Series 4 Wi-Fi annoyance - private address

[Jim Lahey]

was private address enabled in the 2.4 in the phone settings before? (not the watch app on the phone, the settings for the phone itself)
wondering if the setting was "syncing" from the phone to the watch.


the watch will naturally use the lowest power radio available, and power off the others, so as long as your phone is close then the watch will only have the bluetooth radio powered on, if it doesn't see bluetooth for a bit, then it turns on wifi. Same applies to cellular, it will only power that on if it can't find bluetooth or wifi.

so depending on the size of your house, and how far you're able to get from your phone when you set it down. The watch might not switch to wifi that often.

Yes the Phone was set to use private address for the 2.4 Ghz network but it was also never using that network. It was in the list of My Networks but not set to auto-connect and so never used. Either way the setting on the watch should surely be independent of all of this? It has its own MAC and IP address. It's a separate networking device. Otherwise the setting should not exist in the watch settings on the watch.

PS. I'm aware that the watch won't always use Wi-Fi but the annoyance was that it would keep overwriting my toggle when it did, thus re-enabling private address and choosing a new MAC. When all's said and done, the watch was literally overriding the manual toggle so it's definitely a bug.

 

[GeekyGrannie]

I have been checking my watch wifi connection occasionally for a while now and I definitely see this behavior. The watch remembers my network password but forgets the private address setting. Whether it is a "bug" or a "feature", it is annoying to have a setting overridden that way.

 

[JasKen]

Add me to this thread. I noticed this behavior when I first received my watch (Series 5 - A2095). All my LAN wifi network devices are configured and assigned a static ip address via MAC address in my router. My wifi network SSID has not ever changed in 10+ years. I have set the private addressing to OFF on our mobile iPhones, iPads, apple watches which move into and out of my wifi network all too frequently. These devices retain the private address setting (OFF) without any issues with the exception of the Apple Watches which refuses to retain the selection? It’s frustrating as a network admin seeing a new mysterious address show up and connected to my wifi network until I have to change the Apple Watches private address setting back to (OFF). In other words, all the apple watches that I have assigned in my router to allow connection to my WiFi network should consistently reveal themselves with their native hardware MAC address if the private address setting is selected to OFF.

 

[Diamond Dog]

I am having a combination of issues related to this. Sorry to necro this old thread.

First, my Watch seems to only half-remember my network settings. I connected it to my Wi-Fi network by entering my password, and I turned private address off. However, I am having two issues after doing this:

1) The Watch never automatically connects to the Wi-Fi network, even if my phone is off. It'll show it is disconnected from my phone with the red, crossed-out phone icon, but it does not automatically connect to Wi-Fi (even though that option is enabled for this network). Oddly, if I go into the Wi-Fi settings on the Watch and select this network from the list, THEN it connects-- without me having to type in the password again. So, clearly, it is remembering the network-- just not respecting the auto-connect setting.

2) When the above occurs (phone is off or far away, Watch loses connection to it, and I manually reconnect the Watch to Wi-Fi via settings), every time I go to connect it to Wi-Fi, the private address setting has been re-enabled for this network.

Very frustrating behavior.

 

[Jim Lahey]

Very frustrating behavior.

This is Apple Watch all round for me. I got rid of mine in the end and have gone back to old school automatic watches that just tell the time and look nice. Apple Watch is riddled with bugs, oddities, foibles and straight-up hostile design choices. I get that people like them - they're nice - but I'll never look back. I've since realised they're just an addiction that enslave you to a wrist mounted biosecurity sentinel. Simpler life is FTW.

 

[Diamond Dog]

I'm glad you found a path that works for you. Overall, I do enjoy the Watch and I utilize several of the health-related features that I wouldn't find in a traditional watch. So, I guess I'll wait until they fully release the new watchOS and submit a bug report if the issue still exists.

 

[Jim Lahey]

I'm glad you found a path that works for you. Overall, I do enjoy the Watch and I utilize several of the health-related features that I wouldn't find in a traditional watch. So, I guess I'll wait until they fully release the new watchOS and submit a bug report if the issue still exists.

Yeah that’s fair enough. I wouldn’t expect everyone to share the same sentiment. All I will add vis-à-vis software updates is that in my experience all they ever seem to do is add more problems than they fix.

 

[SaguaroSeven]

I am having a combination of issues related to this. Sorry to necro this old thread.

First, my Watch seems to only half-remember my network settings. I connected it to my Wi-Fi network by entering my password, and I turned private address off. However, I am having two issues after doing this:

This is exactly the behavior I experience on my S7 watch since I got in Jan 2022. Never was an issue on S2 or S4 watch. No change with any software update. I have un-paired my Watch several times, and started from scratch when I first got it and again in the summer. None of that helped. This isn't a niche problem, probably many affected never notice it. I generally find my Watch is in a "disconnected" state frequently for no reason...

In this Apple thread has a report that Apple Support recommended changing the SSID of network; at least one person said that worked. I haven't tried this yet. The problem is absurd.

Apple Watch Wifi keeps reverting to priva… - Apple Community

discussions.apple.com

 

[Diamond Dog]

This is exactly the behavior I experience on my S7 watch since I got in Jan 2022. Never was an issue on S2 or S4 watch. No change with any software update. I have un-paired my Watch several times, and started from scratch when I first got it and again in the summer. None of that helped. This isn't a niche problem, probably many affected never notice it. I generally find my Watch is in a "disconnected" state frequently for no reason...

In this Apple thread has a report that Apple Support recommended changing the SSID of network; at least one person said that worked. I haven't tried this yet. The problem is absurd.

Apple Watch Wifi keeps reverting to priva… - Apple Community

discussions.apple.com

Yeah, I have been participating in that thread and saw the SSID change as a solution for that user. I do not plan to do this myself, as it's a ridiculous thing to have to do to resolve a single issue, and I have tons of devices that would need to be touched after making such a change.

 

[Jim Lahey]

Apple Watch networking is becoming full-FacePalm. Or so it would appear. Obviously all of this stuff is extremely complex, but in today’s world it’s the bread & butter of pretty much all consumer electronics. It’s sort of embarrassing that Apple can’t get the basics right. It’s a mature product.

 

[mlody]

My series 4 does exactly the same thing unfortunately.

 

[SaguaroSeven]

What fixed this for me: Forgetting the problematic wifi network from all devices (all my phone, Watch, Macs, ipad, don’t think I did this on HomePods or ATV) Restarting them. Then rejoining.

This plus maybe a watchOS update earlier in 2023 fixed the private address setting. I think forgetting the network didn’t work last year; not positive.