Galaxy Watch 4 LTE and switching phones

[walkerx]

This is a heads-up for anyone switching to another phone and have the LTE version watch.

I've just upgraded from the S20FE5G to the S23 Ultra and have the Galaxy Watch 4 Classic LTE model. After switching I had to ring EE to get the e-sim updated with the new phone, even though keeping the same number. Until this was done the watch would not recognise it had a mobile plan.

On ringing I had to remove the current plan listed in Galaxy Wear, exit and then re-add after the tech guys done something at their end.

[Chris_B]

@walkerx   Why not just put your old sim in the new device ?  You don’t need to change anything then.   

[walkerx]

@Chris_B the watch uses e-sim not an actually sim - not changing the watch just the phone - old phone sim put into new phone, you have to reset the watch to add it to a new phone even if same number, its how they work, the watch can only be linked to one device at a time. but galaxy wearable will throw up an error and tell you, you need to ring ee to get the e-sim updated on the watch so it links correctly to the new phone.

[Chris_B]

@walkerx  When you unpaired the watch from your old device you are presented with the option to retain the watch contract once that’s done you just pair the watch with the new phone and then setup the watch contract that you saved when you unpaired it from the old phone.     Job done 

You don’t need to even call customer service todo this.    The only time you might need to call is if you have a setup issue. 

The sim I mentioned was the phone sim (put your old sim in your new phone ) not the esim that’s in the watch.  

[walkerx]

@Chris_B I can only say what happened to me, even though I put my phone sim in the new phone, told my watch to keep the contract when resetting. But for some reason this didn't work as intended and was told to ring EE and quote error 209 or 219 (I can't remember the error number now) to relink the e-sim.

I did use smarthswitch to do the transfer using cable to cable, and not sure if that may have contributed to the issues, especially as I've reset the phone previously on my S20FE5G without issues and not once had to call support to sort it out, so was not expecting issues when migrating to a new phone.