Export your watch face

Watch Face Designer offers several options for seeing your watch face creation come to life on a physical watch or using the Android emulator.

Google Play

Note: This is the recommended exporting method for designers who create watch faces on Wear OS.

Google Play publishes files that use the .aab (Android App Bundle) format. Watch Face Designer handles everything about packaging your watch face into a bundle for you.

To publish to Play, follow Google Play publishing instructions.

Android Studio

Note: This is the recommended exporting method for developers who create watch faces on Wear OS.

Android Studio export saves a ZIP file that you can extract and use as an Android Studio project directory. It comes preconfigured with Gradle scripts and all the necessary resources to directly edit your generated watch face as code. By editing your watch face in Android Studio, you can implement more advanced features of the Watch Face Format, including ones that aren't supported in Watch Face Designer.

Other methods

Watch Face Designer supports several other exporting methods, as well.

One-click deploy

Note: This option is available only on macOS development machines. If you're developing on a Windows, Linux, or ChromeOS machine, use APK exports instead.

To export using one-click deploy, complete the following steps:

1. Connect your Wear OS device to your computer over USB.

   On Pixel Watch 2 and Pixel Watch 3 devices, you can do this using the included charging cable.

   For devices that don't support direct USB connections, such as Pixel Watch (1), see Wirelessly debugging a Wear OS app.

   See the manufacturer's advice for other watches.

2. Press Export in Watch Face Designer, then select One-click deploy, which prompts you to save a file.

3. Double-click on that file to open it, and select the Play button:

   

   Figure 1: The deployed file open, ready for exporting

   The watch face is deployed to the watch and set as the current watch face favorite.

   Note: You may need to accept a permissions dialog. If you press Always Allow, you don't have to do this again in future.

APK

An APK is an installable Android package. Watch Face Designer handles everything about packaging and preparing your APK for you.

To deploy your APK, do the following:

1. Install ADB.
2. Connect your watch over USB or over Wi-Fi.
3. Use the adb install command.

Raw resources

This export option saves your watch face as an uncompiled Android package, with an AndroidManifest.xml and res/ folder containing your watch face's code and resources.

You can use this package with a tool like AAPT2 to customize how APKs and AABs are generated. This is useful if you need more fine-grained tuning options around features like signing keys and certificates.

Watch Face Studio (experimental)

This option creates a project for use in Watch Face Studio.

Note: Some features from Figma might not appear as expected in Watch Face Studio.