Watch App
Step 2: At the bottom of the screen, you will find ‘My Watch’ – Tap open that
Step 3: Tap/Click on ‘Privacy’
Step 4: ‘Turn Off’ Heart Rate
As you do this, you will find the Green Light Off on your Apple watch.
As we said earlier, the green light that OFF indicates that the watch does not monitor your heart rate. For you to enable it, ‘Turn ON’ the heart rate under the privacy settings of the Apple Watch.
Is the Green Light on the Apple Watch harmful to the Skin?
Absolutely NOT. The optical sensors work on the skin and illuminate the wrist part to measure the heart rate. Nowhere in electronic science, an LED light had damaged any skin. Moreover, it does not cause any discomfort as well. It is part of the watch’s functionality and one must learn to live with that if you are planning to purchase one.
At the same time, the newer series of Apple Watches come with ECG sensors that do not feature any Green Light like this. Especially the newer models like Series 4 and 5 do not have optical sensors.
Instances Where the Green Light is ON even after Disabling the feature
You will definitely come across such situations and if the Green Light is ON even after you followed the above-mentioned steps, there is another way to switch it off.
Please understand, the watch is not malfunctioning if you find the light ON even after disabling the monitoring feature. There are heart rate monitoring Apps that might be functioning and that leaves the Greenlight ON.
To restart your watch, follow the below-mentioned steps
Step 1: Press and hold the side button
You must do this until you find the slider called ‘Power Off’ appearing on the screen
Step 2: Now, gently drag the slider to Turn off the watch
Don’t stop here, you need to switch on the watch again and press the same button till you find the Apple logo appearing on the screen. By now, the Greenlight is completely OFF and it shall not be ON until you enable the heart rate monitoring feature in your phone.
In terms of performance, both optical, as well as ECG sensors, work the same in measuring the heart rate. The accuracy levels are always incredible with Apple Watches and it is the same with optical sensors too.
