apple watch not connecting to wifi

Hi

Whenever your Apple Watch cannot connect to the paired iPhone via Bluetooth, it will attempt, as a fallback, to connect to a compatible Wi-Fi network.

A compatible Wi-Fi network is a 2.4GHz Wi-Fi network that your iPhone has connected to before whilst your Apple Watch was connected to the iPhone via Bluetooth. Apple Watch cannot connect to 5GHz Wi-Fi networks or to public networks that require logins, subscriptions or profiles.

To check whether your Apple Watch can connect to Wi-Fi:

• Enable Airplane Mode on your iPhone:

  Travel with iPhone

• On your Apple Watch, open Control Centre (when viewing the time, swipe up on the screen) and check for the Wi-Fi symbol at the upper-left of the display:

  About Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and cellular on your Apple Watch - Apple Support

If your Apple Watch does not connect to Wi-Fi as expected (after allowing a few moments), then follow these steps:

Firstly, ensure that your Apple Watch and iPhone are connected via Bluetooth and also that your iPhone is connected to your Wi-Fi network:

• About Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and cellular on your Apple Watch - Apple Support

On your iPhone, go to: Settings > Wi-Fi:

• Tap on the "i" / info icon to the right of your Wi-Fi network name > tap on Forget This Network.
• With your Apple Watch still connected via Bluetooth, reconnect your iPhone to your Wi-Fi network, being sure to check that you are connecting to a 2.4 GHz network.
• Pause for a few moments to allow the Wi-Fi information to be shared to your Apple Watch.

On your iPhone, enable Airplane Mode:

• Travel with iPhone

Check whether your Apple Watch has successfully connected to the Wi-Fi network by checking for the Wi-Fi icon at the upper-left of Control Centre (allow a short while for it to connect after losing the connection with your iPhone):

• Open Control Center

When finished, turn off Airplane Mode on your iPhone.

If you have not yet done so and if the feature is supported on your plan, you may also wish to enable Wi-Fi Calling on your devices:

• On your iPhone, go to: Settings > Phone > Wi-Fi Calling.
• On your iPhone, in the Watch app, go to: My Watch > Phone.
• Make a call with Wi-Fi Calling - Apple Support

If the issue persists, then I suggest that you contact Apple Support (remote diagnostics and/or mail-in service may be available, if required), make a Genius Bar reservation or visit an Apple Authorised Service Provider for assistance:

• US: Apple Watch Service Answer Center - Apple Support
• Elsewhere: Apple - Support

An added suggestion to those still struggling with this issue - I just got a new Apple Watch Series 3, struggled for hours on my own and with Apple Support to connect it to Wi-Fi to no avail. I finally took another look at my router settings (I'm using the Netgear Orbi system), and noticed my 2.4GHz connection channel was set to "Auto" (default). Changed the setting to a specific channel (I selected Channel 1), and my watch connected immediately - problem solved. I'm assuming the issue all along was interference on the 2.4GHz channel my router was auto-selecting.

None of my other devices (including my phone) were having problems with the connection, so odd that the watch wasn't able to connect. Perhaps the watch is especially sensitive to interference. Resolution was passed back to the Apple Support supervisor to share with the engineers.

Hello,

So, I have confirmed my suspection to be the cause.

1)First I have temporarily turned off 5GHz radio on my AP.

2)Now I have removed wifi from my iPhone's settings, and connected again.

3)After the info has transferred to my watch, now it does connect to my wifi network.

Good Morning,

I had this issue on two Apple Watch 3s in my household and after the 4.2 update. One started working!!! I did a little trial and error and determined in my situation it appeared to be a security software I had installed on my iPhone that was preventing the WiFi info being shared or setup on my watch. I basically deleted all of the apps I had for 3rd party texting, vpn software, and security software (mine was one offer free to T-Mobile’s customers). After that I forgot my network. Turned off Bluetooth on my setting (not from the control center) and then rebooted the watch and iPhone. Turned on the iPhone and watch. Connected the WiFi to the phone then turned on Bluetooth to allow the watch to get the WiFi info. Waited a minute and turned off the Bluetooth and it worked for me. This may not work for everyone because there are countless apps. But it did the trick for me once I installed 4.2 which fixed some of the issues already. Hope this helps.

Wow OhioApple74 maybe you solved this problem !

I did not delete any apps but I did this and it work !

1-I forgot the 2.4 and 5Ghz wifi

2-Turn off way watch and iPhone

3-Turn on my iPhone and watch

4-Login to my 2.4Ghz wifi

5-Put my iPhone on airplane

And the warch connected to my wifi !!!

MY PROBLEM: iPhone connected to WiFi but Apple Watch showed disconnected when I turned off blue tooth on iPhone.

WHAT I TRIED WITH MY IPHONE: forget network on iPhone then rejoin, unpair and paired, reset watch to defaults, nothing worked.

WHAT I DID NEXT: unpair from my iPhone paired to daughters I phone and WIFI WORKED when I turned off Bluetooth on her iPhone!

Unpaired from daughter Iphone paired to my iphone WiFi would not work.

