How to
How to track hockey shifts on Apple Watch
You can track every shift on an Apple Watch without touching it during the game. Here is how to do it with Hockeywise, and how to read the result.
Steps
Download Hockeywise on iPhone and Apple Watch
Install Hockeywise from the App Store on your iPhone; the watch app comes with it. It needs an Apple Watch and an iPhone.
Start a skate on your watch
Open Hockeywise on the watch and tap to start a skate before you step on the ice. It records as a workout, so it keeps running with your wrist down.
Play your game
Leave the phone in the bag. The watch tells bench, on-ice play and whistle time apart from movement and heart rate, and finds each shift as it happens.
End the skate
Tap end when you are done. The sheet syncs to your phone by itself and retries if the phone is out of range.
Read the shift strip
Open the game sheet on your iPhone. The strip shows every shift on one clock, the gaps are bench time, and each shift lists length, whistle time, skated distance and heart rate.
Hockeywise is not in the App Store yet; it launches in early 2027. Join the waitlist and we email you the day it is live.
Why a shift is longer than the clock says
The scoreboard counts game time. Your watch counts real time. Whistles, face-offs and line changes sit inside your shift, so a shift that the NHL logs at about 47 seconds of ice time can run well over a minute on a wrist. Hockeywise keeps stoppages inside the shift and ends it only after a stretch of quiet bench time, so the numbers match how long you were actually out there.
What to look at
Three numbers do most of the work: shift length, bench time between shifts, and how heart rate recovers on the bench. Short shifts with long benches are fine. Long shifts with short benches are where players fade, and the shift strip shows it at a glance.
Frequently asked questions
Does the watch need a tap at every shift?
No. Shifts start and end on their own. A whistle does not end a shift; about sixty quiet seconds on the bench do.
Why does my shift look longer than the game clock says?
A watch measures wall-clock time, and stoppages stay inside the shift. In elite hockey a shift is about 85 seconds of wall-clock time with roughly two whistles, against the 45 to 50 seconds the NHL reports as time on ice per shift.
Where can I download Hockeywise?
It launches on the App Store in early 2027. Join the waitlist at hockeywise.app for the launch email.