I disconnected my apple watch (AW) from my old phone, tried to connect it to my new one and it needs to be updated first. Tried reconnecting with my old phone, and my husband's, and it wont connect. Also tried updating from the AW but it prompts me to agree to the terms on my phone, which I can no longer connect to.
iPhone 6, iOS 11
I was having this exact issue all day! While transferring my data from an old iPhone to the new iPhone 15 Pro, my watch "froze" in the process of transferring, and thereafter wouldn't connect to my new phone. I repeatedly tried to connect as both a new and existing watch but was never successful. By this point, I'd already wiped and turned off my old phone, so my top priority was to not have to turn it back on and confirm my watch data was off of it. Without going back into my old phone, the solution that worked for me was:
Success!
I have iWatch 7 gps connected to iPhone 13pro and I had problems pairing it to iPhone 15pro (all updated to the latest versions) in the end after I tried all these steps, combo that worked for me:
This is what I did to get mine to work. Had to erase old iPhone, and reset watch.
I just paired my iwatch 5 to iPhone 15 pro max, I found out the easiest way is unpaired with the old iPhone then paired with the new one. My old iPhone is iPhone 11.
This was the perfect solution for me. Scary to choose reset but when it paired as a new phone all my settings and data were there.
Yes! Having the same issue with my series 8, I got it to finally sync but needed to go into setting and factory reset my watch to update it. It updated it synced to the 15 pro, I let it die at work, went to charge it and when it charged I was greeted with the welcome set up thing with multiple languages but my phone still sees the watch? So weird gonna go in this weekend and see what they can do.
After resetting and keeping the plan, it works, however it's buggy, very buggy. The altimeter keeps changing the way it measures, the weather keeps changing to default cities, making notifications sounds while on silent mode, etc...
Erased and kept data plan 2x now and on the 5th shut down and back on on the last 3 days.
Me Too. I think it is because my WatchOS was not the most current even though my iphone operating systems were (old phone and new phone) when I moved to the new phone. Thus the old watch operating system could not talk to the new phone OS. I had to reset my watch by following Apples directions (On your Apple Watch, tap Settings > General > Reset > Erase All Content and Settings). and then pair the reset watch to the iphone but first I had to download the new WatchOS operating system on the iphone because the phone said the watch OS was not current, install the watchos 10.0.1 onto the watch then finish pairing it. It took a long time - be patient. You had to have your iphone (connected to WIFI) next to your watch and your watch had to be charging in order to do it. Then I had to turn off the health data sharing with any health apps. Then had to turn off the phone and turn off the watch then turn them both back on and then share the health data again with the apps. But it is working now. So the moral of the story is make sure all operating systems on all devices shared with a new iphone are the latest version. Then I think the transition is smoother and the watch pairing just works with out all the the rigmarole. Good luck everyone.
I had to unpair my device a couple of times, turn the watch on and off a couple of times and then I chose to pair manually. When I tap on the footsteps on the watch face it then asked me to share data in the health app to see the step count. I did all this and I see 0 steps now but before was seeing three dashes. Hoping this fixed the issue although I’m doubtful.
Wow what a crappy company. But I’ll be honest, I’m not surprised at all sadly. I don’t know how much data is saved from my watch so I refuse to do a hard reset. Guess I’m going to just have to deal with the fact that I can no longer pair it. Will definitely never purchase a watch from apple again 😮💨.
I don’t think there is much data saved on the watch. I reset my watch and I am missing one day of health data for the one day the watch did not talk to the new phone. I had to reset the watch to install the new watchOS so the watch could communicate with the new phone which also had the newest operating system. I should have updated the watchOS prior to turning on the new phone. Learned that the hard way. Good luck.
All I wanted to do was remove the perpetual green running man and even tried to unpairing iwatch with my old iphone 11 which has the latest OS update and re - pair with no success on either phone! (new 15) .
Hours wasted doing hard reboots, unpairing,, can't pair it now. Doest recognize the blowing orb and never sends me a six digit code. My time wasted is more than a watch costs.
I was trying to connect my 5 series watch to 15 pro max. Resetting the watch worked for me when I finally realized I had to do the reset on the watch not in the app on the phone. Thank you for all your tips and helping me!
These steps worked for me today when I upgraded from Iphone 12 to Iphone 15 Pro Max. Resetting the Apple Watch was the crucial piece to allow me to connect the Apple Watch Ultra 2 to my new Iphone. Other techniques on Youtube weren't as successful.
Thank you so much cmayer52. I tried for weeks to pair my Ultra watch wth my new iPhone 15 Pro Max after having erased the previous phone. Nothing worked - except your advice. All working fine :)
Thank you for sharing your solution
This process worked for me except that I had to pair it manually once both devices were powered off and on and the watch was reset. Not a problem, of course. Just glad to have the watch paired to the new phone! Many thanks.
Apple Watch will not connect to iPhone 15