SOLUTION FOR ME: Backed up my iPhone, Reset my IPhone to factory defaults installed as new. Confirmed I joined home network, Paired watch, forgot home network, joined home network and watch WiFi worked when I turned Bluetooth off on my iPhone. Restored backup and WiFi and watch connected to WiFi when I turned off Bluetooth on my iPhone.

Yes I did loose some of my stored passwords but all apps are there and working once I logged back in. Maybe the next version for the watch will resolve the issue, but I was not willing to wait for it.

In my case, it was - but not suggesting it's root cause for everyone's issue. I tried this after plugging in an old Apple Time Capsule router, which connected flawlessly - so definitely router / signal related as nothing else changed. There are 11 different 2.4GHz channels, and I have a cordless phone system that was likely causing interference on the channel my Orbi router auto-selected - locking it to a single channel did the trick. I wouldn't have expected the Watch to be more sensitive to interference than my iPhone, but that seems to be the case. Issue could come back up in other "noisy" environments, so Apple needs to address it.

I have had this problem off and on with both mine and my girlfriend's Apple Watch Series 3. I just tried something new and I told my iPhone to forget my WiFi network, then re-joined it on the iPhone and now it works on my Apple Watch just fine again. Hope this helps.

Worked for me, follow all his steps, first backup phone, then restore to factory default and set as new iphone (done all this via Itunes on my PC), pair your apple watch, forget network, retype password and reenter network, restore iphone to backup, done.

Repost this post to correct some typo...

Because I don’t know to edit my post...

Wow OhioApple74 maybe you solved this problem !

I did not delete any apps but I did this and it worked !

1-I forgot the 2.4 and 5Ghz wifi on my iPhone

2-Turn off my watch and iPhone and wait a few secondes...

3-Turn on my iPhone and watch again

4-Login to only 2.4Ghz wifi on my iPhone

5-Put my iPhone on airplane

And the watch connected to my wifi !!!

So helpful!! thank you - the Lookout Security app on my iPhone 6 was preventing my Apple Watch 1 from detecting home wifi

I had tried all the solutions posted - turning off the watch ,forgetting the wifi networks , turning off Bluetooth on the iPhone , connecting to 2.4 GHz network, enabling bluetooth then turning watch back on - multiple times to no avail. I also tried unpairing and pairing and a clean install on the watch without success.

As soon as I deleted Lookout app on the iPhone then followed the procedure - the wifi worked an Apple Watch !

Thanks again for this solution

I’ve had the same problem!

I’ve got an Apple Watch series 3 GPS + Cellular and an iPhone 7 Plus and it’s just not connecting to WiFi.

Tried absolutely everything that it says online to do, reset, unpair etc but nothing worked, contacted Apple support they had no clue, got second Apple Watch but the Apple Watch still didn’t connect to WiFi.

Just before I threw it out of the window, I read this forum and saw the bit about the LOOKOUT SECURITY APP. So I tried this method, deleted the app, forgot the WiFi network, turned both devices off, set it all up again and it worked !!! Thank god

So it’s the LOOKOUT SECURITY APP, that’s the problem, if you have it on your devices delete now!

Will update my Apple support contact aswell

Thankyou to this forum for restoring my faith !! 😁

Thankyou chaoswith!

Tried everything possible to try get my Apple Watch to connect to wifi, on my second watch and every method has been tried at least twice !

Even Apple support didn’t no what was going on!

Read your post about the lookout app, deleted the app and rebooted and so on, and it now works!

You have saved my Apple Watch!

Thankyou !!!

Thanks for this info. I have been battling this same issue on Apple Watch 2 and now Apple Watch 3. I had the problem when I synced my watch with my 6s Plus and now my 8 Plus. I tried all of the standard Apple troubleshooting steps and spent hours with a genius in a store to no avail.

When I followed your initial steps of wiping my phone and not doing a restore rather a new phone install, my watch worked perfectly. So it definitely is not a hardware issue. There must be a select group of us that have a certain app combination installed on our phones that is resulting in this error.

However, when I restored my phone from the backup the problem returned. Can you explain exactly how you did the restoration of your watch and phone setup to keep WiFi working?

Also, are you now able to setup new 2.4ghz network on your iPhone and it be recognized by your watch when your phone is not in range?

Thanks!

Sorry, I don't understand what you mean with "the update".

But everything is updated to most recent OS version, and still didn't worked. The only thing that worked was setting the iPhone as new phone, not restore backup.

If you want to try it, you can backup your phone (I recommend setting an encrypted backup, with a password, so in case you wanna restore it everything will get back as ever before), then restore it and set it as new phone. Wipe out the WATCH (go to preferences, general, etc) and then go to the Watch App and set it up again. In my case it asked me to enable dictation, which it never asked before! (it didnt worked BTW, as I speak spanish and it only worked in english... but as I said, it seems that the app didnt set it up right).

Please, take into account that it is important that your are connected to a 2.4Ghz Wifi, as Watch can only connect to that band... it cannot connect to 5.8Ghz (I don't understand why... must be some technical reason I would like to think...).

If you need any help, please don't hesitate to ask. I'll be glad to help!

Best.