Apple Watch Ultra 2 - Siri and ejecting of water issues

Hardware
1

Hi

Have anyone had the following issues:

  1. Siri unresponsive after a shower or a swim
  2. Siri really slow or unresponsive with Shortcuts

Ad 1 (Unresponsive after swim): I’ve noticed that my Apple Watch Ultra 2 really struggles to my Siri commands after it’s been exposed to water. It’s as if though it’s not capable to get rid of the water inside the watch - and the symptoms are:

  1. When I push the crown to activate the water lock and eject water, afterwards when Siri is activated the Siri animation does not respond to any commands, and my voice commands does not translate into the screen.
  2. When Siri actually reponds, the Siri voice is either REALLY muffled, or sounds like an old broken radio.

Again, it really sounds as if the Apple Watch cannot get rid of the water. To mitigate, I activate the swimming activity, only to quickly press the crown in order to activate the water lock and eject the water. The humming when ejecting the water really sounds muffled, or like a defect speaker. I generally do that multiple times, to no effect (it seems).

Ad 2 (Slow or unresponsive): I have a Philips Hue setup at home, for which I have made a number of Shortcuts to activate certain lights, Apple TV’s etc.

Generally I have noticed that:

  1. Siri commands against Shortcuts are noticeably slower than my previous Apple Watch (series 6).
  2. Sometimes Siri commands are totally ignored, or it tells me that there’s a problem.

I know that the iPhone has to be connected to my wireless network in order for my Apple Watch to issue Shortcut voice commands.

Have anyone had ANY of the issues above?

Thanks

/jens

2

I can speak to the swimming issue; although, I have the AW Ultra 1. I have the same problem, and what I think is that the issue is the mic is still drying out. I don’t think Siri is unresponsive – try it with your AirPods connected if you have them. I think Siri just can’t “hear” out of the AW Ultra’s mic for a while after a swim.

I’ve done an experiment where after swimming, I re-lock and re-eject the water three or four times. After doing that, Siri will start working close to normally. Otherwise, it usually takes about an hour before it does. That’s why I suspect that the water eject is not completely effective at getting all the water out.

3

Thanks iPursuade. I agree with your answers. What puzzles me, is that this wasn’t such a big issue with my AW series 6.

4

I agree it’s weird and doesn’t seem right. Part of me is glad to find someone else’s who has experienced the same thing. Not because I think you should be suffering. But maybe it’s a design issue as opposed to an individual bug or flaw.

5

Thanks again iPersuade. It’s frustrating to have such an experience - especially with a brand new product.

To make matters worse, Apple removed the exact same post on their community forums, that I posted to reach as many as possible. They did not explain why, instead they provided links to their guidelines and terms and conditions for using their forums. Apparently I’m in breach somewhere… also frustrating.