Apple Watch: watchOS 9.4 prevents accidentally turning off the alarm clock while you sleep

Did you set an alarm on your Apple Watch before going to bed and it didn’t go off as expected in the early morning? It may be because of your hand covering the watch while you were sleeping. watchOS 9.4 corrects the situation.

In its notes, Apple explains that alarms are no longer muted by the gesture of covering the watch with your hand to prevent accidental cancellations while sleeping. As it stands, putting the palm of your hand on the Apple Watch screen for three seconds puts the alerts (including the alarm clock) on mute. It’s entirely possible that your hand lands on the screen while you sleep. This therefore deactivates the alarm, which is to say that it is annoying knowing that it was an accidental action.

With watchOS 9.4, this behavior will no longer be a reality. The alarm will still ring, even if your hand lands on your Apple Watch while you sleep.

Apple distributed the watchOS 9.4 release candidate this week to public developers and testers. The final version for everyone is expected to arrive next week, alongside iOS 16.4, iPadOS 16.4, macOS 13.3 and tvOS 16.4.