No Sensor Data

Before We Start

If you genuinely have not been wearing your Watch and you are getting the not been wearing your Watch banner over the clock, then it is best to wait until you have been wearing the Watch for a few hours. Ideally wear it overnight. The app needs data in order to set things up properly. The setup is not for data capture, it is for data analysis and sleep detection using existing data. For this, it needs data to work with.  


Identifying & Solving Problems

Occasionally you will find that either AutoSleep has no access to your Watch sensor data, or, your Watch is not capturing any data.

The Watch is supposed to do this automatically regardless of whether or not the app is installed. 


How to Prove This

This is very easy to prove. 

  1. Go into Apple Health app. It has a white icon with a red heart. 
  2. Press Health Data tab. 
  3. Press Vitals. 
  4. Press Heart Rate.
  5. Press Show All Data. 
  6. Select a day. 

All heart rate readings for the day are listed here. 

Scroll to see the times that you wore your watch whilst sleeping. 

If the watch is functioning correctly, you will see heart rate readings every 2-10 minutes. 


Common Causes

The most common problem is permissions (especially if you are on iOS 11 as these updates caused health permissions issues for quite a few people), but this is closely followed by people that either don’t use a Watch passcode or have wrist detection turned off. Both of these disable the Watch’s background health sensors. 


What to do?

The first thing to try is this:

Important: make sure that you do every step in this order. Often the problem is due to OS services crashing and this restores them as well as the app’s permissions. 

  1. Go into the the Apple Health app (white icon, red heart), select sources tab, select AutoSleep and then turn off all of the permission switches. 
  2. Reboot the iPhone: 
    • iPhone 6s and earlier: Press home + sleep wake button until you see .
    • iPhone 7 volume down button + sleep wake button until you see .
    • iPhone 8/X quick press up volume, let go, quick press down volume, let go, then press and hold sleep wake until you see .
  3. Reboot the Watch by pressing the crown and side button simultaneously until you see 
  4. Go back into the the Apple Health app select sources tab, select AutoSleep and then turn on all of the permission switches. 
  5. Now go into AutoSleep app and this should restore all permissions. 

This often completely fixes the problem. 


Checklist

If the above doesn’t solve it, then here are the likely causes: 

  1. Is bluetooth turned on in your control panel?
  2. Did you enter your passcode when you put your watch on your wrist before going to sleep? If not then it will not have access to read heart rate sensor data. (If you don’t use a passcode, background health data sensors are disabled for privacy reasons). 
  3. In Apple Watch Settings app on iPhone (black icon with picture of Watch), in Passcode make sure that Wrist Detection is turned on. 
  4. In the Apple Watch Settings app also check in privacy, motion and fitness that you have heart rate and fitness tracking turned on?
  5. Do you have a prominent wrist tattoo? This often prevents the background heart rate sensor on the Watch from taking readings. 
  6. Is your Apple Watch coming loose while you are asleep? Some wear the watch above the wrist bone and this can cause problems as the watch sensors lose contact. 
  7. Did your watch go into power saving mode at any time (battery < 10%)? This turns off all sensors.
  8. Did you use airplane mode? If so, the data will not be sent to the iPhone until you have turned off airplane mode and the Watch has had time to synch all of its data to the iPhone. It is best to turn off airplane mode before you put the Watch on charge. Otherwise, just be aware that the data won’t synch until you wear your Watch again. (It is fine to use airplane mode, just keep this in mind). 

Re-Pairing

If you have re-installed the app and checked everything in the check list and you are still not able to see heart rate data in the Apple Health app for the times that you are wearing the Watch whilst sleeping, the next troubleshooting step is to re-pair your Watch and iPhone. 

IMPORTANT: We've found that most people have success when setting up as a new Watch instead of taking the restore from backup option, which tends to carry across old problems. 


Still Having Problems?

If you are still stuck, then please email using the support button in the app. This will send us some configuration information to assist in helping you.