Smart Tracking | Apple Watch

Want the smoothest, most seamless Smart Tracking experience? Pair it with your Apple Watch.

Smart Tracking was built to shine on the Apple Watch, using its advanced motion sensors and accelerometer to detect your swings automatically. It’s the most precise, truly hands-free way to track your round – you don’t even need to bring your phone. 

If you’ve got an Apple Watch, you’ve already got the smartest tracking tool in golf right on your wrist. Now it’s time to use it to unlock your best game!

Smart Tracking on Apple Watch

If you haven’t already, make sure to Pair your Apple Watch with 18Birdies ( here's how).

Playing A Hole

You can start a round directly on your watch or phone using Smart Tracking! To do this, make sure that Smart Tracking is your selected scoring mode. 

Using Automatic Swing Detection, each swing will be marked in real time – you’ll feel a buzz whenever a swing is detected. If you open the phone’s GPS, you’ll see a yellow dot on the map showing where shots were detected. 

Once you walk away from a shot, you’ll see the distance from the previous shot displayed in the top left corner, great for if you are trying to find a wayward tee shot, or if you just want to know how far you hit the ball. 

🛠️ For the most accurate swing detection results, try not to take swings when you are not near your ball! Practice swings are okay, as long as you are near a ball that you are planning to hit.

If available, you can click on the Map icon to view a map of the current hole! Learn more about Apple Watch Maps here. 

Learn more about Maps on Apple Watch

Marking the Pin

When you get to the green, you’ll see an option to “Confirm Pin Position” appear on your watch. Confirming the pin position is an optional step that improves the accuracy of your stats for the round. 

If you would like to confirm the pin position, you will get a prompt to go next to the hole and tap “Confirm”. To maximize accuracy, walk up to the hole, wait there for about 3 seconds, and then press the confirm button. This will mark the pin at your current location and save it to your round data.

Scoring

Once you finish the hole, click the blue pen icon. You’ll see a simple scoring panel to confirm some details about the hole. 

Confirm Your Score & Putts

We will try our best to predict your total score and number of putts. Make sure this information is correct before moving on. 

Add Penalties

If you do have a penalty, click “+ Penalties” to open up the penalty dropdown. Here you can indicate which stroke resulted in penalties along with how many penalties you incurred. For example, if you hit your tee shot into a hazard, you would add one penalty to stroke 1.

Estimate your First Putt Distance

You will be prompted to mark the Pin Location and 1st Putt Distance using your watch. Use this to estimate your first putt distance. 

🛠️For best results, you can walk from the hole to your ball to measure distance; each step you take is usually about 3 feet. 

Confirm Shot Positions

With Apple Watch and Auto Swing Detection, the shot placement will be pretty accurate. However, it is possible that there will be mistakes! 

You can double-check your shot positions during the round by navigating to completed holes on the GPS Screen, or you can review all of your shots after the round in the Smart Tracking Review Flow. 

🔧 Customize Your Tracking Settings

Every golfer is different, so we provide a few settings to customize your experience. You can find these settings by clicking Tools in the bottom right of the GPS page, and navigating to the Settings tab. 

Exact 1st Putt Distance

If this setting is turned ON, you will be prompted to mark the exact location of the pin and of the first putt location on your watch. When you do this, the exact 1st putt distance will be automatically calculated and saved. Leave this setting ON if you care about exact approach distances and putting details. 

If this setting is turned OFF, you will be prompted to select from a list of estimated distance ranges instead of marking the pin and putt locations. Turn this setting OFF if you prefer a lightweight experience after each hole and don't feel the need to track exact putt distances. 

Manual Shot Tracking

To manually add shots and putts on the Apple Watch, swipe to the left 2 times to reach the Shot Tracking screen. On this screen, you can add and edit shot details as you play the hole. This gives you full control of the details directly from your Apple Watch, no phone required!

If you want to add a shot manually, click the "+ Shot" button here. Make sure to do this at the location where you actually take your swing! You will be prompted to select which club you are using. The lie will be determined automatically. 

To view shot details, click the > under Shots Tracked. This will take you to a shot list that shows all the shots that we have detected or that you have added manually. By clicking on any of these shots, you can delete shots or add more shot details such as the lie and club used.