watchOS and compatible iOS versions

You're pairing your apple watch to your iPhone and suddenly there is a message: "This Apple Watch needs a newer version of iOS in order to pair" And your asking yourself "what am I doing wrong"

Well, mostly nothing. watchOS versions have requirements for the iOS on the iPhone it is pairing to.

So, for watchOS 10 you will need to run a version of iOS 17 on your iPhone in order to pair the watch with your iPhone. So no, If you're still in possession of an iPhone X for example. That model cannot update to iOS 17. So you cannot go and buy a new watch from the store and pair it With your iPhone, because your iPhone is not on iOS 17. To pair a watch running watchOS 10 , you'll need to have an iPhone with iOS 17 installed. If you allready use a watch with this phone, you will see that you can keep on continuing to use the watch, but that you cannot update further then the latest avaliable version of watchOS 9. The update to watchOS 10 will not be avaliable to you.

The same goes up for people still using iOS 15, for instance on an iPhone 6S. The watch that is paired cannot update further then the latest version of watchOS 8, and a watch running anything newer then that will refuse to pair.

So keep this information in mind if you're looking to buy a new Apple Watch when still using an older iPhone. If you're looking for a different watch and still running an older iPhone with iOS 16 or 15, keep in mind that you better can go and look for a refurbished watch, that is not allready running watchOS 10 (if you'er running iOS 16) or 9 (when you're running iOS 15)