Fall detection is one of those features that you never want to use, but are super glad you have it, when you need it. I was really excited to get this feature when I upgraded to the Apple Watch Series 5. As you may have guessed, I run a lot. I also run in all kinds of terrible weather and locations so I worry about potential catastrophic falls. My wife also worries about me.

Fortunately (or unfortunately), over the past couple months, I have had the benefit of putting the fall detection feature to good use, 3 different times in fact. Each time fall detection was triggered I was super glad that I it did. I never found myself having to need it for real, but the times it did trigger were times when I could have injured myself really bad.

Falling On Ice

This was my first experience with the Apple Watch’s fall detection feature. I was running up a long bicycle trail and there was a particular nasty spot of ice covering the whole trail. I was unable to go around it in any way and had to go over it. The day was warm and sunny and was melting. I could tell the ice could be super dangerous so I slowed to a walk. There was a railing on one side which I grabbed, but regardless of all my precautions, my feet slipped sideways, I lost my grip on the railing and landed hard on my side.

I felt a shooting pain in my wrist, my hip felt instantly bruised and my ankle got cut up on the ice. I instinctively bounced back up onto my feet, quickly assessing all the points of impact to make sure nothing was broken or sprained. While I was in a lot of pain, nothing seemed injured and that’s when I realized my watch was vibrating, checking to see if I was ok. Thankfully, I was alright and I shut off the alert. I stood there a bit shaken, but super glad that if I had hit my head and knocked myself out cold, or broken something, my watch would have alerted the appropriate people.

Snowboarding

I love snowboarding, but I don’t get to go enough. I found myself losing control on a particularly steep and icy section and fell hard. While I was completely fine, I had thrown my arm out and it slammed against the snow. I knew from my past experience that I probably set off fall detection and sure enough, my watch started vibrating to make sure I was ok. I quickly shed my mittens and shut it off, thankful again that this feature existed.

While I wear a helmet these days, when I was a kid nobody wore helmets. I remember a particular nasty fall that I had where I slammed my head hard on the ground. I don’t remember if I knocked myself out, but I fell bad enough that people were coming up to me to make sure I was ok. If I had fall detection back then, I’m positive it would have started alerting people.

Slippery Stairs

Stairs are my arch nemesis. Sometimes I’m not paying attention and I barely get a toe on the edge of a step and I fall. Sometimes I’m coming down the stairs and it’s as if the stairs and my socks have conspired together and are out to murder me. In both circumstances I find myself flailing, arms flying everywhere trying to grab the nearest handrail.

In all cases of my stair catastrophes thus far, I’m ok. I may have random stiff muscles the next day in spots I never knew existed, but I’ve never actually hurt myself. I am 40 though, so I’m guessing that at some point I’m going to fall and not be able to get back up. The good news is, the other day in another stair slipping, arms flailing episode, my watch’s fall detection went off again. Alerting me that it cared about my health and well-being, once again reassuring me that if something bad did happen, I’d be rescued.

Enable Fall Detection

If you have an Apple Watch Series 4 or later I’d highly recommend that you enable fall detection, if you haven’t already. To turn fall detection on or off:

Open the Apple Watch app on your iPhone, then tap the My Watch tab.
Tap Emergency SOS.
Turn Fall Detection on or off.

If you haven’t set up your Medical ID or added emergency contacts I’d highly recommend you do that as well:

Open Settings on your iPhone, then tap Health > Medical ID.
Tap Edit.
Enter your date of birth and other health information.
To add an emergency contact, tap the add button under emergency contacts. Tap a contact, then add their relationship.
To remove an emergency contact, tap the remove button next to the contact, then tap Delete.
To make your Medical ID available from the Lock screen, turn on Show When Locked. In an emergency, this gives information to people who want to help.
Tap Done.

To read more about how to use fall detection with the Apple Watch, visit Apple’s support docs.