My download of Apple watchOS 10.4 STOPPED during "preparing" and won't advance.

That worked for me. Thank you.

Same problem here, IPhone 13 Pro with Applewatch Ultra 2.

Same here... I can't believe Apple has done nothing to address this considering this post began over a month ago...

This worked for me too! After getting stuck on preparing download for 10 hours with multiple restarts to my phone and watch, I simply change the face and preparing finished almost immediately!

I got the same issue, I thought I was probably alone till I found this thread

It worked fore me thank you for the tip. I'm having so much issues with my apple watch the past few days, it is really annoying.

Same here. No progress on the “Preparing” event and my battery began to die in 6 hours when it use to last 49 hours.

I have thought of going to classic old fashioned watches.

Worked great - thank you!

That is Not the way it works

Well I followed suit with everyone else, I tried again. When I got hung on the “preparing” stage I changed watch faces and the progress bar began to move and it updated… very odd but it worked.

What if the download of watchOS 10.4 does not show in the storage? That’s my case.

Thanks for advice, if any.

Have you tried power cycling your watch? That worked for me.

this worked for me too. After many many tries. Restarting iPhone and watch before installing seems to work, of course deleting previous attempts from storage.

what a pain.