Blog

Thanks to iOS 17 and watchOS 10, you can ping a lost Apple Watch from your iPhone. Reverse has always been a cool feature on the Apple Watch that lets you find a lost iPhone you left somewhere nearby.

If you take off your Apple Watch at the end of the day and forget to put it on the charger, you might not remember where you put it the next morning. Now you can find a lost Apple Watch from your iPhone. Here’s how it works.

How to ping a lost Apple Watch with an iPhone

You can always use Apple’s Find My app to locate a lost Apple Watch, but this handy trick is quicker and easier. I usually stick to the rule that my watch is only ever (a) on the charger or (b) on my wrist, but that just makes it harder for me to find it if I happen to leave it somewhere else. This handy method makes it much easier to quickly locate a lost Apple Watch.

Note: To use this feature, you must have iOS 17 or later on your iPhone and watchOS 10 or later on your Apple Watch. Not sure if your iPhone is up to date? Go to Settings > General > Software Update to get the latest version. (To check your Apple Watch software, open the Regard App on your iPhone, go to General > Software update.) The watchOS 10 update is available for all Series 4 and newer models, including SE and Ultra.

Table of Contents: How to ping a lost Apple Watch with an iPhone

1. Add the Ping My Watch button in Settings > Control Center
2. Open Control Center and press the Apple Watch button

1. Add the button to your iPhone’s Control Center

To quickly find your Apple Watch with your iPhone, you first need to add the “Ping My Watch” button to your phone’s Control Center. First, open Settings > Control CenterHere you can customize which “controls” are displayed. Then scroll down to the bottom and tap + Ping my watch to add the button to your iPhone’s Control Center. Scroll back up and you can rearrange all the controls by dragging the ☰ on the right side. (While you are at it, remove any controls you do not use by clicking the −.)

2. Ping your Apple Watch from the iPhone Control Center

Now you can ping your Apple Watch from your iPhone to find it as quickly as possible. To do this, simply swipe down from the top right corner of your iPhone screen to bring up the Control Center, then tap the Apple Watch button. Your watch will play the same fun, rhythmic sound from its speakers that you’re used to when you use it to find your iPhone. And yes, this even works if you leave your watch on silent mode – as most people do and, frankly, everyone should.

While the Apple Watch doesn’t have quite as loud a speaker as the iPhone, the audible alarm should still help you find your lost watch in a room. If you don’t hear anything after pinging for a while, it’s probably too far away to hear the alarm, in which case you might want to open Find mytap the Devices and then tap your Apple Watch to confirm that it is not actually missing.

Learn more iOS 17 Tricks

The 50 best iOS 17 features to try after the update

We originally published this post on how to ping your Apple Watch from your iPhone on November 8, 2023. We have updated the information.