The best Apple Watch pet apps

1. WatchieBesti

A pet that hatches from an egg and grows as you move. It reads steps, heart rate and workouts from Apple Health, shifts through eight moods during the day, and graduates into a family collection when it grows up. Thirteen species across three kingdoms, eleven Brain Boost mini-games, and complications for your watch face. It never dies, and there are no leaderboards or friend lists.

Suits you if you want a pet that runs on your normal day and keeps your health data yours.

Where others do better: it has no social play, and there's no hands-on feeding or cleaning.

2. nomi

A watch-first pet from independent developer Andrew Chin. Your steps and active energy fill a heart ring, and you tap it to feed your nomi. It has three hearts. If they all run out, it dies. Keep it alive long enough and it evolves, with rarer forms for pets that last a year or more. No iPhone needed, and a companion iPhone app shows stats.

Suits you if you want the old Tamagotchi tension of a pet that can die. That's the thing nomi does better than WatchieBesti, if stakes are what keep you moving. WatchieBesti vs nomi

3. Belly

A pixel-art cat with seasonal outfits and cosmetics. Steps turn into hearts for its care. It has three mini-games with global leaderboards, friend codes, and a shared space called The Square where you meet other players' pets.

Suits you if you enjoy competing with friends and dressing up your pet. Belly's social side goes much further than WatchieBesti's, which has none. WatchieBesti vs Belly

4. Habbie

A habit tracker with a pixel pet. You set your own habits with timers, counters and checklists, such as meditation or taking vitamins, and it reads more than a dozen Apple Health metrics. Miss a goal and your pet leaves a mess to clean up. A Rest Mode pauses goals, and a No Habit Mode turns it into a plain virtual pet.

Suits you if you want to track habits that aren't movement. Habbie covers far more kinds of goal than WatchieBesti. WatchieBesti vs Habbie

5. PetPock

A virtual pet with manual care. You feed it, give it water and bathe it with taps, and send it to school, work and adventures. It has a pet shop, iPhone widgets, and partner widgets for sharing a pet with someone.

Suits you if you like the care-and-play loop of a traditional virtual pet, or want to share one with a partner. WatchieBesti vs PetPock

6. Watch Pet (Kooapps)

A care game from Kooapps. You adopt pets from a shop, feed them, give them water and play with them, and more pets open up as your trainer level rises. It has mini-games and runs on iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch and Mac, with widgets for the Home Screen and the watch. Its App Store listing doesn't mention step tracking. It shows ads, with an option to remove them.

Suits you if you want a casual tap-to-care pet on every Apple device you own.

7. poki

A retro 8-bit pet: puppies, dogs and cats in a small, light app. Steps turn into hearts. It runs on Apple Watch, iPhone and iPad.

Suits you if you want something simple and nostalgic without much to learn. WatchieBesti vs poki

8. StepDog

A step counter with a dog mascot. You collect dog breeds, compete on local leaderboards, and get weather with live backgrounds and a daily forecast.

Suits you if the step count matters more to you than the pet, and you'd like the weather in the same place. WatchieBesti vs StepDog

9. TameWatch

A step-driven pet. Your daily steps earn coins that keep the pet fed, happy and growing, and it moves through growth stages if you stay consistent. It adds streak tracking, a mood journal, and pet widgets for the Home Screen, Lock Screen and Apple Watch. Its App Store listing offers a free month trial.

Suits you if you want a walking-focused pet with streaks and a journal. It doesn't mention heart rate or workouts in its listing.

10. Pixel Paws

A retro 8-bit virtual pet for Apple Watch. You feed, play with and walk your pet, each action on a cooldown timer, and earn coins to unlock new pets, backgrounds and weather scenes. It's a paid app with no ads, no tracking and no in-app purchases, and it was built with kids aged 4 to 12 in mind. Its listing doesn't mention step tracking.

Suits you if you want a simple, kid-friendly care pet with no ads and nothing to buy after the download.

11. Tamawatchi

A pixel pet in the classic virtual-pet style. It has six species, four mini-games and real pet death if you neglect it. You can revive a pet once for a small fee, or buy a one-time Eternal Pet upgrade so it never dies. There's an optional monthly subscription for faster progress and a hospital animation when your pet is sick. Its listing says it has no ads and no analytics.

Suits you if you want old-school stakes and a hand-drawn look, and don't mind paid extras.