The 5 Best Meditation and Mindfulness Apps for Your Apple Watch

You’ve no doubt heard of the benefits of a daily meditation practice. The benefits of consistent, dedicated practice include being less reactive to your own thoughts, less likely to go through life on emotional autopilot, and more likely to set intention between stimulus and response. Therefore, mindfulness can seriously improve your mental well-being.

While there are plenty of meditation apps on the market that you can access on a smartphone, some apps offer watchOS versions, which means you can have a pocket guru with you wherever you go.

So stop what you’re doing, take a deep breath, and check out the following apps.

1. Apple’s Mindfulness app

If you’re already using an Apple Watch running watchOS 9, you might be familiar with the Mindfulness app that comes pre-installed. The app encourages you to take a few minutes each day to center yourself using your breath.

The Mindfulness app is very simple. Just open the app and tap Reflect Where Breathe. While typing Reflect, you’ll see a prompt that will help you focus your attention for a set period of time. For example, you may be asked to recall a challenge you faced at some point in your life and what you learned from that experience.

Tapping Breatheyou’ll be able to train your breathing by following an animation that appears on your Apple Watch and grows larger as you breathe in and shrinks as you breathe out.

If you need to change any settings, just open the Apple Watch screen. Settings on your Apple Watch, then tap Mindfulness. From here, you can adjust various settings, including mindfulness reminders (for example, at the start or end of each day), decide to receive weekly summaries of your progress, and change your breathing rate (number of breaths per minute).

If you have an Apple Fitness+ subscription, you can also listen to guided meditations on Apple Watch.

2. Headspace

Headspace is a popular mindfulness and meditation app that offers a variety of mental exercises to help you manage stress, induce sleep, and improve focus. The app can be used on a variety of devices, including the Apple Watch.

Like most apps on your Apple Watch, you just need to download the app to your iPhone and create an account. Once you have done this, the app will be automatically installed on your Apple Watch.

You can then use the app to access guided meditations and other mindfulness exercises right from your watch. Using the app on your Apple Watch, you can schedule a timer for your daily meditation, track your total meditation time, view your daily meditation series, schedule meditation reminders, and monitor your heart rate.

Download : Headspace for iOS (free, subscription available)

3. Calm

Calm is a popular mindfulness and meditation app that aims to help you improve your health and happiness. The app offers a variety of mental exercises to improve your sleep, reduce your stress, improve your concentration or avoid feeling overwhelmed.

Like Headspace, Calm can be used on a variety of devices, including the Apple Watch. Among Calm’s most useful features is the daily 10-minute practice, which is perfect for those new to meditation.

Daily practices come in two forms: Daily Calm and Daily Trip, each with its own meditative flavor. Using the app on your Apple Watch, you can also access Calm’s library of breathing exercises and track morning and evening stretching routines.

Download : Calm for iOS (Free, subscription available)

4. Ten percent happier

Ten Percent Happier is a meditation app created and run by Dan Harris, a journalist who, after suffering a panic attack live on TV, has dedicated his life to exploring the world of meditation and mindfulness to make cope with stress and improve well-being. This is a great iOS app for self-coaching and support.

The app is available on a variety of devices, including the Apple Watch. It is designed for both beginners and advanced meditators, and provides a wide range of resources to help develop a regular practice.

Using the app on your Apple Watch, you can time your meditation and track the Daily Dose (the app’s daily meditation practice), Quick Hits (popular guided meditations), and meditation talks (inspiring 15-minute podcasts ).

Download : Ten Percent Happier for iOS (Free, subscription available)

5.Insight Timer

The award-winning Insight Timer app offers many useful features for meditators. The app includes a wide variety of guided meditations and mindfulness exercises, as well as a social network to connect with other meditators. It’s available for iOS and Android devices and is worth checking out if you want to improve your well-being.

The Apple Watch version of the app includes several useful features. Like other apps on this list, Insight Timer offers a basic meditation timer and reminders, but also offers yoga and meditation classes that you can access from the watchOS app.

Download : Insight Timer for iOS (Free, subscription available)

6.Spotify

While not a dedicated meditation app, Spotify offers tremendous value for those looking to practice mindfulness, especially for people who already use the app for podcasts and music. Spotify has an extensive library which, you might be surprised to learn, includes a variety of meditation and mindfulness content.

The mindfulness content you can access from your Apple Watch includes guided meditations, mood music, and nature sounds that can all be used to complement a session.

Spotify also offers a variety of playlists and podcasts dedicated to meditation and mindfulness, including content produced by independent creators and meditation teachers who share their own guided meditations on Spotify.

You can find meditation content on Spotify using the search function. Content that may interest you includes Mindful Meditations from Mindful.org, the Meditation Life Skills Podcast, and the Insight Hour Podcast with Joseph Goldstein.

Download : Spotify for iOS (Free, subscription available)

Find inner peace with these meditation apps for Apple Watch

There are many ways to find inner peace with the help of your Apple Watch. At a minimum, you should use the Mindfulness app to help you refocus each day and focus on your breathing.

If you want to take it to the next level or need help making it a habit, you should download one of the many meditation apps that can guide you through guided meditations with daily practices designed for beginners.

Finally, if you are more advanced, consider checking out one of the apps such as Insight Timer or Spotify to listen to Dharma lectures and podcasts that can deepen your practice by teaching you the philosophy behind it. Learning about Buddhist philosophy, even from a secular perspective, can lead to some of the most meaningful insights you can have. Whatever you do, remember to breathe.