After you set up the watch with cellular from the family plan... can the watch be paired with an old iPhone with wifi?

Question

After you set up the watch with cellular from the family plan... can the watch be paired with an old iPhone with wifi?

My daughter has an old iPhone with wifi but no cellular. We got her an Apple Watch with cellular add on capabilities, to add her to our plan for $10/month... however Apple's directions say to pair the watch with one of the adult's phones in order to activate cellular. I'm wondering once that's done, if we can then pair the watch with the "bricked" wifi phone so that the phone apps can interact with the watch. NOT to give her phone cellular. Just to connect the phone (fitness app, imessage, Spotify, etc).... is this possible.

Apple Watch

Posted on Oct 4, 2021 7:32 PM

Reply

Answer 1

Top-ranking reply

javaliga

Level 10

119,851 points

Oct 4, 2021 8:18 PM in response to somuchredtape

I doubt it - in fact, I'm almost sure it won't work. See the 'Before you start' section in:

Set up cellular on Apple Watch - Apple Support

"Your iPhone and Apple Watch must use the same carrier, and you must be within your carrier's network when you set up cellular on your watch."

Reply

Answer 2

BobHarris

Level 9

55,007 points

Oct 5, 2021 12:39 PM in response to somuchredtape

The Family plan expects to be paired to a parent's iPhone.

If you break that pairing, then you are no longer using the Family plan.

You can re-activate the old iPhone, giving it a cellular plan, plus $10 for adding the Apple Watch, AS LONG AS the old iPhone can be upgraded to iOS 15 (which means it needs to be an iPhone 6s or newer).

Reply