As we discovered last week, August has released an update to the iPhone and Apple Watch companion app for its August Smart Lock, adding untethered lock control for Apple Watch users. With the new native watchOS app, users of any generation of August Smart Lock will now be able to check their lock status and control their lock directly from their Apple Watch, even when it’s not connected to their iPhone — a feature that will be a definite boon for users of more recent Apple Watch models that can already handle GPS-based fitness tracking and their own cellular data connections without the need for the iPhone to be on-hand.
The new Apple Watch app provides support for multiple locks, and even supports watchOS Complications so you can also quickly access your locks from your Apple Watch face. The app will also display lock and unlock status for each of your locks, but it’s worth noting that from our own testing of the feature, this only appears to work over a direct Bluetooth connection to the lock — remote August Connect based connections are not supported, even when the paired iPhone is nearby — so users will still have to reach for their iPhone or use HomeKit commands if they want to unlock their door from their wrist when away from home. The lock/unlock feature is also only available to users who are set up as house “Owners” and not “Guests” and doesn’t provide support for the Auto-Unlock feature of the August Smart Lock, since the Apple Watch doesn’t support the technologies needed for this feature.
