Apple Watch App Not Working After iOS 14 Update

I was experiencing similar issues. Even after a factory reset of my Watch and a factory reset of my iPhone (with a subsequent restore from iCloud) I was running into the issue of the Watch app not launching or presenting me with a syncing screen. I eventually was able to work around it by removing the Watch app from my phone. As many might discover, starting in iOS14 you can not actually "delete" the Watch app, rather you can "Remove it from your home screen". I found that by going into Settings-->iPhone Storage-->Watch and selecting the option "Offload App" I was actually able to remove the app off my iPhone (I had a hard time finding the Watch app in iPhone Storage so I actually used the magnifying glass in the upper right of the screen to search for it). Once that was accomplished I was able to go into the App Store and re-download the Watch app, to my astonishment the Watch app launched and functioned without issue.

A CAUTIONARY NOTE: After re-downloading the app and "setting up my Watch" I noticed that while I was able to setup my Watch from my prior backup I had lost ALL of my activity and health data. While somewhat frustrating I felt it an acceptable trade-off since I was able to use my Watch and iPhone again.

Not sure if it will work for others, but I figured I would share my experience with others. Good luck.

Hi Shep,

I was having the same issue and wanted a solution where I didn’t have to reset and erase my phone. So, I kept trying out different things and actually managed to get the app completely erased and then redownloaded successfully, without doing a complete erase and reset of my phone!! I'll share with you the steps that I took and hopefully this works for you too! I'm thinking the issue might be related to not having my phone updated to the latest IOS software 14.3 when I paired my watch. If that is the cause, then hopefully Apple fixes the issue because that is ridiculous! Hope they fix it permanently either way. Anyway, see what I did below.

1. On the watch go to settings > general > reset > Erase All Content and Settings
2. Go to your Bluetooth settings on your phone and if you see your Apple Watch, click on the 'i' and click "Forget this device"
3. Go to "appleid.apple.com", scroll down to devices and you should see your apple watch. Click your apple watch and select "Remove from account".
4. Next you will need to turn off "Find my iPhone", which should turn off activation lock on the watch. On your phone go to settings > click your name > Find My > Find My iPhone > toggle this off
5. Next step (not sure if necessary) is to go go settings > general > iPhone storage > scroll to the Watch app and "Remove all backups". I saw someone do this somewhere else, saying that there might be corrupt files in the backups, so removing them might be a good idea. If you do have a backup and want to try without this step, it might still work, just wanted to mention this.
6. These next steps have to be done kind of quickly. What I did next was do a Hard reset of my phone (quickly press volume up > quickly press volume down > press and hold side button until Apple logo appears and then release side button). Once the phone turns back on, you should have enough time to be able to get into the app and then unpair the watch, but you have to do this super quickly before the app kicks you out. Make sure your app is on the first screen once you unlock your phone, because you don't have much time from when the phone turns on from the hard reset to when the app will fail.
7. Next, go into the app, and once loaded, quickly press "All Watches" in top left screen > Click the 'i' next to your watch > then click "Unpair Apple Watch". Because you turned off Find my iPhone in the previous step, this should have turned off the activation lock, so you shouldn't have to type in your Apple ID password.
8. After you click "Unpair Apple Watch", you should see a screen where it shows it is unpairing your watch. Once I got to this point, the app didn't kick me out and I was successfully able to unpair my watch.
9. After the unpair is completed, go back to your apps and you should have the ability to completely delete the Watch app. First remove the app from your home screen and then completely delete the app from the app library.
10. After you have deleted the app, you can go back to the app store and download it again and you will be able to get into the app and start over with your watch.

So far my watch and the app seem to be working fine. I really hope this works for you and others! I'd be curious to know if this works for you, or if I can explain anything better. I feel bad for all these people who are having this frustrating issue!

