HT206995: Automatically unlock your Mac with your Apple Watch

Learn about Automatically unlock your Mac with your Apple Watch
woodman2200

Q: Unlock Mac with Apple Watch

Has anybody got other solutions to get unlocking Mac with Watch to work?

I have followed all the latest advice and I still get the message unable to communicate with Apple Watch

iMac with Retina 5K display, macOS Sierra (10.12)

Posted on Sep 23, 2016 4:41 AM

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Q: Unlock Mac with Apple Watch

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  • by rhondafromchristchurch,

    rhondafromchristchurch rhondafromchristchurch Sep 23, 2016 5:08 AM in response to woodman2200
    Level 1 (12 points)
    Apple Watch
    Sep 23, 2016 5:08 AM in response to woodman2200

    Hi please see my post that I have just put on re

    opening mac by Apple Watch. Hope this works

    for you.

  • by Raphael Weidlich,

    Raphael Weidlich Raphael Weidlich Sep 23, 2016 7:13 AM in response to woodman2200
    Level 1 (48 points)
    Apple Watch
    Sep 23, 2016 7:13 AM in response to woodman2200

    After a long research I found these 2 links and it resolved my similar problems:

    https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT207198

     

    https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204915

    follow the instructions. Hope, it'll help.

  • by FrankGOT,

    FrankGOT FrankGOT Sep 24, 2016 1:30 AM in response to Raphael Weidlich
    Level 1 (8 points)
    Apple Watch
    Sep 24, 2016 1:30 AM in response to Raphael Weidlich

    This did not work for me. I already switched from two-step to two-factor authentitation (this works fine) before the problem occurs. A message "Your mac was unable to communicate with your Apple Watch" turns up after marking the tickbox 'Allow your Apple Watch to unlock your Mac" (see screenshot).

    Mac to AppleWatch - connection failure.png

  • by FrankGOT,

    FrankGOT FrankGOT Sep 24, 2016 1:32 AM in response to woodman2200
    Level 1 (8 points)
    Apple Watch
    Sep 24, 2016 1:32 AM in response to woodman2200

    Having the same problem.

    A message "Your mac was unable to communicate with your Apple Watch" turns up after marking the tickbox 'Allow your Apple Watch to unlock your Mac" [see screenshot; the tick box is not marked in the screenshot, but i did click/mark it ]

     

    Mac to AppleWatch - connection failure.png

  • by léonie,

    léonie léonie Sep 24, 2016 1:44 AM in response to FrankGOT
    Level 10 (107,942 points)
    iCloud
    Sep 24, 2016 1:44 AM in response to FrankGOT

    Make sure, Bluetooth is still enabled on the Mac.

     

    Your paired iPhone may not yet be able to connect to iCloud.

    After you upgraded from two-step authentication to two-factor authentication restart all devices and sign into iCloud again.

    • Restart the Mac and sign into iCloud from the System Preferences > iCloud.
    • Restart the Watch while it is close to the iPhone and restart the paired  iPhone and sign again into iCloud in the Settings > iCloud.
  • by FrankGOT,

    FrankGOT FrankGOT Sep 24, 2016 2:28 AM in response to léonie
    Level 1 (8 points)
    Apple Watch
    Sep 24, 2016 2:28 AM in response to léonie

    Thanks Léonie. I tried your suggestions but this did not work for me. Strangely now even the tickbox 'Allow your Apple Watch to unlock your Mac' is gone.  Weird.

  • by léonie,

    léonie léonie Sep 24, 2016 2:34 AM in response to FrankGOT
    Level 10 (107,942 points)
    iCloud
    Sep 24, 2016 2:34 AM in response to FrankGOT
    Thanks Léonie. I tried your suggestions but this did not work for me. Strangely now even the tickbox 'Allow your Apple Watch to unlock your Mac' is gone.  Weird.

    This option will be hidden, if the watch is not paired with iPhone - or the Mac thinks so.

