Not getting notifications on my watch OR my phone

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Level 1

4 points

Not getting notifications on my watch OR my phone

I have been having an issue with not getting text notifications on my phone or my watch. This has been going on for a few weeks. I will pick up my phone and see that I have a text message even though I got no sound or vibration from either my phone or my watch. Only way I have been able to solve this is by turning off the Bluetooth on my phone. If the Bluetooth is off, I get sounds and vibrations on both. But then I have to turn my Bluetooth off and on every time I get in my car, every time I try to stream music, and I also can’t use the feature on my watch that makes my phone alert if I can’t find it. I have had this watch for two years and this is only been happening the last couple of months. I have unpaired them and repaired them. I have shut them both off and turn them back on. Nothing seems to help.

Posted on Aug 30, 2023 8:28 PM

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Answer 1

LD150

Level 10

87,854 points

Aug 31, 2023 1:01 AM in response to jaye181

Firstly with a paired Watch the iPhone will not give any notifications of any event (apart from calls) unless it is open and in use. You need to see if you get iPhone notification when phone is lit up. If not then check if the iPhone is connected by bluetooth to some dormant speaker or headphones.

Otherwise with iPhone on standby they all should go to the Watch so in iPhone, Watch app, My Watch tab, Notifications, Messages, put the check mark against Custom, then Allow Notifications, then turn on Sound and Haptic.

Ensure you have no VPN or VPN based adblocker or any other security apps from App Store.

The ultimate test is to Backup the phone, Unpair the Watch using the Watch App, set up the phone as a vanilla device with not backup restore and then pair the Watch. If you get text notifications then, then your settings or apps are preventing notifications. You then have the choice of restoring the phone backup again or build up from scratch depending on how much phone-based stuff you may lose.

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Answer 2

jaye181 Author

Level 1

4 points

Aug 31, 2023 8:01 PM in response to LD150

Here’s an example of my issue. Tonight I was logging in a website with two factor verification. I had the code texted to me. My phone is locked so in theory, the notification should’ve shown up on my watch. My phone did not ding or vibrate and neither did my watch. In order to see the message I unlocked my phone. In order to see the message on my watch, I had to go to my app, screen and touch the message icon. The only way to work around this is to turn the Bluetooth off on my phone. When I do that, I get the notifications on my watch and on my phone.

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Answer 3

LD150

Level 10

87,854 points

Sep 1, 2023 12:48 AM in response to jaye181

Understood. You say you already did the double restart (Watch and iphone) and the unpair and re-pair, so apart from unpair and set up as new Watch, it only leaves the ultimate test which I gave you, and expanded below.

The following user tip gives the full process - in that case to solve unexplained battery usage but the process and scenarios are totally appropriate for this

Apple Watch battery drain - the ultimate … - Apple Community

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