Since updating to iOS 17 I cannot ping my phone using my watch. I used to be able to swipe up or down (I cannot remember) on my watch and there was a phone icon I could use to ping. Now it’s gone. 😢 HELP!
[Re-Titled by Moderator]
iPad, iPadOS 15
Hi AnanceRN,
It sounds like you're on watchOS 10, which has changed how Control Center is opened.
Press the side-button on your Apple Watch to open Control Center and ping your iPhone:
Hope this helps!
IrnBruEileen wrote:
Thanks IdrisSeabright. The whole picture of phone with parentheses no longer exists on my watch! I then changed it to list and couldn't find it there either. I used to find it very easy to find by swiping up but since the last update - it's gone!
It sounds as if your are looking in Apps, not the Control Center. You get to Apps by pressing on the Digital Crown. The button you need to press to bring up the Control Center is the one next to the Digital Crown. It's oval and almost flush with the bezel.
Thank you so much for helping me find the revised way to ping my iPhone from my Apple Watch! I never noticed the additional long button below the crown on the side of my watch. Push it & there that wonderful icon was that I had been missing so much♥️
Just a quick squeeze of the side button brings up the ping, flashlight, all the old favs
use Siri on your watch, “Hey Siri, alert my phone”. Takes a sec but works!
Found it. I was pressing the crown and not the side button.
Isot0pe wrote:
After spending 2 hours trying to find the ping app...
"Hey Siri, find my iPhone"
Ask Siri to ping your phone.
MJfitness wrote:
Everything about this update made the watch worse. I have to jump through hoops just to find out where the watch battery life is at.
Pressing a button is a HOOP? What world are you living in? It is one movement of a finger. Just as swiping up was one movement of a finger.
I don’t understand why Apple decided to update and make it worse but I think anyone with a watch agrees that they should change it back. I also can’t ping my phone and the instructions on how to do it with the new update do not work at all. This update was a major downgrade. I was going to buy a new Apple Watch soon but might just switch back to Fitbit now
No, this was a HUGE improvement in the usability of the watch. With the old, bad implementation you could only open the control center to check the battery, or find your phone by FIRST making sure a watch face was displayed, then swiping up from the bottom of the screen, carefully avoiding any Complications on the bottom corners of the screen (or you would get the weather or your calendar instead).
By moving that function to the oblong button on the side of the watch you open the control center by just a quick press on that button. You don’t have to exit the music control app, or the workout app, or any other app on the screen to go back to the watch face screen, swipe up, see what you need, then somehow navigate back to the app you were using.
shrinivasan18 wrote:
Hi Timdifferent,
the side button on my watch is not working for a while now is there any other way to access the ping button other than the side button?
thanks in advance
That is the new way to access the control center.
You could explore if a Siri a Shortcut will activate the control center.
Send your feedback to
https://www.apple.com/feedback/watch
nadya71 wrote:
How to ping iPhone from I watch
Read the following link:
Pressing the oval side button worked! Thanks!
Michlrlc09 wrote:
tapping oval button does nothing for me just asks for pin and takes me to main screen. Why did they change something that was perfect the way it was!!
Then something is very different about your watch. What is the model, and which version of watchOS are you running? Do you have wrist detection enabled?
The functions of the side button (flat oval) are as follows:
johnscf wrote:
When I open the control screen I see a phone icon but when I press it it doesn’t ping my phone. Instead it brings up:
Favorites
Recents
Contacts
Please explain what steps you are using to open the Control Center. None of those things are options in the Control center.
Are you pressing the side button? And by "side button", I do not mean the Digital Crown, the knob that rotates. The side button is next to it. It is flat and oval.
OMGitsSandi wrote:
Yes!! I literally stopped wearing my watch, this was my favorite thing about it!
Read the following link:
CSMillerKY wrote:
Another annoying apple “update” that only makes things more complicated and unuser friendly.
Apple does not read this user-to-user technical support forum for feedback.
But you can send Apple feedback via:
If enough users send feedback, it is more likely a decision maker will see it, and maybe take action.
How to ping iPhone from Apple Watch
