How to return a lost Apple Watch?

There has to be a better answer than this that involves Apple at bare minimum agreeing to send an email of some sort to the owner.

i do not trust the ‘authorities’ or the employees of the establishment where i found someone’s Apple product to take any better action than i could to find this thing’s rightful owner. i fully expect both options would result in the item being discarded or parted out by someone i gave it to. in my case i found a relatively new 2019 iMac in the hall at a storage facility. They wouldn’t even agree to go back through their security footage to help me out. i plugged it in at my house hoping to find some clue and yet it seems to be the case that i can’t do anything to get it online.. so the fact of it being on Find My doesn’t even help.

Once someone found my iphone and i was able to reach that person by CALLING my phone. Had that not been true i never would have gotten it back im so sure.

Surely there’s a better way.

Id also add… i got an iphone at a Goodwill once that at the time was still usable. it was a 6S. the person who donated it had wiped it but never released it from their Apple account. so it is a brick. being able to send an email to these people would have been wonderful. i feel like all these situations should be possible but don’t add to Apples bottom line. Feels lousy.

And whoever wrote ‘be honest’ i’d say yes.. that is the reason for my interest in finding the owners. i am honest.

Valentineo Said:

"I found someone Apple Watch..how do I return it to them: Trying to return it to the owner"

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Returning a Found Device:

Be honest about this and hand it in to local authorities, or to the lost-&-found lat the location you found it at. There is nothing that can be done about it on Apple's end. If you were at school, then head it in to the proper staff member.

GalaxyT25 wrote:

…that is the reason for my interest in finding the owners. i am honest.

Please prove that you are not an abusive ex intent on violence, or a thief intent on crime, or a purchaser of known stolen property, or a troll intent on harassment, or some other sort of scoundrel.

And this mechanism of proof must work reliably, remotely, and world-wide.

And must work at the scale that Apple operates at.

Whoever lost their device here does have the opportunity to set a message on the device, or to Find My to locate it. If they choose not to, then you are left to turn it over a lost and found for the location it was found, or turn it over to local police, or to recycle the device.

The All Too Common SAD Reality of Buying a used iPad/iPhone - Apple Community. (Also applies to Watch.)

You are welcome.