optimized charging on AppleWatch 9 stopped after almost one year

Question

rijkesser Author

Level 1

4 points

optimized charging on AppleWatch 9 stopped after almost one year

I purchased my Apple Watch 9 in January 2024.

Optimized Charging has worked fine from the start.

I wear the watch at night and charge it in the morning.

I am retired so all days are the same, I have not traveled or been on vacation for the last half a year.

Last week, 3 weeks before the warranty expires, optimized charging stopped working and now charges to 100% every morning.

I don't think it has anything to do with the WatchOS 11.2 update as that was a few weeks ago.

In the almost 12 months that I have had my watch, I have never used more than 55% of the battery between charges. There is no reason why the system would suddenly charge to 100%.

I have searched the community discussions and all relevant Apple support documents and have not found any explanation for this behavior. After that I contacted Apple support twice, in total 1.5 hours, we checked all settings and did even a factory reset, but nothing helped.

I'm afraid I have to send it back to Apple for repair, because this behavior shortens the battery life.

Or does anyone have any suggestions?

Apple Watch Series 9, watchOS 11

Posted on Jan 16, 2025 10:49 AM

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Answer 1

Ingo2711

Level 9

74,235 points

Jan 17, 2025 1:00 AM in response to rijkesser

Did you restore your watch from the latest backup after unparing it?

If yes, try to set it up as a new device instead, you will not lose your Health data.

In case you did already try that, getting it serviced would be the next step, in case this is hardware related and not software related.

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Answer 2

rijkesser Author

Level 1

4 points

Jan 17, 2025 6:49 AM in response to Ingo2711

So here I'm back.

I followed your advice and reset the watch to factory settings.

Then I did start the watch and configured it as a new Apple Watch, so without restoring the backup.

After that I checked if optimized charging was enabled.

This was the case. After this I charged the watch and saw that it continued charging past 80% and went all the way to 100%.

I will see how it behaves during the weekend, if it does not change I will send it to Apple for repair, because then we know that the error is hardware related.

Thanks for your help!

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Answer 3

rijkesser Author

Level 1

4 points

Jan 18, 2025 3:14 AM in response to Ingo2711

My last report:

Today I chatted with Apple Support again. Despite the fact that they have the transcripts of the previous sessions, I had to explain everything for the third time.

In addition, apart from the issue of 'optimized charging', a few other problems arose, such as; saturation measurements no longer work, and the temperature sensor has also stopped. This while all settings in both Watch and iPhone are correct.

Conclusion: it must be sent in for repair, they will send me a shipping box + label.

Thanks for thinking along and have a nice weekend!

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