Apple Watch is Disappointingly Imperfect

I've owned three Apple Watches. While impressive in many ways, they fall short of Apple's product standards, in my opinion. The larger issue may be Apple's software quality control in general, but this post isn't about that. This is just a collection of my minor complaints with Apple Watch.

My History with Apple Watch

I first tried an Apple Watch Series 8 in September of 2022, which was $429. I returned it after about 10 days. The experience was not great, in my opinion, and the health and emergency monitoring features didn't quite outweigh the headaches of using it, especially considering the purchase price. I bought a $25 Casio (with 10-year battery!) that had a vibration alarm, my favorite Apple Watch feature.

About two years later, in December of 2024, I bought an Apple Watch SE 2nd-gen for $149. For the price, it seemed like a good way to have multiple vibration alarms during the day while also providing a little peace of mind regarding heart attacks and falls (not that I'm old, but there's often nobody around within earshot of me during the day).

After only a few days of using it, I noticed the SE 2 had battery issues. I'm not sure what was going on, but I decided that if I really liked using the SE 2, I'd upgrade to one with a better battery.

I recently bought a Series 11, in September 2025, for $399.

Minor Complaints

• My Series 11 (running watchOS 26) woke me up at 4:24am with a buzz on my wrist. I had auto-update enabled, and attempted to install an update a couple days prior. On the two prior evenings, as directed, I put the watch on its charging puck next to my iPhone... and the watch didn't update itself. When an update fails to install, waking the user up over night is absolutely unacceptable! I've now turned auto-updates off.
• I use a shortcuts "automation," to automatically turn theater mode on and night and off in the morning. it usually works, but not always. When an automation fails every once in a while (timeout?), it really reinforces my avoidance of shortcuts in general.
• I cannot figure out how to easily sort my contacts, when calling or messaging me at certain times of day, into groups that:
  • buzz my wrist only (with no sound on iPhone), or
  • make a sound on iPhone (with or without buzz on my wrist, either way), or
  • are completely silenced.
• Along the lines of the above contacts buzz/sound/silence problem: there's a weird sequence of steps I have to do to sync focus modes between Apple Watch and iPhone. It should be simpler.
• There's no straightforward way to set certain watch faces to appear during certain times of day. For example, I'd like a simpler face when I'm trying to sleep. I have to create a shortcut "automation" for this. A setting in the "Sleep" app or watch faces picker would be much easier.
• There's no straightforward way to set theater mode, during certain times of day, for example, when I'm trying to sleep. Again, I have to create a shortcut for this?
• Tap to pay doesn't always seem to work if, after strapping on the watch, I unlock the watch via my phone. Tap to pay works reliably when unlocking the watch by typing my passcode directly on the watch.
• When a timer ends on my watch, I often raise my wrist to try to press the restart button and the watch interprets that as a stop gesture.
• I use RunKeeper, not the built-in Workouts app, to track my runs. On rare occasions during a run, and sometimes during a long walk, the watch will detect a workout and ask if I want to start tracking it. Why can it only detect a workout on rare occasions?
• On rare occasions, when trying to type in the passcode to unlock the Apple Watch, after typing a digit (sometimes the final digit)... nothing happens. The typed passcode digit is deleted and I have to try typing it again.
• The timer complication doesn't show timers started on my phone.
• A few times a month I have to unlock my watch after waking up in the morning, after it's been on my wrist all night.
• For a company that seems aware of materials and energy waste with packaging and shipping, there's an awful lot of packaging material used to deliver a single watch band.
• I often have reminders set to go off ~30 minutes after my morning alarm. When daylight savings time ended early on November 2, 2025 I was woken up by my reminder wrist tap being triggered ~30 minutes before my alarm! In other words, the alarm went off as expected, at the correct time after the clocks changed, but the reminder went off as if the clocks hadn't changed (watchOS 26.0.2).

Specific to the Apple Watch SE 2:

• I turned off all apps and features I can bear on the Apple Watch SE 2, and I was barely limping across the finish line with 10% battery remaining some days before my evening recharge. It was worse when doing a ~1 hour long RunKeeper activity during the day. A watch that bills itself a fitness- and activity-tracking watch should have a battery than can easily handle this.

So far, I only noticed this on the Apple Watch SE 2:

• The morning silent alarm is nice. I turn on theater mode for sleep (automatically, with a shortcut, more on that above) so when I raise my wrist to turn off the alarm I have to tap the screen to activate. Sometimes, while the alarm is buzzing, I tap the screen to wake and then before I can tap the stop button the screen turns off.

Bottom Line

Overall, I'm positive on the Apple Watch and I'm glad I bought the Series 11. I figured it was worth writing these issues down somewhere. I'm especially disappointed with some of the complaints because Apple Watch is 10 1/2 years old! A 10+ year old sleep tracking watch can still do a vibration notification at 4:24am? A 10+ year old watch OS doesn't sync focus modes with iPhone? It's just strange.

Many of the above complaints were for watchOS 11. I'll make a note if any of the above seem to be fixed with watchOS 26.