Find Friends on Apple Watch 3 with cellular

Hi

Apple advises that, subject to cellular reception, if friends check your location via Find My Friends and you are wearing your Apple Watch Series 3 (GPS + Cellular) and do not have your iPhone with you, then (subject to connectivity) your location will automatically be tracked using your Apple Watch instead.

More information:

View a friend’s location

About Find My Friends - Apple Support

Set up and use cellular on Apple Watch Series 3 (GPS + Cellular) - Apple Support

From what I understand the it's not if they are wearing their watch, it's if they are wearing the watch and also do not have their phone. The watch will then take priority assuming it has good enough cell signal.

Also, when I use find my friends I only see the one entry, where her watch was. But when I log into icloud and use find my iphone, I see the watch and phone separate.

Yes, I did read your previous reply. It doesn't seem to be what we are experiencing on our end. For example, if my wife goes for a walk and leaves her phone at her desk, when we check find my friends it shows her phones location, not the watch. I know you say subject to reception, but her watch reception would be fine. This is why I wondered if turning off the iPhone would force the watch to report it's location. I'm not sure why you can't specifically select the watch in find my friends, like you can an iPad.

Just an update. When I login to iCloud I can track the watch separately, but it was showing offline while she was out. Once she got back it came back online. Location Services is turned on, on the watch. Not sure what is happening.

So if you go out for a run with the watch, but without the phone and you want to still be tracked, would turning off the iPhone force it to track on the watch?

See my previous reply.

Another update.. Today it seemed to work as advertised. Thanks.