Apple watch silent haptic alarms do not always work, why?

[miblev]

No solution yet. I have been told Apple engineers are working on it. In fact I have answered some questions for them. If anyone else is having this problem, it wouldn't hurt to contact Apple Care. I 'm hoping the more calls they get, the more attention they'll pay to the issue.

 

[iPGnr1]

I am struggling this case with apple support right now.

Have you guys come any further solving the problem?

/iPG

 

[festaman]

Update: the alarm on my new watch worked fine the first two nights. However, this morning it didn't vibrate and when I woke up, the alarm screen was on my watch. I think Apple has a software glitch.

I am.having the dame problem. Started a week or so ago. I'm wondering if cover to mute is causing it .

 

[Mac Guy]

I'm wondering if cover to mute is causing it .

That's an interesting observation! I've noticed (or think I have) that occasionally at night I won't get a notification. It's usually when I'm watching TV in low- to no-light situations. I wonder of cover to mute is a function of absence of light or IR detection of the hand.

I'll turn the feature off for a few days to see if that changes anything. It's not like the problem occurs often.

 

[miblev]

Interestingly, while I haven't had the problem for a while, it has started to crop up again. I don't use cover to mute. I saw on another forum that someone who was having this problem stopped using repeating alarms and that seemed to work. I am going to try that.

 

[Jon Waldron]

I turned off cover to must as well and its working a lot better for me.

 

[icw70]

Happened to me for the 1st time this am. Been using this feature for months with no issues. Will try turning off "cover to mute".

 

[Hou77098]

AW1.
I have used silent haptic alarms daily for over a year without a glitch. Now in the last 2 months, I have had several instances of not being awoken by the alarm. Of course I would be pleased if this apparent software bug could be fixed. As a failsafe, I would like an option where audio alarm is activated if there is no manual effort to stop or snooze the alarm.

This silent alarm is one of my favorite features, very sad to have it malfunction.

 

[miblev]

Interestingly, I haven't had any problems the last few months with my silent alarm not going off until this morning, when it didn't work.

 

[carcomp]

If your taptic engine is not working, give your watch a "knock" with your knuckle, then open the Breathe app and see if its working now. Mine developed a case of "it doesn't work after it has charged overnight". Its a hardware issue. I'm setting up a ship / return now to get a new device.

 

[vadeek]

Re: Apple watch silent haptic alarms do not always work

I look at my watch, the alarm is on the screen (with the options to snooze or dismiss), but there are no haptic touches.

Hello All,
Writing a replay to this one-year-old post just in case someone is looking for a solution facing the same problem. I've also faced the issue. Exactly like it is described in the quote: the alarm is on the screen - but no vibration at all (the watch is in the silent mode, means it should vibrate only). The vibration worked for other notifications (so, it wasn't a mechanical malfunctioning). And I also initially thought I just didn't fill the vibration being asleep. But then it stopped working for alarm at all. Means whenever I set the alarm (to whatever time) it never vibrated. I brought my watch to apple service - they were puzzled a bit, took for diagnostics, and returned saying the issue does not reoccur. And showed its warkability on THEIR phone. That moment I realized the problem is with the phone, not the watch.

I tried many options: Remove suspicious apps, which could affect the alarm, reinstall the watch app, unpair the watch, pair again, etc. And finally I've come up with the following solution:
1. Unpair the watch from your iPhone.
2. On your iPhone go to Setting->General->Reset: Reset All Settings
3. Pair your watch again. (it can be restored from the backup, so all the watch settings like the screens etc will be restored, no need to set them up again).
4. Voila! The alarm vibrates again.

So the problem is with some setting on the phone, which stops the vibration.

And one day the issue came back. But this time I knew what I exactly did to my watch (something unusual), which could be the reason. This time going to bed I noticed my watch's battery almost dead and decided to leave them on the charger for the night and just use regular alarm of the phone. I set up the alarm, and in the morning was awaken by both devices: iPhone's alarm and the watch's alarm (what is normal, as it is said if the watch is on its charger the silent mode doesn't work for alarms and such kind of notifications). I put the watch on my wrist, entered the pin and immediately felt the vibration. But I had to press 'snooze' two times, for both alarms: of the phone and of the watch. After that the vibration had gone again. (Was fixed again with the steps above).
So, it is looking like there is some software conflicting issue of the alarms which leads to the situation when the vibration of the watch is gone.

 

[zenjen]

Re: Apple watch silent haptic alarms do not always work

Hello All,
Writing a replay to this one-year-old post just in case someone is looking for a solution facing the same problem. I've also faced the issue. Exactly like it is described in the quote: the alarm is on the screen - but no vibration at all (the watch is in the silent mode, means it should vibrate only). The vibration worked for other notifications (so, it wasn't a mechanical malfunctioning). And I also initially thought I just didn't fill the vibration being asleep. But then it stopped working for alarm at all. Means whenever I set the alarm (to whatever time) it never vibrated. I brought my watch to apple service - they were puzzled a bit, took for diagnostics, and returned saying the issue does not reoccur. And showed its warkability on THEIR phone. That moment I realized the problem is with the phone, not the watch.

I tried many options: Remove suspicious apps, which could affect the alarm, reinstall the watch app, unpair the watch, pair again, etc. And finally I've come up with the following solution:
1. Unpair the watch from your iPhone.
2. On your iPhone go to Setting->General->Reset: Reset All Settings
3. Pair your watch again. (it can be restored from the backup, so all the watch settings like the screens etc will be restored, no need to set them up again).
4. Voila! The alarm vibrates again.

So the problem is with some setting on the phone, which stops the vibration.

And one day the issue came back. But this time I knew what I exactly did to my watch (something unusual), which could be the reason. This time going to bed I noticed my watch's battery almost dead and decided to leave them on the charger for the night and just use regular alarm of the phone. I set up the alarm, and in the morning was awaken by both devices: iPhone's alarm and the watch's alarm (what is normal, as it is said if the watch is on its charger the silent mode doesn't work for alarms and such kind of notifications). I put the watch on my wrist, entered the pin and immediately felt the vibration. But I had to press 'snooze' two times, for both alarms: of the phone and of the watch. After that the vibration had gone again. (Was fixed again with the steps above).
So, it is looking like there is some software conflicting issue of the alarms which leads to the situation when the vibration of the watch is gone.

Thank you. This is good to know.

 

[Mad_Mac_Maniac]

Re: Apple watch silent haptic alarms do not always work

I’m happy to see i’m Not the only one with this issue... I’ve had this issue sporadically for a while and mostly just stopped using the watch as my alarm.

For what it’s worth, a few months ago I received a new watch, and set up as new, and this morning I still had the issue appear.

However, through testing I think I have determined the problem (or at least one problem, there could be others). And it does involve cover to mute... but turning off “cover to mute” doesn’t seem to change it.


When the alarm is going on and I “raise to wake” and then immediately cover the face the alarm haptic stops. I haven’t been able to replicate this behavior if I raise to wake, pause a couple seconds then cover, or if I tap to wake then cover. It appears to only be raise to wake immediately followed by covering. Again, this behavior continues for me even when I disable cover to mute.

Correction: I was now able to replicate with a tap to wake immediately followed by a cover. Point is that it definitely has to do with covering the screen. But I haven’t been able to find a solution