Apple Watch 3/Watchos 5 - Swimming not counting laps or calories correctly.

Thanks, Andy.

+1 on this!

See my screenshots below that show a significant drop in recorded laps and calories starting Sept 17 with the watchOS 5 release.

My typical swim time is about 30-35 mins. I went from about 50 laps recorded for that time down to only 2 for the entire session. Same story with a significant drop in calories recorded.

Talked to Apple Support this morning and they suggested recalibrating the watch. (Instructions here: Calibrating your Apple Watch for improved Workout and Activity accuracy - Apple Support). I'm going to try it, but won't be swimming again until Friday. If this works for others in the meantime, let us know.

I use Apple Watch previously, and I feel it is a good device for sports. But currently, I use COUNTU Goal as my daily swimming tracker. It's smaller and easy to use. And COUNTU Goal has a very useful function, lap/time vibrate alarm function. I thought it's enough for my workout.

Same issue here but I was in the pool trying to squeeze in 2500m, I got to 2550 and jumped out and finished the workout. I got home and workout app is only showing a 1000m swim but gave me the calories, almost closed the move ring, closed exercise ring and shows the hr duration of my swim just the distance is way off. Super frustrating. Anyone find a fix to this iOS 5 update glitchiness? Thanks in advance! Just noticed cals are off too!!

I had another experience today. I swam 50 laps and it recorded only 46 laps!! I average less than a minute per lap. This has happened so many times and i have even joined the discussion previously. What is disappointing is we have not heard anything from apple. Do they care? I am thinking of getting a garmin instead!!

I did 50 laps a couple of days ago and it recorded only 45. The time of 47 mins+ is correct.

i read the other day that series 5 do not have much difference with the series 4. Apple has to improve first before they roll out the 5.

Having the same issue. First swim today with Apple Watch 3 since updating to WatchOS 5. Swam 1,700 yards this morning and the Workout app said I swam 475 yards and burned 74 calories. First time it's been inaccurate. After reading your post, I quit the Workout app and restarted the watch. We'll see if it works correctly, when I swim next.

Hmm can make sense, but, starting the problem just after watchos 5? also noting it comes with a lot of changes in workout app?

As a developer myself it seems more like a software problem reading some sensors.

I disabled the new features of auto-start and auto-stop workouts to see if it makes any change, but I won't be swimming until tomorrow.

Hi all I am having the same prob I swim 52 lengths since update it’s registered 2,11,2,7 and 3 lengths,

The calories are miles out to.

I’ve unpaired the watch, cleared and restored from a back up I’ve also unpaired, cleared and set up as a new watch still faulty.

I phoned apple who knew nothing of this fault, and they booked me in for a visit to a store to check the watch for Saturday, I really think I am wasting my time going as it seems obvious that it a software fault.

I’ve just checked and there is a update out, it doesn’t mention about swimming but it does say something about activity tracking, I have updated but I won’t be able to test it till Monday.

If in the meantime anyone does do the update and tries it before Saturday could you please post an outcome as it will save me a long trip to a store.

Otherwise I will pop an update on Monday.

Thanks Andy.

I've only done one swim so far with watchOS 5, but can definitely confirm that auto sets isn't working at all for me. Distance, laps, and calories are all fine and reasonable. But I really miss the auto sets.

I used to have a problem with watchOS v4 where, only while swimming, the distance displayed on the watch was totally bogus...something like 3K yards after one lap, and it never changed, even though the number of laps changed and was correct. But, after completing the workout, the total distance displayed and synced was correct. Rebooting the watch fixed it. Maybe worth a try for you?

But, indeed, frustrating.

Chris

P.S. 6500 yards @ 5x/week...wow!!!

Hi are you still having the same fault

I contacted apple today for a 3rd time and they took some readings off my watch over Wi-fi and couldn’t find a fault with the watch itself.

He said it’s possibly a software fault surprise there, he has past my reading on to a different team to look at all the info and will come back to me in 4 days maximum.

In the meantime he suggested that more people need to contact Apple via the apple support app to register this fault as it will help.

Cheers Andy.

Hi Andy,

Thanks—because of your message I also just contacted Apple and let them know this was still an issue. Pointed the customer service rep to this discussion forum. And I can confirm, as user SEGefren mentioned, the update to v5.01 didn't solve the issue.

—Ken

I’m having exactly the same problem. I swam 6 laps nd it said I burned 3 calories and swam 0 laps. I guess Apple didn’t check this out too good on this upgrade. I wanted to at least count some calories during my swimming workout so I put it on water fitness. Laps do not count that way however. This is unacceptable!!!

Same problem, swim my heart out for 45 min and it gave me 37 cal burned. Never had this issue prior to ois 5 and 5.01 doesn't fix it. I have tried all the resets mentioned with no change. Such a bummer. I use this daily.