Apple Watch and time till LTE connection

[KarstenS]

I have an Apple Watch 4 with LTE and since some days an eSIM for the watch.

So when I go out of range of my iPhone, it still takes alot of time, till the watch is connecting to the LTE network.

The longest timespan I have manually checked was 5 minutes after I got out of range.

Everytime I checked the state when it was still not connected to LTE, it does connect around 10 - 15 seconds later while I did watch the state.

But this is not really what I did expect by an cellular functionality.

So there is always a window of some minutes after getting out of range to the iPhone, where calls get not notified on the Apple Watch.

 

[BillGates1969]

I’ve had LTE in my S3, S4 and Now S5 and there is a delay, but normally never more than 5-20 seconds tops.

Are you in a good coverage area? If I run it as a test (ie turn off Bluetooth and WiFi on the watch) it is about 2-3 seconds. If I naturally do it (ie walk away from my home whilst leaving the iPhone at home) it takes slightly longer as it takes maybe 5-20 seconds to realise it is no longer on wifi.

Hope this helps

 

[KarstenS]

to realise it is no longer on wifi.

So there seems to be differences between what kind of connections are used when "walking away".

My situation, where I noticed this huge delay is: iPhone internet connection is through cellular network (LTE). Apple Watch is connected to the iPhone by BT. No WIFI for my devices in this area.

In your case it is about leaving the WIFI range.

In my case it is about leaving the BT range.

 

[BillGates1969]

So there seems to be differences between what kind of connections are used when "walking away".

My situation, where I noticed this huge delay is: iPhone internet connection is through cellular network (LTE). Apple Watch is connected to the iPhone by BT. No WIFI for my devices in this area.

In your case it is about leaving the WIFI range.

In my case it is about leaving the BT range.

I think the watch looks for a BT connection with the phone first, then if that fails falls back to WiFi. If that fails it should activate the LTE.

What if you turn off BT in settings and then WiFi - will it connect to LTE in under 10 seconds?

 

[KarstenS]

What if you turn off BT in settings and then WiFi - will it connect to LTE in under 10 seconds?

I would like to stay at a more realistic usecase: "I move away from my phone".

 

[BillGates1969]

I would like to stay at a more realistic usecase: "I move away from my phone".

Yes I agree, but I am thinking for testing purposes. You may be in bad LTE area etc. If it connects in a few seconds, then we can look at what is causing the delay. If it still takes a minute of so, then it may be the LTE or it could be the watch hardware. At least we know.

 

[KarstenS]

Would say this should be enough.

 

[BillGates1969]

Would say this should be enough.

Yep that looks fine. It maybe a hardware issue. I know I am a sample of one, but on my S3,S4 and now S5 i can leave the house and within 10-20 seconds tops it kicks in.

Not sure what others get. I am in the UK on the EE network - not sure if different carriers/cellular bands make any difference.

 

[Bazooka-joe]

Yes its about 10 to 20 seconds on the EE network for me.

 

[KarstenS]

From my ovservations its less about the speed to get into the cellular network than more about the time till the watch notice: the BT connection to the phone has been lost.

In all my "tests" the result was about the same. I was for some time far away enough that the connection got lost. I wake up the watch and swipe up. The green phone connection symbol is still there. 2 or 3 seconds later is switches over to the red "X" and some seconds later it connects to the cellular network.