Can't update series 4 watch: claims it's not connected to the internet, but it is

Thanks for the suggestion. I have tried the steps that are possible with no luck.

Note that this phone is new to me and has not yet been paired with my phone so I have no way to access anything on the phone, so suggestions about removing media or restoring from backup are impossible for me to try.

• Check your Internet connection

A: I am sure that my phone has internet connection. I have no way to access the watch so I have no idea of its status.

• Restart your watch

A: Tried about 20 times. No luck.

* Remove media and apps

A: I have no access to my watch

* Unpair and update your Apple Watch

A: Watch is already unpaired, and the error in question is preventing me from updating

* Restore from backup

A: I have no access to my watch

Update: After about 30 minutes on the phone with Apple support we were able to get it to work. What did we do? Basically tried different things, all of which I'd done before. Kept both phone and watch on chargers, which I'm pretty sure I tried too. The person I spoke to admitted that this is a known issue and that they have no idea why it happens or how to get around it.

I should add that the person was very knowledgeable and patient.

This issue is resolved but in a rather unsatisfactory manner.

Further update: I did the factory reset (thanks for answering in the other thread) hoping that would help but alas I'm in exactly in the same position.

Nice idea alas no help. I still get the dreaded "...you are not connected to the internet". I did confirm that I was indeed.

Thanks for the idea Randy; alas I had no updates to delete.

I believe the update that's trying to happen is for the watch, not the phone. (But I tried your suggestion anyway)

Hi Akurilov, I am still experiencing the same problem. It's incredibly frustrating.

I hope someone can help me (us) solve this problem.

It was basically 100501 attempts of exactly the same thing. It failed on the first 100500 and succeeded finally. The tech mentioned that downloads won't start unless the phone is at least 50% charged; it's possible that when I tried it earlier the phone wasn't charged enough. I don't know whether the watch also needs to be at least 50% charged, but certainly worth confirming.

But I don't think that's the whole story. The tech also mentioned that this is a known problem and that Apple has no idea what's causing it. Which is quite bad, because this has been going on for a very long time. I imagine as it's intermittent it's very hard to debug. If it were my code, I would add better error messages than "you are not connected to the internet" which is clearly incorrect. And trace through the code to see what kind of events can lead to this conclusion, whether it's true or not, and add different messages for each event. But I don't work for Apple :-)

I would recommend that you call Apple support. They were quite prompt and very patient, and ultimately did solve my problem.

Good luck!