Apple Watch 3/Watchos 5 - Swimming not counting laps or calories correctly.

Hi hercuular I have heard nothing about a fix yet, Apple have taken some reading from my watch and I have provided them some screen shots to help,

Just waiting at the moment :-(

If you can please report it to Apple via the apple support app,

The more people that report the fault the better.

If I get a update I will post the outcome on hear.

I will give it another 2 weeks then I will be asking for a new watch as my year guarantee is up in 3 weeks.

Cheers

I am having the exact same problem. I swam 6 laps, watch counted only 2 lap and 1 calorie. This is a bummer.

Another problem is that when you put watch in water fitness mode you still have to manually put it into waterproof. It does not do that automatically like when you put it on swim mode.

I've been working with Apple Support on this issue for the last three weeks and for the most part, they have not come up with any answers or solutions. Today I asked them if they could just replace my Series 3 watch with another one that hasn't been updated to WatchOS 5. And they agreed to do it! (While it doesn't solve the WatchOS 5 issue, at least I can return to swimming and have the watch do the tracking.)

I’m having an issue as well with Apple Watch 4 . In my case, the software is measuring laps properly but halving distance. Each length of our pool is 12 yards but Apple Watch measures a lap as 11 yards not 24.

In swimming parlance and in the Apple Watch swim tracking, a “lap” is one length of a pool. So if you’re swimming in a pool that’s 12 yards in length, one “lap” is 12 yards. Swimming back and forth is 2 laps. If you swim two lengths (back and forth) the watch should say you swam 2 laps and 24 yards (which might make it look like it’s halving the distance, if you’re thinking a lap is returning to your point of origin).

Hi. I was having the exact same problem right after I updated the software to WatchOS 5.0.1. After 4 weeks dealing with Senior Advisors and people from the Engineering team, they offered me a replacement without the update. I don't know if they will do that for everyone, since I have AppleCare+. I will try it today in the swimming pool, but I guess it will work just fine. Does anyone know if Series 4 has the same problem with WatchOS 5? I don't think I will update it in a while...

Don't know how helpful this is, but I do not have this issue. I do the same swim workout about 4 times per week lasting about an hour. I had a series 2 watch for about two years and the upgrade from WatchOs 4 both to WatchOs 5 and 5.0.1 did not have any effect on the number of laps or calorie burn measured - all within the normal variation. I subsequently upgraded to a series 4 watch also running WatchOs 5.0.1 and it gives very similar figures. So your problem not universal. I have not yet upgraded to the latest WatchOs 5.1, so I can't speak to that if that is the version you upgraded to.

Hi. As far as I know, Series 2 has not been affected (my friends who have it told me it was still working fine). However, Series 3 seems to be having problems. Lately my watch was also recording a huge amount of burnt calories during workouts that should not burn a lot... Or even counting more steps than before... My guess is that there is some kind of bug affecting the way it measures everything on Series 3. Hope they fix it properly soon! Thanks!

I love my iwatch3 but I too am very frustrated with IOS 5.0.1. No matter what I have tried, I swim for 30 minutes and it shows a few laps and 100 yds. Apple please help. I have turned everything off, unpaired, etc... It would be helpful if Apple either fixed the software or provided clear solutions.

Andymnorris: what version of WatchOS got your watch working again? I guess I'd like to see more verifications that the latest version is correctly counting swim laps before I upgrade the OS again. Apple was kind enough to replace my Series 3 watch with Watch OS 4 on it and I don't want to go through the trouble of upgrading to 5 and it not working again.

I too have a series 3 and have had some issues but none as bad as this! Mine was displaying 3k yards right when starting my swim but then would be correct at the end of the swim. My main issue is that my watch missed 25 yards almost every single swim. It’s super annoying but now after seeing all these problems, I have nothing to complain about lol. It seems to have resolved with the latest update but will keep an eye on it. Hope everyone gets theirs resolved too!

And I second - 6,500 5 times a week is BEAST! Were you a Collegiate or US swimmer? I swam 3,100 in 64 mins the other day and felt like Michael Phelps lol

I am also having this issue, I updated to watch OS 5.0.1 yesterday and since then the swimming in the activity app is completely wrong. On 3/11 I swam 1000m and app said I burnt 800 calories (usual for my swim) updated on 4/11 did a 1000m swim and it says I burnt 81 calories....i'd have burnt more if i'd just floated in the pool for 45 mins!!! The screen also looked wrong during the swimming work out, the font was much smaller and it was all aligned to the left of the screen.

I reported the issue to Apple support who said it was the 1st report of this issue and had I tried restarting my watch!

This is utterly shoddy of apple to release an update to OS that clearly has a known issue in it that has made my watch pointless for a swimming workout. I'm utterly fuming and ready to send my watch back to apple, especially as they have said they won't help me move back to the working OS 4 version that was previously on my watch and I have to stay on this in useable and broken version.

I too have had this issue, not displaying any laps during swim (but for me accurately showing the laps at the end on the summary screen). I have a series 3 with 5.0.1. After reading there is a new IOS version, 5.1.1, I am downloading it as I type this. I won’t be able to test for several days due to travel, but the previous post indicated that this fixed the issue (for him). If you are on 5.0.1, I suggest you consider updating the software.

This only happened to me once ... it has worked fine since, with no further upgrades to the software. I’m not sure why the laps didn’t display during my swim that one time (but accurately showed the total laps in the summary screen), but it hasn’t happened again since that one time.

I received 5.1.1 the other day and updated to it and went swimming tonight and my iWatch 3 finally worked great again. It has taken over a month, but for as many billions a dollars Apple makes in profits every year, I really think the programmers should make sure it works as advertised and perform more testing before they send out upgrades. I love my watch for swimming when it works right. So whoever fixed the software, thank you.