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Apple Watch 3 stair count

A few days ago, my watch started counting way too many flights of stairs. Right now it's showing I've climbed 120 flights; I've likely climbed two. I've checked to make sure all the usual settings are correct and I've reset the calibration data twice with no change. Any ideas? This seemed to happen almost right after the last update.

Apple Watch

Posted on Jul 24, 2020 11:28 AM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Jul 29, 2020 11:46 AM

Correctly Counting Flights of Stairs

How to use Water Lock and eject water from your Apple Watch - Apple Support

How to clean your Apple Watch - Apple Support

Talked to some Apple Watch engineers and they suggested:

  1. locking the water (swipe up and hit the water drop),
  2. washing the watch with alcohol or soap/water,
  3. flush the water out per the instructions - pull on crown.

It worked! Voila! Miscounting flights of stairs problem fixed.


4 replies
Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Jul 29, 2020 11:46 AM in response to meg4848

Correctly Counting Flights of Stairs

How to use Water Lock and eject water from your Apple Watch - Apple Support

How to clean your Apple Watch - Apple Support

Talked to some Apple Watch engineers and they suggested:

  1. locking the water (swipe up and hit the water drop),
  2. washing the watch with alcohol or soap/water,
  3. flush the water out per the instructions - pull on crown.

It worked! Voila! Miscounting flights of stairs problem fixed.


Jul 28, 2020 11:02 AM in response to meg4848

Hi meg4848,


Apple Watch is normally a great way to track your activity, and we can see why you might be concerned about the flights of stairs not counting correctly. It sounds like you've already done some really great troubleshooting on your own.


Are your Apple Watch and iPhone both displaying the same number of flights? If so, does this normally happen during a particular workout?


If the Apple Watch and iPhone are displaying a different number of flights, please reach out to us using this link so we can take a closer look:


Get Support


Best Regards!

Jul 29, 2020 11:35 AM in response to sterling r

Thanks, Sterling. Both the watch and iphone are displaying the same impossible number--108 flights so far today. It doesn't happen during a particular workout, although my watch has also suddenly started counting more exercise minutes and move time. I was always unhappy about the accuracy of the exercise minutes as I didn't get credit for exercise time as I felt I should. I don't know whether this change happened when the stair count went crazy or when I calibrated the watch, but I would guess that the count is not accurate either, although it is not wacky like the stair count.


Jul 31, 2020 11:14 AM in response to javaliga

It worked! I simply flushed with warm water and dried, then flushed the water out as per instructions. It is now counting flights of stairs correctly. Unfortunately my exercise credits have also returned to their previous incorrect normal. For a 41-minute, 3 km walk this morning at an average pace of 13'27"/km, I received 9 minutes of exercise credit, whereas Zones (app on iPhone) shows 38 minutes of cardiac work and 3 minutes of warmup work. I'm disappointed in the way Apple calculates workout credits.

Apple Watch 3 stair count

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