Activity updating, but Health App says Apple Watch no longer paired

Question

Activity updating, but Health App says Apple Watch no longer paired

Okay this is odd.

My Apple Watch is definitely paired with my iPhone 5S. the phone's Watch app says so. My Activity rings are updating nicely on the phone.

But I'm concerned because in the phone's Health app, under Sources, it lists my phone and my watch. When I select my watch it says, "This Apple Watch is no longer paired with this iPhone."

Now, I had to do a restore of my iPhone, which somehow caused this, but I'm afraid to unpair/re-pair my phone and watch because I don't want to restore from an old backup and lose my activity. Right now, my plan is to try the unpair/re-pair procedure just after midnight tonight, but I want to make sure my Watch is backed up.

But if anyone has any clue on what might be causing this or where else I should look for clues, I'd really appreciate it!

Posted on Aug 25, 2015 8:40 AM

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Answer 1

Best reply

Jonathan UK

Level 10

163,769 points

Aug 25, 2015 8:51 AM in response to Nicolas diPierro

Hi Nicolas

First try restarting - or, if that doesn't work, force restarting - both your iPhone and your Apple Watch, to see whether that rectifies the issue:

Restart Apple Watch: Press and hold the side button until you see the Power Off slider; Drag the slider to turn off completely; Afterwards, press and hold the side button until you see the Apple logo.
Force restart Apple Watch: press and hold both the side button and Digital Crown for at least 10 seconds, until you see the Apple logo.

Restart iPhone: Press and hold the Sleep/Wake button until the red slider appears; Drag the slider to turn your iPhone off; When it has finished turning off, press and hold the Sleep/Wake button again until you see the Apple logo.
Force restart iPhone: press and hold both the Sleep/Wake and Home button for at least 10 seconds, until you see the Apple logo.

If not, there is no need to wait until after midnight to unpair and re-pair your devices.

When you unpair your Apple Watch using the Apple Watch app on your iPhone, it takes a new backup right before it erases your watch:

Unpair your Apple Watch and iPhone - Apple Support

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Answer 2

Aug 25, 2015 10:21 AM in response to Jonathan UK

Thanks Jonathan, this worked, with two caveats you might like to know about.

First, when force restarting each device... when holding both buttons for at least 10 seconds, in both cases, the Apple logo appeared after a few seconds, but by the time I hit 10 seconds, the logo had disappeared... in other words, I'd forced it on and off. After each instance, I then just powered them on normally.

Second, (and I am running iOS 9 Beta 5 and Watch OS 1.0.1), the error message "This Apple Watch is no longer paired with this iPhone," has now been replaced with "Go to the Apple Watch app to change health data settings for this Apple Watch."

This is more in line with the message one sees when selecting a phone as a Health data source, "Go to the Motion & Fitness settings under Privacy in the Settings app to control fitness tracking on this iPhone."

Thanks again. You helped me avoid unintentionally losing data.

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Answer 3

Jonathan UK

Level 10

163,769 points

Aug 25, 2015 10:38 AM in response to Nicolas diPierro

You're welcome! Thanks for returning to confirm - and also for your helpful feedback. 🙂

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