Apple Watch Battery Draining suddenly after Software Update

UPDATE:

After getting home and charging my watch on the fast charger, once at 50% I was able to install the 10.4 update. It definitely seems to have stopped the fast watch draining.

This seems to work for me as well. My watch didn’t update to 10.4 - I remember initiating the update but it’s still 10.3.1. Disabled auto update and restarted twice and it seems to drain normally again. My wife’s watch and phone got updated so it seems the massive drop is avoided if the watch is also 10.4 - but then again it’s just one case. FWIW, mine is 15 Pro with series 6 but hers is 14 Pro with series 7.

As a few have also said, I managed to fix this. This is what I did…

1. Open the Watch App on your iPhone. Go to General, Software update and toggle off Automatic Updates
2. In the same Watch App on your iPhone, go to General, Storage and then delete the 10.4 file
3. Reboot the iPhone and the watch
4. Put the watch on its charger and then unlock it. You may need to wait until your watch battery is over 50%
5. On the Watch, open the Settings app and go to General, Software Update. Scroll down and kick off the download.
6. Now just leave your watch on the charger for an hour or so. My watch was updated when I went back to it.
7. Toggle Automatic Updates back on in your Watch app

Good luck 🙂

Okay. I fixed mine by 1) disconnecting bluetooth 2) clearing all background apps running on watch 3)putting it and my phone both on charger 4) downloading watch software update manually (which required turning bluetooth back on but they were both still on chargers) 5) letting the update happen.

Watch is now charging normally and retaining charge much better. I still think it's draining faster than it used to, but only barely (down 2% in an hour).

I had the same problem everyone is talking about with my Apple Watch Ultra 2. It actually died twice yesterday after the update on my phone. The new update will only install on your watch if your watch battery is above 50%. I had to turn off the Optimized Battery Charging function in the watch app to charge my battery enough over night. The app installed on my watch overnight and no battery draining issues today.

Finally after turning off auto-update, I manually initiated the update and now my watch is 10.4 and the battery drain seems about right - about 12% overnight and 90% to 72% from 8am till 2pm.

What is required is a forced restart of your Apple Watch. A forced restart is more than just turning your Watch off and on. Observe the battery usage for the next 24 to 72 hours. If there is no improvement you’ll need to unpair the Watch from your iPhone, force restart the Watch and the iPhone and lastly pair the two devices. Battery usage will return to normal in 24 to 72 hours.

Force restart Apple Watch - Apple Support

Force restart iPhone - Apple Support

Unpair and erase your Apple Watch - Apple Support

I’ve had this problem as well. While not an ideal fix. I seem to have found a work around. I restarted my watch and turned off automatic updates. I had to do this a couple of times between my phone and the watch to actually get auto updates to stay off. But my battery has stopped draining.

Thanks.

Disabling Auto update and deleting the 10.4 install file seemed to do the trick without worrying about Bluetooth or rebooting. Clearly Apple broke something with the installer. I think it was only draining when I was inside and in WiFi too.

i had the same issue. Luckily, I was able to update the watch OS. After I did that, the watch is no longer losing power. So the solution is to update the watch S/W. Good luck everyone

Here’s the workaround I used (no thanks to Apple). Unpair the watch, turn off phone and watch, turn back on, pair again.

Very frustrating that Apple hasn’t addressed this. The least they could do is give a heads up to the user when the device calls for an update.

hope this helps someone else.

This fixed the battery drain on Apple Watch issue for me: Open the watch app on your phone, open General settings, then toggle Background App Refresh to off. My watch battery is back to normal after doing that.

This happened to me yesterday. Completely drained battery after 3 or 4 hours. I tried the software update on the phone which was problematic as it said it would take 3 days to download, but I left it overnight and installed the new watch update this morning. So far it seems to have resolved the issue

I had the same issue with my Apple Watch Ultra2 after the update. The update won’t install if your watch battery is below 50%. I had turn off the optimized battery charging feature on my watch so it would charge over 50% last night. The update installed and my watch is working fine now. It died 2X yesterday.

I finally was able to get the latest Watch update done and so far, my watch is still going strong. It was a waste of time calling Apple and when I said that their phone lines were probably blowing up with people complaining about the same issue, she had no comment.

So, if you can get the update done, fingers-crossed, that should work. I unlocked the watch and put it on the charger even though it had been there all night. When I came back half an hour later, the update was done and so far, so good.