Can a cellular Apple Watch for a Family Member (standalone) keep its cell number if paired with another phone with no cell service?
Here's the situation, my daughter is using:
- Apple Watch Series 5 Cellular, set up "For a Family Member" from my phone to establish Verizon standalone service (single account with watch line only)
- iPhone 8 with no SIM, essentially working like the old ipod touch because we don't want her to have a fully phone enabled phone yet. The original idea was to pair the watch with this.
I have an iPhone with cell service through Mint (who doesn't support Apple Watch), which I used to do the Family Member setup, since that required my Apple ID on the phone and my daughter's Apple ID on the watch.
Now that the watch has been all set up and has the cell number, we're seeing that a lot of things are missing or aren't working right. Watch faces in the phone app, shared purchases, etc. This experience seems to be not as good or reliable as a regularly paired Apple Watch.
Has anyone tried unpairing from the current phone and re-pairing to a phone not "for a Family Member", that has the same Apple ID as the watch (in my case, my daughter's)—and kept the cellular service still working? Or does that wipe the eSIM.. or cause some other trouble?
Apple Watch Series 5