Apple Watch Main Screen stuck on spinning circle

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Level 1

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Apple Watch Main Screen stuck on spinning circle

To start off, I do have a VPN on my iPhone that tunnels all my traffic through a DNS filter with CloudFlare. The issue I am running into is likely related to this, but I am wanting to know if anyone has information about the what network traffic the apple watch apps (specifically the main clock screen, like the Home Screen) generate. I tried location through the Cloudflare logs but cannot distinguish anything specific to the Apple Watch.

I do have some Apple domains blocked because there is no way to block the Search (or spotlight) results from including web images and locking it down from being re-enabled. So it is also possible that some of the watch domains are blocked under those that are shared with the iPhone Search web image results, but no real way to distinguish them. It also appears that Apple doesn't really release or make this Apple Watch backend networking information available in their documentation.

Posted on Aug 10, 2025 09:14 AM

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Answer 1

APPL3 M4N Author

Level 1

36 points

Aug 11, 2025 02:10 PM in response to Ingo2711

To confirm then, does that mean it is essentially impossible to use an Apple Watch on an iPhone that has a permanent VPN connection on it? That sort of what it sounds like you are suggesting, but want to confirm that for sure.

Thanks

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Answer 2

Ingo2711

Level 9

77,853 points

Aug 12, 2025 03:52 AM in response to APPL3 M4N

As far as I know, the Apple Watch uses the Wi-fi settings on the paired iPhone. If the VPN blocks connections the Watch needs, you will get the spinning circle.

VPN overview for Apple device deployment - Apple Support

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Answer 3

APPL3 M4N Author

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36 points

Aug 13, 2025 09:27 AM in response to Ingo2711

Thanks for that article. Super Helpful!

I see that it says "Note: Apple Watch pairing isn’t supported with Always On VPN." But does that mean the pairing process is not supported or having an already paired watch is not supported? (Essentially saying you can't use an Apple Watch with an Always On VPN?)

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Answer 4

Ingo2711

Level 9

77,853 points

Aug 13, 2025 12:15 PM in response to APPL3 M4N

As I understand this, nothing can be blocked during pairing the watch by VPN, which can result in unexpected behavior during the use of the watch, for example spinning circles, because processes can‘t complete due to restricted access to Apple servers.

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Answer 5

APPL3 M4N Author

Level 1

36 points

Aug 20, 2025 07:35 AM in response to Ingo2711

I did a deep dive on this and it actually looks like the VPN is not the issue. The problem is related to the Allowed Apps list on a Configuration Profile that is on the phone. If I remove that profile, reboot the watch, it works perfectly fine.

What this introduces though is it's likely related then to this list missing some of the Native Apple Watch apps. And to add insult to injury, Apple doesn't provide a list of the Apple WatchOS native App Bundle IDs to get them added to the allow list. I've been trying to identify what all of these are, but seems like there are only about 10 that people can find, none of which are the Watch Face "app".

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Answer 6

Ingo2711

Level 9

77,853 points

Aug 11, 2025 03:10 AM in response to APPL3 M4N

Turning off your VPN is the only way to get your watch out of this circle.

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