Credit: Kaitlyn Cimino / Android Authority
- Wear OS users won’t be able to install legacy watch faces from the Play Store starting January 14, 2025.
- Legacy watch faces will still work if they are already installed on the device.
- Developers won’t be able to publish updates for legacy watch faces to the Play Store.
After Google introduced Watch Face Format (WFF) in 2023, WFF and non-WFF watch faces coexisted. This only lasted for a short time, however, as Google eventually made WFF mandatory. Since then, the company has been gradually phasing out support for non-WFF watch faces on Wear OS. Google has now announced the next step it will take to get to full adoption of WFF.
If you’re a Wear OS user who cares about custom watch faces, then you may know that support for AndroidX and Wearable Support Library (WSL) watch faces is being removed. This started in January 2025, preventing new watch faces that use these formats from being published on the Play Store. However, developers are still allowed to publish updates for these legacy watch faces.