Bluetooth and Wi-fi interfering with each other

[DCstewieG]

My wife just got her watch and now we've been disappointed to find that it absolutely destroys her iPhone 5's wi-fi connection. I haven't seen anything about this but I can't believe we're the only ones seeing it.

With both BT and w-fi on, the status bar icons both go on and off as they disconnect and reconnect. If I turn off one, the other is fine. After reading a bit, this doesn't seem surprising to me. BT and wi-fi both work on 2.4 GHz. We actually have a dual band router but the 5GHz signal just isn't reliable everywhere.

A solution would be nice (besides buy a new router) but I'd just like to know someone else is seeing this!

 

[phirstube]

How is your router configured? What type of security do you have enabled on your router?

 

[DCstewieG]

I'm not at home to check but I believe it's set for G+N only, and I have separate SSIDs for 2.4GHz and 5GHz. Using WPA2 for security. It's a TP-LINK TL-WDR3600 running OpenWRT.

 

[Knightcastle]

My wife just got her watch and now we've been disappointed to find that it absolutely destroys her iPhone 5's wi-fi connection. I haven't seen anything about this but I can't believe we're the only ones seeing it.

With both BT and w-fi on, the status bar icons both go on and off as they disconnect and reconnect. If I turn off one, the other is fine. After reading a bit, this doesn't seem surprising to me. BT and wi-fi both work on 2.4 GHz. We actually have a dual band router but the 5GHz signal just isn't reliable everywhere.

A solution would be nice (besides buy a new router) but I'd just like to know someone else is seeing this!

Noticed you said "If I turn off one, the other is fine" so I wouldn't necessarily say the watch "destroys her iPhone 5's wi-fi connection"

As you've said yourself, it's unusual that it's just you seeing this problem. Rather than an extremely isolated instance of WiFi and Bluetooth not getting on because they're both on 2.4Ghz (very unlikely) I'd be inclined to say there was something wrong in the software that is make the watch or the phone unable to decide which to use.

Try unpairing and re-pairing. You might be surprised.

A quick way to test if WiFi and Bluetooth really are interfering with one another, play some music through a bluetooth speaker and try and simultaneously download something from WiFi? You should come across the same problem. I very much doubt you will.

 

[alxz1194]

I have been having this exact same problem with an iPhone 6. Sometimes both my bluetooth connection and wifi drop at the same time; at this point, I am unable to connect to any 2.4ghz wifi networks or bluetooth devices. Interestingly enough, I am able to use 5ghz networks. When I turn bluetooth off and back on, both connections start working again. This has been happening a couple of times per day out of nowhere for me, and restoring my phone as well as re-pairing the watch has not helped

 

[papbot]

I haven't noticed this. I have wifi and bluetooth on all my devices so that Handoff/Continuity works between them and prior to the watch no issues. After the watch no issues, nor any having bluetooth headphones connected for an extended time. You may have a device problem that needs to be looked at.

 

[iamasmith]

I gave up long ago trying to propagate a Wifi signal in a house and switched to using Devolo mains networking devices.

No worries about going through 8ft of wall on a 6" thick wall because you are at 15° to the router through the wall.. just break out the Wifi separately in every room that needs it and get full strength ^^