Do galaxy watch apps stay when switching phones?

[Adamodactyl]

Hello, 

I am wondering whether applications that I have bought for my watch will stay, when I switch my phones. The new phone will still be Samsung, and it will be associated with the same Samsung account. I am currently using the Galaxy Watch Active 2.

[LongHiker]

@Adamodactyl The Galaxy Watch 3 and earlier use the Tizen OS and apps are downloaded from the Samsung Galaxy Store. Moving between these watches should retain the same apps. 

The Galaxy Watch 4 and beyond, use the Android Wear OS and apps are downloaded from the Android Play Store. Moving from an earlier watch may mean that you can't use the apps you did before on the GW3 and earlier devices. The developers of the apps must provide a Wear OS version for it to be available in GW4 and later devices. 

[Adamodactyl]

Thank you for your reply, however I just want to clarify that I am not changing watches, but rather phones.

[ChaosSaber]

Yes, the watch will have to be reset in order to connect it to a new phone

[LongHiker · Accepted solution]

@Adamodactyl Sorry I misunderstood your question.

Switching phones won't affect the apps on the watch. Before you do the reset on the watch to connect to the new phone, do a backup in Galaxy Wearable. Then after resetting the watch, you can restore the watch settings from the backup

Galaxy Wearable app -> Watch settings -> Accounts and backup -> Back up data