You Can Play 'Pokémon Go' Anywhere Thanks to Mobile — What About Apple Watch?

We live in the future now, where every dream we had in our collective childhood seems to have become a reality. All of our favorite Disney movies are at our fingertips (for a paid Disney Plus subscription), we can talk to our friends whenever we want (except when they leave you on read for weeks), and perhaps most importantly, we can fulfill our real-life ambitions of becoming Pokémon masters thanks to Pokémon Go.

Sure, we may be able to bring our Pokémon games anywhere thanks to the portability of the Nintendo Switch, but Pokémon Go adds an extra layer of reality thanks to its ARG gameplay. We can travel with, evolve, and battle with our very own collection of Pokémon companions in real time. The only thing that would improve it is if we could play it on the Apple Watch... But wait, can we play Pokémon Go on Apple Watch? Let's dive in.

Pokémon Go is a free-to-play augmented reality game. By using GPS and your own real-time location, players can assume the role of Pokémon trainers and travel around their surroundings. You can encounter different species of Pokémon to catch and train, collect items from specially marked PokéStops in your area, and even find Gyms where you can battle against other trainers or even Team Go Rocket. It's about as true-to-life a Pokémon experience as we can get in this modern age.

The game is available on Android and iOS, meaning that you can download on just about any mobile device including smartphones or tablets. But is the game playable on Apple Watch?

Once upon a time, it was. Well, technically.

In 2017 — a year or so after the game's initial launch — the dev team at Niantic introduced Apple Watch compatibility with Pokémon Go. You couldn't play a full version of the game on it, but a companion app on the Watch added some additional functions to the base game.

According to The Verge, you could use this app to collect items from PokéStops or detect nearby Pokémon without having to hold your phone the whole time. You could receive notifications about Egg hatching progress and even log each play session as a regular workout.

While you couldn't catch Pokémon regularly using the Apple Watch, this certainly added some fun extra content to an already-enjoyable experience. Unfortunately, this companion app is no longer available.

Back in July 2019, Niantic announced that it would no longer support the companion app on Apple Watch devices. The app was phased out in favor of Pokémon Go's Adventure Sync function, which essentially does everything the companion app did while still being tied to the same device.

In a blog post concerning the app's discontinued support, Niantic stated: "We want to focus on building Adventure Sync so that Trainers will no longer have to split their gameplay between two devices."

While the Apple Watch companion app is no longer available, Pokémon Go fortunately still sees regular updates to this day.