PCMag Expert Builds 3 Seiko-Inspired Galaxy Watch 8 Faces in 10 Minutes

Q: With AI now designing watch faces from text, is Samsung's visual studio already becoming obsolete for custom designs?

No. Samsung’s Watch Face Studio is not obsolete; it remains one of the main practical tools for building custom Wear OS watch faces, even as AI makes design faster. The key reason is that Wear OS now relies on the Watch Face Format, a standard co-developed with Samsung, and Watch Face Studio is a supported visual editor for that format. It handles layout, complications, always-on behavior, battery optimization, and packaging for Galaxy Watch and other Wear OS devices. That makes it more than a sketch tool: it is part of the production pipeline. AI is changing how people create watch faces, but mostly by lowering the barrier to entry. Tools such as Gemini in Android Studio can turn text prompts into code, help generate XML, and speed up advanced features like dynamic weather, moon phases, or custom interactions. That is powerful, especially for users who are not programmers. But AI does not remove the need for a visual workflow. Designers still need to choose assets, refine layouts, test readability on a small round screen, manage complications, and ensure battery-friendly always-on modes. Watch Face Studio is strong precisely because it gives direct control over those details in a WYSIWYG environment. The more likely outcome is coexistence. AI will increasingly generate drafts, code, and ideas, while Watch Face Studio remains the reliable editor and deployment tool for polishing and shipping them. For many users, AI will complement Samsung’s studio, not replace it.

3 articles · Updated · PCMag · Jul 23

Using Samsung’s free Watch Face Studio, a PCMag expert recreated several Seiko-inspired analog faces for a Galaxy Watch 8 Classic after a damaged Seiko Sport5 became unusable.
About 10 minutes of tinkering in the app—plus roughly an hour editing photos—was enough to make a workable facsimile, while more complex elements like a flipping date complication still need scripting.
Watch Face Studio lets users assemble analog or digital layouts, add complications, and create always-on versions, with Samsung recommending OLED active-pixel ratios stay under 15% to limit battery drain.
Getting a custom face onto the watch is the harder part: sideloading over Wi-Fi requires developer options and wireless debugging, while exporting files for phone-based loading proved clunkier.
The project highlights a simpler alternative to the uneven Google Play watch-face marketplace, though sharing or selling designs still raises copyright limits for branded recreations.