Hi John,

I was having the same issue and wanted a solution where I didn’t have to reset and erase my phone. So, I kept trying out different things and actually managed to get the app completely erased and then redownloaded successfully, without doing a complete erase and reset of my phone!! I'll share with you the steps that I took and hopefully this works for you too! I'm thinking the issue might be related to not having my phone updated to the latest IOS software 14.3 when I paired my watch. If that is the cause, then hopefully Apple fixes the issue because that is ridiculous! Hope they fix it permanently either way. Anyway, see what I did below.

1. On the watch go to settings > general > reset > Erase All Content and Settings
2. Go to your Bluetooth settings on your phone and if you see your Apple Watch, click on the 'i' and click "Forget this device"
3. Go to "appleid.apple.com", scroll down to devices and you should see your apple watch. Click your apple watch and select "Remove from account".
4. Next you will need to turn off "Find my iPhone", which should turn off activation lock on the watch. On your phone go to settings > click your name > Find My > Find My iPhone > toggle this off
5. Next step (not sure if necessary) is to go go settings > general > iPhone storage > scroll to the Watch app and "Remove all backups". I saw someone do this somewhere else, saying that there might be corrupt files in the backups, so removing them might be a good idea. If you do have a backup and want to try without this step, it might still work, just wanted to mention this.
6. These next steps have to be done kind of quickly. What I did next was do a Hard reset of my phone (quickly press volume up > quickly press volume down > press and hold side button until Apple logo appears and then release side button). Once the phone turns back on, you should have enough time to be able to get into the app and then unpair the watch, but you have to do this super quickly before the app kicks you out. Make sure your app is on the first screen once you unlock your phone, because you don't have much time from when the phone turns on from the hard reset to when the app will fail.
7. Next, go into the app, and once loaded, quickly press "All Watches" in top left screen > Click the 'i' next to your watch > then click "Unpair Apple Watch". Because you turned off Find my iPhone in the previous step, this should have turned off the activation lock, so you shouldn't have to type in your Apple ID password.
8. After you click "Unpair Apple Watch", you should see a screen where it shows it is unpairing your watch. Once I got to this point, the app didn't kick me out and I was successfully able to unpair my watch.
9. After the unpair is completed, go back to your apps and you should have the ability to completely delete the Watch app. First remove the app from your home screen and then completely delete the app from the app library.
10. After you have deleted the app, you can go back to the app store and download it again and you will be able to get into the app and start over with your watch.

So far my watch and the app seem to be working fine. I really hope this works for you and others! I'd be curious to know if this works for you, or if I can explain anything better. I feel bad for all these people who are having this frustrating issue!

Settings > General > iPhone Storage. Within iPhone storage find your Watch application. There should be an option to "offload" or "Delete" the app altogether. What worked for me was deleting it altogether. After deleting, re-download from the apple store. Make sure you're connected to Wifi/internet before downloading. After opening the re-downloaded app, it should prompt you to set up your apple watch. Be sure your apple watch is charging with its original cord and adapter.

If you've reset your watch, DO NOT choose the language or region before pairing. Somehow it prevented me from pairing. I hope this helps. If you have any questions lemme know!

Settings > General > iPhone Storage. Within iPhone storage find your Watch application. There should be an option to "offload" or "Delete" the app altogether. What worked for me was deleting it altogether. After deleting, re-download from the apple store. Make sure you're connected to Wifi/internet before downloading. After opening the re-downloaded app, it should prompt you to set up your apple watch. Be sure your apple watch is charging with its original cord and adapter.

If you've reset your watch, DO NOT choose the language or region before pairing. Somehow it prevented me from pairing. I hope this helps. If you have any questions lemme know!

Now working!!

Ok, so this is what I did, after several frustrating attempts of even calling apple support and not having any help (they even suggested to use my watch as a digital watch, not pairing it!!!!)

1.- backup iPhone on iCloud

2.- erase all content and settings

3.- turn on iPhone

4.- load iCloud backup

5.-go to general-iPhone storage-use lookup to look for watch app-delete app

6-go to app store, reinstall watch app

7.- on apple watch go to settings

8.-scroll down to restore

9.- restore apple watch and erase all data

10.- on iPhone open the watch app

11.-pair!!!

12.-voila!!

