Having a wearable like the Galaxy Watch without a Bluetooth connection to your phone limits a lot of main features one looks for when acquiring a smartwatch. It can be done, especially on Galaxy Watch 4 but, at the end of the day, you’ll need to sync that fitness data or get notifications while your phone is in your pocket. Sadly, some users run into an issue that completely breaks this functionality. Namely, it seems that the Galaxy Watch keeps disconnecting from the phone after some time. The Bluetooth connection just drops out of nowhere. Others got it even worse when the phone and the watch can’t pair at all.
And this applies to almost all models, including Galaxy Watch Active 2, Galaxy Watch 3, and even Galaxy Watch 4. If you’re also affected by this, make sure to check the instructions we provided below.
Table of contents:
- Restart your phone and Galaxy Watch
- Check Bluetooth
- Reinstall the Wearable app and clear the cache from Galaxy Plug-In
- Reset the watch and set it up again
Samsung Galaxy Watch disconnects from Bluetooth
1. Restart your phone and Galaxy Watch
Start by restarting both your phone and your Galaxy Watch. Power off and then power on both devices and ensure that Bluetooth is turned on on both of them. If the automatic pairing prompt doesn’t appear, open the Wearable (Galaxy Wearable) app on your phone and connect with your watch from there. You can do that from the left pane (hamburger menu).
Also, make sure that your watch firmware is up to date. If you can’t check for updates on your phone because of Bluetooth connectivity issues, you can do it on your watch. Just make sure that you’re connected to Wi-Fi and navigate to Settings > Software update.
If the Galaxy Watch keeps disconnecting, we suggest checking Bluetooth and ensuring that your watch appears on the list of available devices.
2. Check Bluetooth
Again, make sure that Bluetooth is enabled on both devices. In addition, we suggest disabling mobile data, NFC, and Location Services on your phone. Disconnect your phone and other Bluetooth devices. This is a good way to diagnose if there are some Bluetooth issues on your phone. On the other hand, if you own another Bluetooth device, try pairing it to your watch to see if the Bluetooth is working on your watch, too.
Unpairing is also an option but we don’t see how this can help in this scenario considering that the pairing process is done by Galaxy Wearable and Galaxy Watch Manager. The Galaxy Watch is not a simple audio device (e.g Bluetooth speaker) that can work without the companion app. The reason more to check those two services before we reset the watch.
3. Reinstall the Wearable app and clear the cache from Galaxy Watch Manager
Galaxy Wearable and the plug-in that comes with it are essential if you want to connect and control your Galaxy Watch on an Android smartphone. So, what should you do? First, you should try and clear data and cache from both. Here’s how to clear data from Wearable and Galaxy Watch Manager:
- Open Settings.
- Tap Apps. Expand All apps or open Manage apps.
- Open Wearable or Galaxy Wearable.
- Tap Storage and clear data. Do the same for Galaxy Plug-in called Galaxy Watch Manager.
- Open the app, sign in if necessary, and check if the phone connects to your Galaxy Watch now.
If that did nothing, you can also uninstall both services/apps in the same way and then install Galaxy Wearable from the Play Store. The plug-in will auto-install once you install the app. Once you’ve done that, make sure that Galaxy Wearable has all permissions granted. Also, open Settings > Apps > Wearable > Battery and disable Battery optimization for this app. Some users report that the app gets put to sleep after some time and then Galaxy Watch automatically disconnects.
4. Reset the watch and set it up again
Finally, if none of the steps worked for you, you can remove the watch/reset it and set it up again. You should do this even when there’s nothing wrong, to speed up your watch. Because everything is in the cloud, you won’t lose your data. Just make sure to back up everything beforehand. Here’s how to reset your Galaxy Watch:
- If you can connect your watch to the phone, quickly open the Wearable app and then Watch Settings. Open the Account and Backup option and back up your data. Your phone needs to be connected to Wi-Fi to do this. After that, you can reset your watch without your phone.
- Open Settings on your Galaxy Watch.
- Select General.
- Tap Reset and confirm.
- Once your device resets, use your account to sign in and check if it connects to your phone.
If your Galaxy Watch keeps disconnecting, you should take it to repair service because there’s probably a hardware problem that’s causing this. With that said, we can conclude this article. Thank you for reading and feel free to share alternative solutions or post questions concerning the ones we provided. You can do that in the comments section below.
Editor’s note: This article was initially published in May 2022. We made sure to revamp it for freshness and accuracy.
