My Apple Watch 9 is acting weird - Is this a bug?

My Apple Watch 9 also went crazy this afternoon, Feb. 20, 2024. I initially got a vibrate on my watch indicating a timer was complete, but I did not set a timer. Then I noticed the passcode screen was randomly selecting numbers to unlock and would not stop; it kept locking me out. I had to do a power shut down (holding Crown and Side Button) together and then restart. It fixed it and I had to manually close out nine timers the watch had set. My concern is this: Is this a watch defect and should I make a claim before the standard warranty runs out? OR Will this problem fix itself with the reset and recent update that is set to happen tonight when I put the watch on the charger? AND will this return later in another problem issue and I'll be out of my warranty? There are known "glitches" with Apple Watch 9; this is not the first time I've had to hard power down!! I just got this Apple Watch from my children for Christmas 2023. My older Apple watch was eight years old and I never had an issue with it!

This happened to me also with my Ultra. In the middle of the night it started multiple timers as it switched back and forth running different apps. I also took it off to stop it accessing apps and got locked out for hours. Luckily no 911 call. By morning it had drained itself and went in to power save mode. I powered it off, and restarted it and put it on the charger. I’m still locked out. I had a series 2 for many years, never had anything like this.

Apple Watch newbie here - for beginners, how do I unpair it from my phone? 🤦🏻‍♀️ Can’t find anything on the watch app on my phone.

I tried the hard restart and am now locked out of the watch for an hour.

Ugh.

This is happening to me. Started after update. No workout view anymore and constantly puts me in race or splits when I am in Outdoor Running workout. Spend gobs of time with Apple Support and still not resolved. Also, a green flashing light randomly comes on on the back of the watch. Has also slid into SOS mode without prompt or fall. This thing is glitzier than all get out. I will not be updating this watch anymore. Time to park it.

Mine JUST flipped out on me right now (not sure if it has the update or not). It was going through a bunch of apps, then turned on my phone camera and recorded a few short videos from my phone. I took it off my wrist and then it started going through random keys on the its passcode screen until it timed itself out. When the timer ran out, it kept going through random numbers on the watch screen. I was trying to reset it for some time, but it was not letting me--it was sliding the SOS button halfway, almost like it was taunting me. :/ It finally shut off, but now I am afraid to turn it back on...

Happened to me today, watch ultra 2, watchOS 10.3

like it’s tapping things on itself, nothing I can do until I force restart by press and hold the crown button and side button at the same time.

apple please fix this

My Apple Watch 9 is acting erratically as others said on this forum. I did a hard reset and it is back to normal. I noticed it was in the middle of an update when I took it off of the charger.

I wanted Apple to be aware.

This just happened to me today. My watch went completely berserk. I was in the kitchen reading the mail, had my watch on but wasn’t touching it at all. It sent SOS alerts to my emergency contacts, sounded the emergency alarm, was zooming through/opening all of my apps, wouldn’t respond to touch (I tried to stop the emergency call), and then my screen locked and the passcode screen was literally entering/punching numbers in on its own. I thought my watches had been hacked and taken over remotely. I was able to get a few seconds of the passcode screen/numbers being entered but outside of that, I was too distracted to capture more of the issue because I was trying to stop my watch from calling emergency services and sending SOS messages.

This just happened to me. My Apple Watch 9, purchased Dec 2023, just started acting possessed. It also called my local emergency services, which was awful. Then it locked me out. I have forced reset and put it on charge. This is really not cool and needs sorting out asap.

This exact same thing happened to me last night (March 14). I shut down my phone and tried to shut down my watch, but it wouldn't. When I put it on the charger, it finally rebooted and seems fine now. It was as if a mad hacker was trying to get into my watch. Yikes. I hope Apple is doing something about this!

Same thing just happened to me. Spent a good 30 seconds fighting my watch to keep it from dialing emergency services when I tried to shut it down politely.

Hard reset, crown+power, seemed to resolve the issue at the moment, but looking down to see your watch flashing through all your apps, contacts, health info, trying to enter your passcode after being removed, etc., and not being able to stop it is a little stressful.

Rgfeaster wrote:

Just happened to me (3/15/24). Screens flying all over the place, emergency contacts notified. Don’t think 911 was called, though. Hard boot seems to have corrected it. Fingers crossed.

I was freaked out thinking I was going to see cops coming to my house.

My kids all called me asking if I was OK...at least it works :)

Sadly, when I did take a nasty fall last October, fall detection did not work. That's when I needed it!

I have an older version of the watch (5 years old). Two weeks ago at 4:30 in the morning it brought me out of a deep sleep making a terrible warning sound and called 911. This morning it did the same, at 2 am, but I rebooted it before 911 was called and placed it on the charger. Pushing the crown brought me to the Health screen and the 911 emergency screen. Operating system is up to date. Apple, let’s get this fixed!

Same problem - particularly concerning as it attempts to call emergency services! very dangerous

It should be APPLE POLICY to immediately post on streams like this to clarify:

(a) They are aware of the problem.

(b) Explain what the issue is.

(c) What a temporary solution is (if any)

(d) When a permanent solution will be available.

Thoroughly disappointed in Apples deafening silence on support issues.

VRBe wrote:

It should be APPLE POLICY to immediately post on streams like this to clarify:

This is a user-to-user technical support forum. It is Apple's explicit policy that they don't provide support here.