Refresh Widgets

One of the key features of Numerics is its ability to automatically update your dashboards as frequently as possible. However, there may be instances when you'd want to manually refresh your widgets. This guide will walk you through the process, addressing common questions and issues that you might encounter along the way.

Understanding Widget Refresh in Numerics

When Numerics is open and on screen, it updates each widget every 60 seconds by default. However, services that Numerics integrates with can impose limits on how often apps can request data. To navigate these limits, Numerics uses intelligent scheduling to prevent exhausting available API calls and ensure continuous connectivity.

Users can force a manual refresh by tapping the refresh button in the widget detail view. This action bypasses limit checking and immediately fetches new data. If API limits have already been reached, the widget may go into an error state, signified by an exclamation mark ('!'). Numerics will automatically check for updates and exit the error state once API access resumes.

Custom data integration widgets (like JSON or CSV) aren't subject to these rate limits and will update every 60 seconds as long as the app is active and in the foreground of your device. After fetching new data, Numerics syncs it to iCloud, triggering a push update to all other connected devices

How to Manually Refresh Widgets in Numerics

While automatic updates are a convenient feature, you might find yourself needing to manually refresh your widgets.

To refresh a widget manually:

1. Open the Numerics app.

2. Navigate to the dashboard containing the widget you wish to refresh.

3. Tap on the widget to open the widget detail view.

4. Tap on the refresh button.

This process will force the widget to fetch new data immediately, overriding any limit checking.

Tips to Improve Widget Refresh Frequency

Here are some tips to optimize background updates and improve the refresh frequency of your widgets:

1. Make sure Numerics has permission to send you notifications. You can check this in device Settings > Notifications > Numerics.

2. Enable the 'Change Notifications' switch for widgets you want to update frequently.

3. Limit the number of widgets enabled for 'Change Notifications' or 'Show on Apple Watch' to ensure critical widgets are prioritized during each background update opportunity.

4. Using Numerics on an Apple Watch or adding Numerics as a favorite app in your Apple Watch Dock can improve update performance.

5. If a Numerics widget is set as a complication on the Apple Watch, the update frequency can increase significantly.

6. Open the Numerics app often. This signals to the OS that you're actively using Numerics and increases the likelihood of background fetch opportunities.

7. Use an Apple TV as a Numerics Dashboard Server to keep your Numerics updated across all devices. Just ensure that the setting to "Disable Screensaver" is turned on in Numerics for tvOS.

If you're having issues with widget refreshes or not receiving timely updates, you can reach out to Numerics support. You can do this through the 'Let us know' section of the relevant widget. This will send the widget’s log as an attachment to the support team for analysis.