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apple watch will not pair and watch is out of date

I have an iPhone XS and an Apple Watch series 2. The watch is fully factory reset and I have not used it in over a year. When I go to pair it to my phone, it is incredibly difficult for the two devices to recognize each other to pair, but after some trouble shooting and I get the watch to recognize the other device to begin set up I am prompted with "Update Your Apple Watch. To finish pairing, your Apple Watch must be running the latest version of watchOS." I click the "Update Now" button but after about a minute, the watch will immediately prompt the message "Unpairing Apple Watch. Your phone is currently unpairing Apple Watch." I am stuck in this cycle of when I try to update the Apple Watch to continue set up, it will immediately unpair the phone to set up and I cannot find any resources online that help. I have tried erasing network settings on the iPhone, reseting both iPhone and Apple Watch, checking if the Apple Watch is activation locked (which to my knowledge and looking on iCloud it is not), checking WiFi and bluetooth connections, etc.


Any help is appreciated.


Posted on Jul 19, 2020 3:52 PM

Reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Jul 20, 2020 1:34 AM

This is a known problem ios13 doesn't seem to like older watches with

watchos5 or below,here are some proven solutions from other forum

members.


Quote;

Apple watch 2;

I found a friend, who was on iOS 12 and used his iPhone to pair. Before

pairing it asked to upgrade the watch OS (iOS 13 didn't offer this option).

After I upgraded the watchos I unpaired the watch from the ios12 phone and

then was able to pair it with any iPhone running iOS 13.


Quote;

1st gen apple watch;

pairing was successful on the following device (with associated OS)

to pair via bluetooth I used an iphone 7 with iOS 12, after pairing

immediately accepted the watchOS update to version 4.3.2 after everything

was successfully equipped with the last update, unpaired the iPhone and the

Apple Watch a reset (factory settings) all this took some time but afterwards

pairing on an iPhone XR with iOS13 g was a piece of cake.


Quote;

May 9, 2020 4:58 AM in response to Hashimsabbah

Just did this with a series1. I had to pair with the original phone and update

the firmware for me to pair correctly. All I did was ask to pair and the update

happened on an iPhone 6.


Quote;

nickfit888

Jul 5, 2020 5:23 AM in response to fieryjack

So the “pairing with an old iPhone on iOS 12” trick actually worked for me. I

got a brand new series 3 Apple Watch via a warranty replacement from

Apple. I could not pair the watch to my iPhone X due to the 5.3.7 update

issue. Originally it allowed me to update to 5.3.7 but it was stuck after that.


Based on the advice from “fieryjack” I took an old iPhone 6 (iOS 12.4.7) and

was able to pair my Apple Watch. Once it was paired (watch was fully set

up and synced to the iPhone 6) I tried to update the Watch OS but it said I

needed up update the iOS in order to do so. I unpaired the watch from the

iPhone 6 and paired it with my iPhone X (running iOS 13.5.1). Not sure if

this additional step helped but I chose the manual pair option and this time

the watch gave the option to update to 6.2.6! Once it started updating i

turned off the Bluetooth on my iPhone so that it would update faster using

the wifi network (assuming you are connected to a fast wifi network). I

think it took between 2-3 hours to download the update and after that i was

able to restore my watch using a previous back up.

Thanks again fieryjack for the tip!



Find a phone with ios12 on it if you can and pair your watch to it,it will ask

you to update the watch select yes,after it has updated unpair the watch

from the ios12 phone and then pair it with your ios13 phone.Now you can update to watchos6.

Alternatively contact apple store and see if they will update the watch

through the data/diagnostic port.

Similar questions

1 reply
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Jul 20, 2020 1:34 AM in response to dominiquezito

This is a known problem ios13 doesn't seem to like older watches with

watchos5 or below,here are some proven solutions from other forum

members.


Quote;

Apple watch 2;

I found a friend, who was on iOS 12 and used his iPhone to pair. Before

pairing it asked to upgrade the watch OS (iOS 13 didn't offer this option).

After I upgraded the watchos I unpaired the watch from the ios12 phone and

then was able to pair it with any iPhone running iOS 13.


Quote;

1st gen apple watch;

pairing was successful on the following device (with associated OS)

to pair via bluetooth I used an iphone 7 with iOS 12, after pairing

immediately accepted the watchOS update to version 4.3.2 after everything

was successfully equipped with the last update, unpaired the iPhone and the

Apple Watch a reset (factory settings) all this took some time but afterwards

pairing on an iPhone XR with iOS13 g was a piece of cake.


Quote;

May 9, 2020 4:58 AM in response to Hashimsabbah

Just did this with a series1. I had to pair with the original phone and update

the firmware for me to pair correctly. All I did was ask to pair and the update

happened on an iPhone 6.


Quote;

nickfit888

Jul 5, 2020 5:23 AM in response to fieryjack

So the “pairing with an old iPhone on iOS 12” trick actually worked for me. I

got a brand new series 3 Apple Watch via a warranty replacement from

Apple. I could not pair the watch to my iPhone X due to the 5.3.7 update

issue. Originally it allowed me to update to 5.3.7 but it was stuck after that.


Based on the advice from “fieryjack” I took an old iPhone 6 (iOS 12.4.7) and

was able to pair my Apple Watch. Once it was paired (watch was fully set

up and synced to the iPhone 6) I tried to update the Watch OS but it said I

needed up update the iOS in order to do so. I unpaired the watch from the

iPhone 6 and paired it with my iPhone X (running iOS 13.5.1). Not sure if

this additional step helped but I chose the manual pair option and this time

the watch gave the option to update to 6.2.6! Once it started updating i

turned off the Bluetooth on my iPhone so that it would update faster using

the wifi network (assuming you are connected to a fast wifi network). I

think it took between 2-3 hours to download the update and after that i was

able to restore my watch using a previous back up.

Thanks again fieryjack for the tip!



Find a phone with ios12 on it if you can and pair your watch to it,it will ask

you to update the watch select yes,after it has updated unpair the watch

from the ios12 phone and then pair it with your ios13 phone.Now you can update to watchos6.

Alternatively contact apple store and see if they will update the watch

through the data/diagnostic port.

apple watch will not pair and watch is out of date

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