    How to check if a Mac Supports Auto Unlock with the Apple Watch

     

    Screen Shot 2016-09-23 at 11.40.10GMT.png

    So check, if your watch is still paired with its iPhone  if you no longer see this setting in the System Preferences..  Then unpair and pair the watch again with the iPhone.

    https://help.apple.com/watch/#/apdde4d6f98e

  • by FrankGOT,

    FrankGOT FrankGOT Sep 24, 2016 3:08 AM in response to léonie
    Level 1 (8 points)
    Apple Watch
    Sep 24, 2016 3:08 AM in response to léonie

    @Léonie.  I unpaired and repaired my Apple Watch. After that the tick box 'Allow your apple watch to unlock your mac' came back. But i still go the initial error message "Your mac was unable to communicate with your Apple Watch".

    That said, the tickbox also was gone, and came back on my MacBook and here the Apple Watch unlocking does work (again).  Could the problem be that the new unlock feature is not yet set up to work with multiple macs ?

    ps - thanks for your help so far. I am happy to take more suggestions and troubleshoot more; but may do so a little later (the sun is shining outside..:) //Frank

  • by léonie,

    léonie léonie Sep 24, 2016 3:27 AM in response to FrankGOT
    Level 10 (107,942 points)
    iCloud
    Sep 24, 2016 3:27 AM in response to FrankGOT

    Could the problem be that the new unlock feature is not yet set up to work with multiple macs ?

    I am using the watch to unlock three different Macs, that are compatible with unlock.

     

    It is working very well with my two MacBook Pros, when I am at home and have only one Wi-Fi available (unless I moved too far away from the iPhone), but when I am in my office at work, where my two Macs are on different networks for different Time Capsules, I can only unlock the Mac that is on the same network as the iPhone.

     

    Is the network card of your Mac compatible? It should be for a Mac mid 2013 or newer.

    But check, if the Mac lists it as compatible in the System profile: https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-10672

     

    Enjoy the weekend and the sunshine!

  • by FrankGOT,

    FrankGOT FrankGOT Sep 24, 2016 3:35 AM in response to léonie
    Level 1 (8 points)
    Apple Watch
    Sep 24, 2016 3:35 AM in response to léonie

    Thanks. My iMac is one year old (Status: supported, as in the system report).

    Have a good weekend too

    /F

  • by FrankGOT,

    FrankGOT FrankGOT Sep 24, 2016 5:31 AM in response to FrankGOT
    Level 1 (8 points)
    Apple Watch
    Sep 24, 2016 5:31 AM in response to FrankGOT

    Interestingly, after a couple more tries (including taking off my AppleWatch and put it on again) I now managed to get my Apple Watch to unlock my iMac. Something seems to be fragile in the communication between my iMac and AppleWatch.

  • by Doooooop,

    Doooooop Doooooop Sep 25, 2016 12:30 PM in response to woodman2200
    Level 1 (4 points)
    Sep 25, 2016 12:30 PM in response to woodman2200

    Hello,

    I had the same problem. none of the forums helped.

    Then i tried turning Bluetooth off and then back on from my Mac and it worked straight away.

  • by FrankGOT,

    FrankGOT FrankGOT Sep 25, 2016 12:58 PM in response to Doooooop
    Level 1 (8 points)
    Apple Watch
    Sep 25, 2016 12:58 PM in response to Doooooop

    @Doooooop - txs, good to know.

  • by dgturc83,

    dgturc83 dgturc83 Sep 25, 2016 5:33 PM in response to woodman2200
    Level 1 (16 points)
    Sep 25, 2016 5:33 PM in response to woodman2200

    I have also noticed having other Bluetooth devises paired with your Mac will cause problems with the unlock feature. For example, if I pair my Bose speaker, the Mac will try to unlock from my watch then fail and ask for a password 100% of the time. As soon as I un-pair the speaker, it starts unlocking from my watch perfectly.

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