Step-by-step

Get ready for watchos 5

1 Check your iphone

Apple Watch upgrades via an iphone, with watchos 5 requiring IOS 12. It means you’ll also need to upgrade your iphone so check for space at Settings>general>iphone Storage.

2 Free up room

The IOS 12 public beta has required 4GB of free storage space so if you don’t have this much room, begin cleaning up. Scroll to identify the space hoggers and note the sizes.

3 Check Watch space

Tap the apps you don’t need and select ‘Delete App’. Go to the Watch app on your iphone, tap ‘My Watch’ and go to General> About. Note how much space is available.

4 Remove Watch data

Ideally have at least 300MB free. Remove unwanted apps under My Watch by scrolling to the section ‘Installed on Apple Watch’. Tap an app and toggle Show App to off.

5 Limit photo storage

Remaining in the My Watch tab, select Photos>photos Limit and reduce it to free space. Remove music by tapping ‘Music’ and turning off unwanted auto-added playlists.

6 Clear up Messages

Now grab your Watch. Open Messages and identify messages you don’t want. Swipe left and tap ‘Delete’ to remove them. This will free space and spring-clean your device.