Can Apple Watch Ultra function without iPhone?

To not have to have a smartphone?

You can use it for calling, all sorts of workout activities, pay with cash at a point of sale, texting, music, see the location of your friends and share your location (if you are so inclined). The features missing are not an ideal situation, but the standalone Apple Watch is still better than any other dumb phone alternative, and it is on the wrist (not in the pocket).

There is a movement to reduce addiction to smartphones. Standalone Apple Watch is the best smartphone alternative that exists today even with the missing features.

The standalone Apple Watch is also invaluable for young teenagers to keep them away from smartphone addiction. I've just bought an Apple Watch for my son who has just turned 14 and set it up as a standalone Apple watch instead of buying him an iPhone. My son can do everything he needs to do on the Apple Watch, including occasional texts, phone calls, and even FaceTime (audio) to his friends.The things that he can't do on it, he can do on his Mac. He will not have a device in his pocket that he gets addicted to and stares at all of his time. He will be able to actually experience real life instead of staring into his phone. The standalone apple watch is also a great tool to keep teenagers away from social media.

An additional benefit is that when the Apple Watch is given to a child, Apple Screen Time can be used to set usage and time limits as well as to set downtime on the watch from the parent's device. This is not something that would help an adult to get rid of the smartphone addiction, but that's definitely something that parents should use for their kids. In my son's case, we can control what apps he can use, for how long, and at what time he can no longer use his devices with Screen Time and Down Time. The restrictions apply both to his Mac and his standalone Apple Watch. Even when Down Time starts and his watch blocks him from using its apps, he can still call and message, but only to the people that we allow. So, he can call and message to his parents, but not to anyone else once Down Time kicks in. An additional benefit of giving our son a standalone Apple Watch is that we can track his whereabouts and not worry about him leaving his phone accidentally somewhere because the Apple Watch is always on his wrist.

Apple Watch is meant to be a partner device for your iPhone, so no, you cannot use it properly without your iPhone. If it is a cellular model you can use it stand alone, but the expierence will be limited

Why are you replying to a comment not directed towards you and instructing me on how I’m supposed to act? Maybe you do need to spend a little more time on the internet, so you can figure out how it works.

ps: all caps means you’re shouting at someone, not adding emphasis to your writing. 😀

Yes, you can use the Apple Watch as a standalone device. Set up Apple Watch for a family member - Apple Support

You still have to have at least one iPhone, but you can set up a number of Apple Watches to be their own standalone devices not paired to the iPhone(Apple calls this Apple Watch with Family Setup). These Apple watches have their own Apple IDs, their own phone numbers, etc. The feature works with the Apple Watch 7 or later (including Apple Watch SE) and the iPhone 6S or later. The Apple ID on the iPhone and the Apple IDs on the Apple Watches must be in the same Family Sharing group, so if you have a family of five, you can have every member of the family use a standalone Apple Watch with their own Apple ID and have one iPhone with its own Apple ID used exclusively for provisioning and activating the five standalone Apple Watches.

There are a few limitations when the Apple Watch is used as a standalone device (aka Apple Watch in Family Setup), but I think these limitations will eventually go away:

The following features and apps are not available with the Apple Watch using Family Setup:

• Apple Pay using a credit or debit card in Apple Wallet
• Medications
• Respiratory rate
• Irregular heart rhythm notifications
• ECG
• AFib History
• Cycle Tracking
• Sleep
• Wrist Temperature
• Blood Oxygen
• Walking Steadiness
• Audiobooks
• TV Remote
• News
• Shortcuts
• The double tap gesture

Apple Cash Family is available in standalone Apple Watches (Apple Watch with Family Setup) in the United States, allowing one to send or receive cash via iMessages and pay using Apple Cash with the Apple Watch at a point of sale.

+1 no you cannot use the Apple Watch without an iPhone.

No, Jeff. YOU consider a different vendor smart watch. I will consider the Apple Watch.

The features currently unavailable in the standalone version of the Apple Watch setup are the features that I never use. And the features that I do use in the Apple Watch are all available in the standalone setup of the Apple Watch.

And if you remember how iPad was initially released, it couldn’t be set up without a Mac. A few years later, the iPad became a full-fledged standalone device that no longer required a setup from a Mac. The same will happen with the Apple Watch that it won’t require an iPhone to be set up as a standalone device, and it will have all these currently missing features available soon enough.

So, Jeff. You do YOU , and I will do ME.

I was just trying to understand your reasoning behind wanting a standalone device. I understand the motivation and desire of not wanting a child to have unfettered access to internet, games, apps etc.

In my experience, as a former teacher, there will come a time in the not too distant future that peer pressure and requirements of today’s school and work enviornment will probably require their use of a smart phone. In my opinion, it’s best to expose teenagers to technology when they are still under the supervision and guidance of their parents and not leave it up to the child to discover on their own. But you know your own children best and which you and your family the best.

Not all health features are disabled. Heart rate monitoring works, and so does all the exercise activities tracking. What’s disabled is the medical device features, which is not what I want my Apple Watch to track for me anyway. I do not need an EKG device constantly monitoring my heart or thermometer monitoring my body temperature or the watch measuring my glucose levels. I’m actually quite against these medical features sending alarms and freaking people out. So, personally, I won’t miss these features on my standalone Apple Watch. The only feature I will miss is the Apple Pay with credit cards. But I can handle this with Apple Cash. It’s actually another layer of addiction (this time to credit) being peeled off.

Yes, you can use your watch as a standalone device, and it will keep track of your heart rate, walks, etc. You can use it as a phone, you can send iMessages and SMS, you can listen to Apple Music, you can use Apple Cash, and most other stock Apple apps. You can also use third party apps that do not require a companion iPhone app to run. Not many third-party apps exist that can work autonomously without the iPhone companion app and that provide useful feature, but they do exist. You can research this topic in more detail, but the bottom

linen is that what you are trying to achieve is possible. The only limitation today is that you have to have at least one iPhone to provision and activate your watch as a standalone device. The iPhone and the watch must be on the same iCloud Family sharing plan. You can activate up to 5 standalone watches with a single iPhone. So, theoretically, a family that wants to wean themselves off the smartphone addiction by jettisoning smart phones and replacing them with standalone Apple Watches will still have to keep one iPhone to activate and provision the Apple Watches. This requirement of having to use the iPhone to activate and provision Apple Watches as standalone devices will most likely be removed in the near future like it happened with the iPhone and the iPad, which used to require a Mac or PC running iTunes to activate the iPhone and the iPad. That requirement was there for a few years before it was removed and the iPhone as well as the iPad became completely autonomous devices that didn’t require a PC or a Mac to activate them.

Why have an Apple Watch if you deliberately disable all the health related features and financial features like Apple Pay?

Jeff Donald wrote:

Why have an Apple Watch if you deliberately disable all the health related features and financial features like Apple Pay?

Because the Apple Watch was designed as an iPhone accessory, and many of the features depend on the iPhone.

The Apple Watch Family setup was intended for dependent children, or aging parents that you are trying to keep tabs on.

If you do not want an iPhone and you are not a dependent child, then consider a different vendor’s smart watch.

Yah, no kidding. 😀😀 I didn’t either. This thread went sideways back in May. I’ve looked at many Smart Watches and even as a former Apple employee, I probably wouldn’t buy an Apple Watch, if I didn’t have an iPhone. It just makes more sense (at least to me 😀) to match devices ie smart watch to smart phone.