Apple Watch unlock with Face ID not working on iOS 14.7.1

The issue has been narrowed down to mask detection.

if you switch off mask detection in iOS, the the watch unlock will work in 14.7.1.

Switch on iPhone unlock with mask detection, and auto watch unlock will fail.

Unpairing my Apple Watch from my iPhone https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204568

Then pairing and restoring my Apple Watch to my iPhone https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204505

Cured my Apple Watch unlock via iPhone issues.

No need to reset/unpair and re-pair. The problem is with the mask detection setting. Just turn off Unlock with apple watch in the phone passcode settings and the problem goes away. This is why unpair/repair works. It restores with this off.

Go back and turn on the mask detection setting on your iphone and see what happens. I did this too and it worked bc the mask detection gets turned off after an unpair/restore

Same for me. 14.7 worked fine, but next day after 14.7.1 Watch wouldn’t unlock. Using iPhone 11 Pro and Watch S4.

What worked for me was turning both devices OFF, the back ON. Now I’ve seen for the first time the new Slide-down oval that tells you Watch was unlocked (with FaceID); it has a “Lock” button on the right side.

Previously I tried

• restarting the watch,
• toggling Wi-Fi on both devices
• switching watch unlock setting two off then back on.

Those didn’t help, or maybe they did in combo with powering both devices off.

Update: unlocking the watch doesn’t seem to be complete reliable. Had to try twice to capture screen shot.

Sure enough, the mask detection setting is the root cause here. Turn it off and the problem goes away. Hopefully we get a fix soon. I had it working with a restore, due to that turning off mask detection. Turned it on and watch unlocked stopped. Guess I'll just live with putting in a passcode on the watch for now. Rather do that then turn off mask detection. Now we just wait for a fix.

Just as everyone has found, turning off “Unlock With Apple Watch” under Face ID and Passcode on the phone restores the function, as someone else said ironic as we’re apparently going to have masks with us for the foreseeable future. When 14.7 was released the feature was 50/50 for me when I still had the mask feature enabled, 14.7.1 killed it altogether. I would think this is a bug with high priority.

Turn off "Unlock with Apple Watch" under iPhone settings -> Face ID & Passcode (for touch ID, it may be slightly different title).

This is a bug, and Apple will most likely issue an update in the next few days/weeks.

Unpairing and pairing again, turns off “Unlock with Apple Watch”, which is why it appears to fix things.

If you want both, you may be able to do the following dance (assuming you have Face ID; not sure if this will work for Finger Print Reader iPhones)

iPhone screen blank (screen off)

Raise Apple Watch until the numeric passcode unlock screen appears.

Then immediately wake the iPhone and unlock it.

If you wake the iPhone too early, it will not work.

If you wait too long to wake and unlock the iPhone, it will not work.

They issued a new watch update - 7.6.1 - which fixes it somewhat. If you keep “Unlock With Apple Watch” enabled you have to get the numeric keypad to appear on the watch and then wake the phone, swipe up to unlock and the watch will unlock. This is on my Face ID iPhone 12 Pro Max. If you turn off Unlock with Apple Watch you only have to wake and unlock the phone, you do not have to have the keypad onscreen on the watch. This is still inconvenient and they need to try again.

The two features do work when both are enabled. However something in ios 14.7 impaired the feature that unlocks the watch when unlocking the phone. When that was initially implemented it worked almost instantaneously for me. Now on 14.7.1 and watchOS 7.6.1 I’ve now realized that it does work but with a variable delay. At first I thought it didn’t work at all because I would unlock my phone in the morning after putting my watch on and when rotating my wrist a few times I would still get the keypad appearing on the watch. For about a week now I’ve continued the same routine - put on watch, unlock phone - check a few notifications, emails, etc. and within a few minutes, sometimes 5 or more, I will see the watch unlocked notification at the top of my phone screen. Sometimes it’s not until after I get a cup of coffee, with my phone unlocked, that I see that the watch has been unlocked. So it does work but if you check immediately upon unlocking the phone you will think it does not.

I have not figured out what affects the variability of the time involved in the feature - some position of your wrist, some activity on the phone or the position of Aquarius in sky, who knows - but now that I just ignore it instead of immediately checking it has worked almost every time. But if you need it to be unlocked immediately you’ll just have to enter the code.

No need to reset/unpair and re-pair. The problem is with the mask detection setting. Just turn off Unlock with apple watch in the phone passcode settings and the problem goes away. This is why unpair/repair works. It restores with this off.

Tested it myself. rodc7 response is correct. Turn mask detection off, Phone unlocks Watch. Turn mask detection on Phone/Watch unlock fails. I am using a iPhone 12 mini with a Apple Watch 4.

unpair your Watch and iPhone and repair them. I’ve read that some people are having success with that. It doesn’t show that it’s unlocking the Watch, it just does.

Hope this helps

Confirmed the same as rodc7 on iphone 12 pro and AW5. I did a complete repair/restore on my watch too - this works because it disables the iphone unlock/face detection with mask on option. Disabling this option unlocks watch right away, enabling requires 2-4 times unlocking phone to get watch to unlock. Funny thing is when I tried it enabled with a mask on it didnt unlock my phone. So the combo of options features is quite messed up on 14.7.1 it seems. Great timing yet again - the feature was enabled just in time for masks to be removed and now doesnt work in time for masks to be required again.... oy vey.