In this tutorial, you will learn how to install a third-party watch face APK on Wear OS from your computer.

Requirements

  • A Wear OS smartwatch
  • A computer (Windows/macOS/Linux)
  • A watch face APK file
  • Same Wi-Fi network for watch and computer

Install from computer (ADB over Wi-Fi)

  1. Download Android platform-tools (ADB).
  2. Extract the archive to an easy location (for example: C:\platform-tools on Windows).
  3. Open a terminal in that folder.
Opening a terminal in the platform-tools folder on Windows

Open terminal in the platform-tools directory.

  1. On your watch, enable Developer options, then enable ADB debugging and Wi-Fi debugging.
  2. Read the watch IP and port from Wi-Fi debugging (example: 192.168.1.18:5555).
  3. In terminal, connect with adb connect WATCH_IP:PORT.
  4. Accept the debugging prompt on the watch.
  5. Copy your watch face APK into the platform-tools folder.
  6. Install with adb install your-watchface.apk.

If the install succeeds, you should see output similar to Performing Streamed Install and Success.

Install from Android phone (coming soon)

This section will be added in a future update.