old version of nike run club?

well

these forums are user helping other users like yourself, it's sort of going

to a physical apple store and asking other customers their advice

so if noone reply it might be because noone knows

it's up to the developers of the app how they support it

try reaching out to nike

How to contact an app developer - Apple Support

It is incredibly frustrating when an app you rely on for your daily runs suddenly disappears or stops working because of an automatic update, especially when it feels like your questions about it are being ignored on the forums.

The community member on the page is right about one thing: the Apple Support Community is made up of everyday users, so silence usually just means no one has a good workaround. However, there are concrete technical reasons why this happens, and unfortunately, a few strict limitations regarding how older versions are handled.

Here is the breakdown of why old versions get removed and how the system works behind the scenes:

1. Why Apps Get "Auto-Deleted" or Disappear

If the Nike Run Club (NRC) app vanished from your watch entirely, it usually comes down to a watchOS compatibility drop.

• Every time Apple releases a major watchOS update, developers like Nike have to update their apps to match the new system architecture.
• If a developer decides to stop supporting an older watchOS version (for example, if a new NRC update requires watchOS 10 or higher, but a user is on an older series watch), the app store marks the device as incompatible.
• If Automatic Downloads is turned on in your settings, the system attempts to sync the latest version from your iPhone. If your watch can't run the new version, the old, incompatible version is often stripped away or hidden because it can no longer communicate with the phone app.

2. Can You Keep and Use an Older App Version?

In the Apple ecosystem, neither Apple nor third-party developers allow you to freeze or roll back to older app versions on the Apple Watch.

Unlike a Mac or a PC where you can keep an old software installation file indefinitely, Apple Watch apps rely heavily on a "handshake" with your iPhone and Nike's cloud servers. Even if you managed to block the update, an outdated version of the Nike Run Club app would quickly stop working the moment Nike updated their backend servers, meaning your runs wouldn’t sync, and the app would crash.

How to Prevent This Moving Forward

To stop your devices from changing software versions without your explicit permission, you can turn off automatic updates:

• On your iPhone: Go to Settings > App Store and toggle OFF both App Updates and Automatic Downloads.
• On your Apple Watch: Open the Settings app on the watch, tap App Store, and turn OFF Automatic Updates.

The Catch: While this prevents the app from updating automatically, it is a temporary shield. Eventually, if you update your iPhone's iOS or the phone's Nike app, it will break the connection to the older watch app anyway.

If your Apple Watch hardware has been phased out by Nike's latest software updates, your best alternative to keep tracking your splits seamlessly is to use the built-in Apple Workouts app. It will never be auto-deleted from your watch, it tracks the exact same GPS and heart rate metrics, and you can even use third-party tools to export those workouts back into your Nike account later if you want to keep your streak alive.