Summary
- Pixel Watch’s Wear OS 5.1 update is causing several issues.
- Users are reporting delayed notifications, syncing problems with the Fitbit app, and crashes when customizing watch faces.
- Google has yet to acknowledge any of the problems.
After releasing no software updates for the Pixel Watch lineup since November 2024, Google dropped the Android 15-based Wear OS 5.1 update for its wearables in early March. A broader rollout began mid-month, introducing several new features, including improved step count accuracy and Loss of Pulse Detection. However, many Pixel Watch owners aren’t seemingly pleased with the latest update, as they are running into various bugs and issues.
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Several Pixel Watch 3 owners on Reddit (2) report issues following the Wear OS 5.1 update with delayed notifications and sluggish performance. Some users are also experiencing syncing issues with the Fitbit app, with data failing to sync consistently.
To make matters worse, users are also running into crashes when attempting to customize their watch faces and are unable to change the colors or complications.
Among all the reported issues, delayed notifications seem to be the most widespread, affecting a large number of users. I’m experiencing this problem on my Pixel Watch 2 as well, with notifications either not arriving at all or showing up after a significant delay.
In an attempt to resolve this problem, some users tried factory resetting their watches and setting them up from scratch but it proved ineffective. A restart seems to temporarily work for me, but the problems crops up again after a few hours.
Could Wear 5.1 be the reason for the Pixel Watch’s delayed notification issue?
Since the March 2025 update for the Pixel Watch lineup introduced several major underlying changes, they may be the root cause of the issues. Google has yet to acknowledge any of the problems, so there’s not much you can do.
Your only option is to restart the watch and see if that helps fix the delayed notifications and poor performance issues. You can also try a factory reset, though based on the feedback from users on Reddit, it does not seem to make any difference.
Google will push the next Wear OS update for its smartwatch lineup in June 2025, so Pixel Watch owners may have a long and frustrating wait ahead of them until Google fixes the reported problems. Perhaps if more users voice their concerns though, the company may push a bug-fixing update next month.