I cannot receive calls on my Apple Cellular watch unless I remove the Bluetooth link between my iPhone and my hearing aid!

Question

Level 1

29 points

I cannot receive calls on my Apple Cellular watch unless I remove the Bluetooth link between my iPhone and my hearing aid!

I have a new Apple watch 11 cellular plan (Telstra) and can use it to make calls but it fails when I try to receive calls. The odd thing is that the problem disappears when I remove the Bluetooth connection between the iPhone and my hearing aid. Then I can receive incoming calls okay. This is interesting but useless. If I get the call when I am in my bed room and need to go to another room to switch off that Bluetooth connection, that is some kind of sick joke! So if all the extra money I spent on the Cellular model was wasted it is a bit late to find out.

Unless someone out there has a solution for this problem!

Elliot

Apple Watch Series 11

Posted on Dec 8, 2025 11:28 PM

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Answer 1

Ingo2711

Level 10

80,193 points

Dec 12, 2025 12:46 AM in response to elliotau

Did you check on your iPhone in Settings -> Accessibility -> Audio & Visual -> Call Audio Routing, if it is set to "Automatic"?

Can you pair your hearing aids to your watch in Settings -> Bluetooth, to receive calls on your watch when using your hearing devices?

Are your hearing aids listed in Settings -> Bluetooth -> My Devices?

If yes, can you tap on the little " i " and select "When Last Connected to this iPhone"?

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Answer 2

Dec 9, 2025 1:03 AM in response to elliotau

Change Call Audio Routing → Automatic

Turn off Calls on Other Devices

Disable hearing-aid-specific call priority

Enable Wi-Fi Calling on Apple Watch

Reset network settings (Telstra fix)

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Answer 3

elliotau Author

Level 1

29 points

Dec 11, 2025 7:05 PM in response to azaksalmarzur28

Thanks for your reply. However, I have not got a lot further in solving my problem. I was not able to carry out the instruction "Disable hearing-aid-specific call priority" as I could not find where to do this on either my phone or my watch.

The situation is still that the only way I can answer a call on my Watch is if my phone is switched off or if the hearing aids are switched off or not connected to the phone by Bluetooth. Which are not solutions!

Elliot

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Answer 4

elliotau Author

Level 1

29 points

Dec 19, 2025 12:01 AM in response to Ingo2711

Thanks Ingo

Sorry about the delay in testing this. I am very grateful for your suggestions as they have given me a much better understanding of what is happening. And in fact when I established a paring between the watch and my hearing aids I was immediately about to receive calls on my watch. Very good!!

However I am not out of the woods yet. The problem is that while my hearing aid model allows me to have multiple devises to set up to a pairing with number of devices, it can only support one active connection at a time. So if there is a connection in place between the watch and the aids, when I take a call on my phone I cannot use the the aids to listen to the call. Which is my main way to take calls. And for some reason the watch has the bad habit of steeling the connection form the phone from time to time!

I don't think this is an unsolvable problem for me. I was already thinking of replacing my near to 6 year old aids with a newer device. And I notice that more current hearing aid models seem to have the ability to connect to 2 devices at the same time. This should fix the issue!

So thank you for your input!

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