Apple watches

Can I use an Apple Watch if my cell phone carrier doesn’t support it? If it only connects to my phone will it still work?

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A GPS only model does not need a cellular carrier. Or a more expensive cellular model that you do not active the cellular features works just like a GPS model.

An GPS only model does "Everything" a cellular model does as long as your iPhone is nearby. The cellular model, if activated with your iPhone carrier, can leave the iPhone behind and still make/receive phone calls, stream Apple Music, send/receive messages, use apps that need access to the internet, such as the weather app(s).

Please read the following

https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT205547

and pay close attention to the footnotes.

Also I read something that it doesn’t connect to your hotspot why is that? Does it connect to your home WiFi? I’m debating on buying one because I’ve wanted to for a while but I’m skeptical about it

If you mean your iPhone as a hotspot, then the Apple Watch does not have to, because it already uses your iPhone as its networking device via Low Energy Bluetooth.

It will connect to WiFi, and if you are in a WiFi area that you have connected your Apple Watch to, the Apple Watch can use that, but it will ONLY use WiFi if the paired iPhone is not nearby, as Low Energy Bluetooth to the iPhone uses less battery in your Apple Watch.

I have a GPS only Apple Watch it is does everything I need. Since I'm never without my iPhone, I did not need to pay an extra $100 U.S. for a cellular model, nor did I need to give my iPhone carrier and extra $10 U.S. a month to activate cellular that I would not need.

I have made and answered phone calls on my Apple Watch. Actually spent a half hour talking to my brother via my GPS only Apple Watch, and he never suspected until I told him when I was finished.

I constantly send and receive iMessages with my Wife.

I've also use the Walkie-Talkie feature with my Wife more any number of times.

I use Find My Friends (which in this case is my Wife) so I can decide if I should call, iMessage, or send email based on whether she is driving or at a location where she would even see my iMessage.

I'm always check the weather.

I set timers for things like when cooking things.

While I can play stored music and podcasts from my Apple Watch, I just play them from my iPhone, HOWEVER, while they are playing, I can stop/start the music, adjust the sound level and skip tracks from my Apple Watch.

There are many other features available on the GPS only Apple Watch, but I'm not going to spend all night writing about them 😀

I've edited what I written above. Jump back and read that.

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/250432474?answerId=250828620022#250828620022

But the answer is YES to all your questions.