How To Back Up & Restore Your Apple Watch

Whether you’re upgrading to a new watch, troubleshooting an issue, or simply resetting your device, the thought of losing all of the data on any of your devices is daunting, to say the least. This is quite true for my Apple Watch. I have spent countless months closing my rings on it.

Let me walk you through just how to never lose that data via backing up as well as restoring your Apple Watch.

Back Up Your Apple Watch#

The good news is that I don’t have to follow additional steps in order to back up my Apple Watch data. It is automatically synced with my iPhone when they are nearby, ensuring a seamless data transfer. When this iPhone is backed up to the cloud, the Apple Watch data is backed up as well.

The data is backed up on your family member’s iCloud directly if you have an Apple Watch that’s on a Family Setup. This is automatically backed up when the watch is connected to Wi-Fi or a power source.

Additionally, my Apple Watch also gets completely backed up automatically when I unpair it from my iPhone. This makes sure even the last recorded data, such as the last heart rate reading right before I hit ‘Unpair’, also gets backed up. 

Apple Watch backup includes:#

• Data and settings for built-in apps, such as distance, Maps, Calendar, Mail, Weather, and Stocks.
• The layout of apps on the Home Screen.
• Language. 
• The current watch face and its customizations.
• System settings such as volume, text size, haptics, and brightness.
• Health and Fitness data, including history, Workout and Activity data, awards, and data entered by the user.
• Settings for the notifications.
• Music settings and albums, playlists, and podcasts that are synced to the Apple Watch.
• Siri Voice Feedback that controls when Siri gets activated.
• Photo albums that are synced with the Apple Watch.
• Time Zone.

Apple Watch backup doesn’t include:#

• Bluetooth connections.
• Stored debit or credit cards on Apple Pay.
• Apple Watch’s password.
• Messages, if they are not synced to iCloud automatically.

Back up the Apple Watch to iCloud#

In order to back up the Apple Watch to iCloud, we will need to back up our iPhone. This is because the Apple Watch is already backed up on my iPhone, and it just needs to be uploaded to the cloud.

1. Head to Settings on your iPhone and tap on your name at the top.
2. Select iCloud > iCloud Backup.
3. Select Back Up Now. This will back up your Apple Watch data stored on your iPhone to iCloud.

Restore your Apple Watch #

It is noteworthy that you don’t believe that the activity and fitness data history will show up on your Apple Watch after it is restored. This data is backed up and available to view on your iPhone or iCloud.

To restore a backup on your Apple Watch, start pairing the Apple Watch with your iPhone and select Restore from Backup. This will display the backups available that you can choose to restore. Tap on the last stored backup and click Continue. This will restore your Apple Watch.

Agree to the terms and conditions and sign in to your Apple ID.

Wrap Up#

As important as it is for our data to be backed up so as not to lose out on information such as workouts and health history, Apple has made this process so much easier. There is no need for me to manually back up my data periodically. It gets updated automatically on my iPhone.

So the next time you want to reset your Apple Watch for whatever reason, simply unpair your watch from your iPhone for the last recorded metrics to be backed up and proceed with restoring your Apple Watch without losing your data.

FAQs#