I have finally got mine to work.

I got through to a senior manager and sent a diagnostics report to them but they never got back to me after that - very unhelpful. So I decided to just go for it and backup my phone onto my computer then reset the phone. Then when I reinstalled the backup onto my phone I was able to delete the app and reinstall it. Now everything works perfectly.

The community was a million times more helpful than Apple itself

Here’s what I did to fix this issue. It was extremely frustrating so hopefully it works for you too.

1st step: reset your Apple Watch and put to the side.

2nd step: go to your phone and settings, general, reset, and reset all content and setting (make sure you back up your phone to iCloud)

3rd step: after you set up phone again, go to general in settings, iPhone storage, go down to watch and delete from phone.

4th step: go to app store and install watch app

5th step: now you can pair watch to phone by opening the watch app.

hope this works!!!!

I got it to work!!

1. installed 4.2
2. erased and reset watch
3. backed up iPhone, erased and restored from backup
4. once iPhone was restored I was able to delete and watch app and re-download it.
5. watch app finally worked and I was able to connect and setup my watch as a new watch.

Hope this helps someone!

I had this exact same problem today with my iPhone xs max and mi brand new watch series 6. It worked great for 2 days and then the watch app wouldn’t open and my watch wasn’t connecting to my iPhone. I read a lot about this issue and it seems it happens if you previously had an apple watch paired with you iPhone and pair a new one without erasing the old one.

I tried everything, shutting it off, hard reset and tried to erase the app with no success. Finally I did the factory reset and downloaded my backup from iCloud and it did not work (App still would not open). So I did a factory reset again, this time started as a new iPhone (sadly) and it worked just fine. Luckily i just cared about my passwords and photos so starting without the iPhone backup was not a problem.

TL’DR: The issue is on the iPhone, not on the watch. To fix it, factory reset your iPhone and start it as a new iPhone (without the iCloud backup)

I did an encrypted backup to my laptop then unplugged the phone (encrypted keeps more data such as saved passwords). Then reset the phone not plugged in. Went through all the steps but didn’t set up an Apple ID or anything with the reset phone.

then I deleted the watch app and redownloaded it (not sure I needed to as when I restored the backup it restored the old faulty app)

then I plugged my phone into the laptop and it came up with the option on I tunes to either set it up as a new iPhone or restore it from a backup. I restored it from the backup then when that had I completed I deleted the watch app and then redownloaded it and everything worked fine.

the only thing not saved on the backup was Face ID and I had to log back into a few apps such as Snapchat but all my app data was saved

Chiming in to say I was having a similar problem, but I did finally fix it.

Shortly after getting a new Apple Watch SE, the Watch app would not open no matter what I did. I first did a factory reset of my iPhone and restored it from iCloud backup. I then went into the “Find My” app and deleted the watch, which turns off the Activation Lock. (Very important.) Then I factory reset my Watch SE. After this, the watch and Watch iOS app worked normally and I set up the watch as a new watch. I lost about a day’s worth of data but worth it now that everything is working normally.

I wish Apple would formally acknowledge this problem and provide a way to fix without the factory resets!

For all people who are following this thread there is a solution from charlieutter and a slight variation by me. On or around Nov 18.

Key points:

Once the watch has been factory reset, remove activation lock on FindMy. This means remove it from Find My.

When restoring the phone, after you reset the phone, Remove The watch App and redownload it.

Then repair the watch. This worked well for me and a few others.

You will loose all watch data, but if you backup your phone and restore you should be fine.

so i have just received my new iwatch 6 and i could pair it because the watch app kept crashing. So made sure my phone was backed up and i factory reset my iphone11. Then i restored my phone and deleted the watch app and reinstalled it, now it's working. Apple really need to developed a better troubleshoot for the watch.

I tried everything aside a full factory reset. I decided to try it as a last resort. Backed everything up to the cloud and crossed my fingers and did the factory reset. It resolved my issues and I was able to finally pair my watch (series6) up to my phone (Xsmax))and my watch app is seems to be working fine now and is no longer locked up.