An interval workout timer for Apple Watch, with a companion iPhone app for editing programs.
Most interval timers assume you move from one exercise to the next instantly. In real strength work you don’t — you change a strap length, get down onto the floor, find a weight. CloseTraxer treats that gap as part of the workout: transitions are budgeted, and the difference between the budget and reality is recorded.
Transitions can be automatic, or manual. And this is where CloseTraxer is different. If you have set the transition to manual, you control with your watch when you are done with the transition. No more stress to get down to the floor and feel bad for starting late.
When you are done transitioning, tap the watch face, or Double Tap with the thumb and index finger pinch and you transition, on your schedule, no stress.
Requirements
– iPhone running iOS 18 or later
– Apple Watch running watchOS 11 or later, paired to that iPhone
A real Apple Watch is required. The workout session, heart rate, and haptics don’t exist in the Simulator.
How it works
A program has three segments — warm-up, core circuit, cool-down — and each holds a list of moves with a work duration and a budgeted transition between them.
Segments can be set to tap to start, which is the interesting mode and typically used for the core circuit. The transition timer counts down to zero, then keeps counting up as overtime until you actually begin the move. You’re never rushed into an exercise you aren’t set up for, and the overrun is measured rather than hidden. Over a few sessions this shows which transitions you consistently underestimate.
If overtime runs past the segment’s cap, the session pauses automatically, on the assumption you’ve put the watch down rather than spent eleven minutes adjusting a strap.
The watch speaks the next move and uses a distinct haptic for each thing worth noticing — five seconds remaining, work starting and ending, the transition budget running out, and a nudge every five seconds spent in overtime. You can follow a whole session without looking at your wrist.
On Apple Watch Series 9, Ultra 2, and later, Double Tap starts the next move.
The two apps
iPhone edits your program library — the comfortable place to reorder moves and adjust timings. Apple Watch runs the session.
They stay in step automatically: the phone pushes the library to the watch, the watch sends completed session logs back. Both survive the other device being asleep or out of range, so an edit made on the sofa is on the watch by your next session.
Health data
Sessions run as a real workout, recorded as functional strength training, so heart rate and active energy land in the Health app exactly as any other workout does. This also lets watchOS keep the app running with the screen off — something a plain timer app doesn’t get.
You’ll be asked for Health permission the first time you start a session. If you decline, the timer still works but the session won’t be recorded and heart rate won’t display.
Common questions
The watch app hasn’t appeared. Open the Watch app on your iPhone, scroll to Available Apps, and install CloseTraxer. It can take a few minutes after installing the iPhone app.
Programs edited on the phone aren’t on the watch. Both devices sync when they’re in range and awake. Open the app on both and give it a moment.
No heart rate during a session. Check Settings → Health → Data Access & Devices → CloseTraxer on your iPhone and confirm heart rate and active energy are allowed.
The session paused by itself. Overtime passed the program’s cap. Adjust the cap for that segment in the iPhone app if your real transitions need longer.
Privacy
Everything is stored on your devices. There is no account, no server, and no analytics. CloseTraxer collects no data, tracks nothing, and transmits nothing — the only data leaving the app is the workout it writes to Health, which stays under your control in the Health app.