Series 3 LTE watches may join unauthenticated Wi-Fi networks, Apple investigating

One of Apple’s biggest announcements from this year’s September event was the Apple Watch Series 3 with LTE, which, as the name suggests, packs in a cellular connection. With an electronic SIM card embedded inside, the Apple Watch Series 3 should help alleviate some of the requirement that your smartwatch must be connected to your smartphone, but in reviews for the wearable it looks like that may still be a requirement, as the cellular connectivity on the Series 3 with LTE seems to be spotty for many people who have tried it ahead of the public launch later this week.

According to a statement the company gave to The Verge, they’re aware of the issue and are investigating a fix that will be released as part of a future watchOS 4 update.

We have discovered that when Apple Watch Series 3 joins unauthenticated Wi-Fi networks without connectivity, it may at times prevent the watch from using cellular. We are investigating a fix for a future software release.

Kudos to Apple for acknowledging the issue just after pre-orders. The Verge editor Lauren Goode wrote in her Series 3 review:

 On more than one occasion, I detached myself from the phone, traveled blocks away from my home or office, and watched the Watch struggle to connect to LTE. It would appear to pick up a single bar of some random Wi-Fi signal, and hang on that, rather than switching to LTE.

While many reviews point out that they had issues with calling in general from the Apple Watch Series 3 with LTE, others don’t seem to have any issues at all. Some believe that the battery life is going to be an issue for a lot of future owners, and even Apple confirmed the wearable has only one hour of talk time, but talking on the phone, let alone from a smartwatch, for an hour might not be a big deal for most.