A couple of weekends ago, as I crossed the French border into Belgium, my Pixel Watch 4 greeted me with three important warnings that no longer surprise me. All of the Watch’s personal safety features — the ones that I rely on and that I wear this particular smartwatch for — are unavailable while roaming. I was literally a couple of miles away from France, but tough luck!
I’ve gotten so used to this Pixel Watch (and Pixel phone) limitation, but I still think it’s absolutely silly and should be talked about a lot more so users know what to expect when they put their money down on this watch.
Traveling? No car crash detection, no fall detection, no loss of pulse detection!
Rita El Khoury / Android Authority
So what’s happening here? Well, I can’t be 100% sure, but it seems like every time my Pixel Watch detects that I’m roaming and no longer in the country of my phone’s main SIM card (I think it looks at the default calling SIM card), it will immediately turn off all three of its crucial personal safety features: car crash detection, fall detection, and now also loss of pulse detection.
This isn’t new; it’s been happening for years, and I’ve already talked about how my Pixel lets me down on trips, but it’s worth highlighting again for anyone who doesn’t travel frequently and hasn’t seen the three dreaded “not available” notifications yet, or for anyone planning to buy this watch thinking it’ll protect them everywhere.
The moment your phone starts roaming, all of the Pixel Watch 4's safety features cease to function.
The safety features extend to the limits of your SIM’s official border support, not beyond. Even if you travel to a country where the feature is officially supported, like Belgium in my case, it gets turned off. And even in Europe, where roaming is free and people cross borders all the time, you lose all safety privileges.
Rita El Khoury / Android Authority
I know this because I have a French SIM card that allows me to make calls and use data for free inside the EU. I can even call 112 for emergency services in whichever country I’m in without adding any prefix or paying any extra charge. Yet, even crossing the French border for 15 minutes to Mons in Belgium results in my Pixel phone stopping car crash detection and fall detection, and my Pixel Watch deactivating both of those, plus the crucial and potentially life-saving loss of pulse detection.
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