Now playing on Apple Watch not working after update

Update- I deleted the watch app and reinstalled, then powered off the watch twice. Everything began to function properly after that! Also, subsequent updates seem to have made operations more seamless! I do think that the “now playing” screen is still less user friendly (smaller controls), and less responsive, but at least it works now!

Noticed the same on my Series 8 after updating to 9.4 recently. It seems to work again for a short period of time after rebooting the watch before it goes back to this strange behaviour. According to people on reddit a full re-pairing process also doesn't fix this for good. Seems to be a bug with watchOS 9.4. Hopefully Apple will fix this annoying bug with the next update (9.4.1 or 9.5)

From time to time, I still have this issue. Restarting the watch solves it for me, but only temporarily. I have found a better and faster solution: opening the recent apps on the watch (double crown click) and then closing the "Now Playing" app by swiping it to the left. After that, if I reopen the app, it works for some time, and a watch restart is not needed.

I was having this same problem, ie. could see on my watch what was playing from my phone but couldn’t click on the watch to control volume or play/pause in any way as before. All is saw was this but clicking did nothing:

This is a new Apple Watch for me as of a few weeks ago, but I still had my old watch also paired. I did two things: unpaired the old watch and then restarted both my watch and phone… not sure which of these is responsible but now it works, and I can click to get to the controls as before:

(Apple Watch 9/iPhone 11 Pro, updated 10.2/10.17)

I had same issue. I unpaired watch (ultra) and repaired and audio apps are now automatically launching on Watch

I unpaired my watch from the app and restarted the watch and re-paired it with the backup and the now playing works now. - we’ll see if it keeps working🤷🏼‍♀️

Resetting my watch and phone helped me

Same issue. Restarting the watch seems to have worked for me.

I found that turning my watch off and then back on seems to fix the issue. I was having to do this weekly, but the past month has been better, not sure why. Anyhow, give that a shot folks, hopefully it will get your Now Playing to start working again.

I need to restart my phone and watch every day in order to make it work again. Absolute PITA.

Two days in - looks like it’s working again. Finally. 16.5 fixed it.

This wasn't the issue, and it has been resolved by the latest WatchOS in any case.

Restarting the watch worked for me but it doesn’t last. Now I have to restart every couple of days. Come on Apple, this is lame.

iPhone 13 Pro Max, iOS 17.6.1

Apple Watch Series 8, OS 10.6.1

Restarting my Apple Watch will fix the problem, but only temporarily. It eventually comes back.