We all have different ways of motivating ourselves to exercise, so when Apple announced Workout Buddy for the Apple Watch at WWDC 2025, it made us think about what sorts of verbal encouragement would spur us to complete our workouts. We couldn’t help but imagine the different types of future Workout Buddies — and how they might help, cajole or even bargain with us to hit our fitness goals.

Workout Buddy in WatchOS 26 will be available at the outset in eight workouts (such as running and cycling) that you can activate when the workout begins. It exists as a voice through the watch and Bluetooth headphones or earbuds and is modeled on actual Apple Fitness Plus trainers. Workout Buddy can deliver progress indicators, stats and vocal encouragement as you push through an exercise routine.

Initially, Workout Buddy comes across as the type of friend who’s there to give you a pat on the back and a helpful rundown of what you just accomplished. But people respond to different types of encouragement. As we wait for WatchOS 26 to arrive (the software is currently available only to developers), here are some different types of workout buddies that could someday — or hopefully not, in some cases — echo in our heads while we’re sweating.

The cheerleader: «That light sheen of sweat makes your skin positively radiant! Good job hitting the half-mile mark! Wow — you have the resting heart rate of a 20-year-old!»

The drill sergeant (said in the sweetest voice possible): «Get off your ass and burn off those donuts! You’ve still got two miles to go before you reach the calories you consumed, champ!»

Your fittest friend who never seems to exercise: «Listen, brah, if you don’t push one more mile outta this run, you’re never gonna refine that six-pack and ever, like, find true love or succeed at anything in your life. Just straight-talkin’ ya, brah.»

Your friend who keeps stats at baseball games: «You’ve completed 1.39 miles of this run with a heart rate of 185 beats per second and burned approximately 140 calories, which is slightly below yesterday’s run, probably because you got only 6.4 hours of sleep last night and ate 50g more pasta for dinner than your usual serving…»

Your chill friend: «Hey, good set. I’m right here with you. Let’s do another one.»

The guilt-tripper: «Way to complete that 30-minute walk! Those donuts are still waiting at home!»

The buddy who knows you so well: «All right, you’re doing it. Look, if you can push through another half a mile, you can justify that bagel and a glass of wine tonight to celebrate.»

The caffeinated spin class instructor: «Let’s go babes, keep on keeping on! Yeah! One and two and… That’s right! You can do this!»

The zen dude: «Hello there. Good morning. Let’s thank our bodies for being here. And let’s be present in this workout. Only 15 gentle miles of uphill running to go. Namaste.»

The nihilist buddy: «Wow — is that really all you could muster? Fine, whatever, it doesn’t really matter anyway.»

Mom: «You got out there and did a workout. You did good, hon.»

Werner Herzog: «You have walked 20 miles. Can you feel the futility? I can tell you haven’t even left your house. Why do you make me a participant in your lies?»

Maybe the most important Workout Buddy: «Hey. Hi. I know it’s early, and you’re warm and comfortable, but you said you were going to wake up early and go for a ride. C’mon — you can do this. Just get out of bed. We’ll do it together. Your favorite coffee shop is right at the end of the route.»

I switched from a Google Pixel 3 XL in 2021 to Apple’s iPhone 12 Pro Max, and in the years since, I’ve dearly missed Google’s Hold For Me. This feature is so useful in saving me from the misery of listening to awful hold music whenever I needed to call up a business, my health insurance provider, my cellphone carrier or any of the other myriad adulting tasks that still require speaking with a representative. Instead, the Google feature would helpfully silence my phone while keeping the call active, listen to the hold music for me and then ring when it’s time to return to the call while alerting the representative that I’ll return shortly.

And so at the Worldwide Developers Conference 2025, when Apple announced Hold Assist — which sounds awfully similar to Pixel’s Hold For Me — I was thrilled. I’ve been eying a switch back to Android for the rumored Pixel 10, partly because I’ve missed having these call controls for everyday issues. But with iOS 26, Hold Assist should detect hold music, and then give you the option to silence the call while keeping it active. Then, when the representative comes back on, the phone will notify you when it’s time to return to the call. We’ll have to wait until at least the public beta to start trying this feature out, but on paper, it sounds almost exactly like the Pixel feature.

While I’m glad that the iPhone will finally have an equivalent to this feature, it’s worth pointing out that it’s taken a long time for such calling enhancements to make their way outside of Google’s Pixel line. Google introduced Hold For Me in 2020, but most other Android phones made by Samsung, OnePlus and others do not include their own take on the idea. 

The new Call Screening feature for iOS 26 is similar to the Pixel’s Call Screen option, but it sounds like Apple’s rendition will take a more automated approach. Apple’s Call Screen will collect information like the person’s name and purpose from an unknown caller for you, and then present it as a summary to help you decide if you should pick up. You can also send more prompts as needed if you’re still unsure.

Google’s solution lets you pick the questions that are asked to the caller and, instead of a summary, you watch as a text transcription of the call takes place. 

What I appreciate most about these features is that they remember that the iPhone is a phone at the end of the day. And spam callers remain just as much of a problem now as ever, especially as AI voice clones add even more issues to the kinds of scams trying to reach people.

Until these features are available when iOS 26 arrives later this year, I will just continue to bring my patience to the next time I have to call up my health insurance provider. And keeping my fingers crossed that hold music can become a thing of the past when Hold Assist becomes widely available.