In short
If you wear a watch, some LinxyPass approvals can be answered on it. The request appears on your wrist showing one number, you check it against the screen you are signing in on, and the sign-in completes without your phone leaving your pocket. It works on Apple Watch and on Wear OS watches.
The watch approves only one kind of sign-in: one from a browser that remembers you from an earlier LinxyPass sign-in — the page that greets you with Welcome back. Any sign-in where you have to pick the number — because somebody typed your username or email, or because you scanned a Mark — is confirmed on your phone, where the three numbers are. On Apple Watch such a request says Confirm on your iPhone instead of offering Approve. That split is deliberate: the wrist can only check a number, not pick one, so it is kept for the everyday case of your own browser.
On this page
What works where
| Apple Watch | Wear OS watches | |
|---|---|---|
| Approval on the wrist | Yes, for a browser that remembers you | Yes, for a browser that remembers you |
| A sign-in that needs the number picked | Shows Confirm on your iPhone; no Approve | Approving it from the wrist is refused, and you are told to confirm it on your phone |
| One-tap approve | Yes | Yes |
| Deny from the watch | Yes | No — dismiss it, or deny on the phone |
| What a tap on the notification does | Opens the request; Approve and Deny are separate actions | Approves — the whole notification is the Approve control |
| Needs the phone in range | Not always | Yes |
| Needs the watch unlocked and worn | Yes | Yes |
Support is not tied to a particular model. If your watch runs Wear OS and is paired with the phone holding your Linxy App, the approver is available to it.
Which sign-ins the watch can approve
A number on the sign-in screen only protects you if somebody has to pick it from a set of choices. The phone asks you to do that. The watch cannot: it is handed one number to compare, not three to choose from. So Linxy accepts a wrist approval only where there is no number to pick.
| How the sign-in started | What the browser shows | Where you approve |
|---|---|---|
| A browser that remembers you from an earlier LinxyPass sign-in | Welcome back. Approve the sign-in on your device. and a match number | Watch or phone |
| Somebody typed your username or email | A match number | Phone only — pick the number |
| You scanned or pressed the Mark | The Mark, often with a number above it | Phone only — you are already holding it |
| One-Tap from a Brand card | Nothing until the site opens | Phone only — it started there |
In practice the first row is the one people meet every day: you sign in to the same site from the same computer, the page says Welcome back, and your wrist taps. A typed username is exactly the case an attacker can produce from anywhere, which is why it is kept on the phone.
Getting it working
There is nothing to enable inside LinxyPass itself. What matters is that approvals are allowed to reach the watch at all:
- The Linxy App must be installed and enrolled on the paired phone
- Notifications must be allowed for the Linxy App. The App asks for that permission right after your first approval on the phone; if you declined, or reinstalled the App and never answered, turn notifications on in your phone’s settings — without it nothing chimes and nothing reaches the watch
- LinxyPass approvals must be switched on in the App’s notification settings. This is a separate category from messages, scans and connection requests, precisely so that silencing a chatty conversation cannot silence your sign-ins
- Your watch must be set to show notifications from the phone, and to wake its screen when one arrives
The separation of notification categories is worth using deliberately. You can mute everything else Linxy sends you and still be certain a sign-in approval will reach your wrist.
What the watch shows you
The watch shows less than the phone, on purpose. The phone runs the full ceremony: three numbers, one of which matches the screen you are signing in on, plus whatever is known about where the request came from. The wrist shows two things — the name of the site asking, and one number, large. Your job on the wrist is not to pick; it is to check that the number on your wrist is the number on the screen in front of you. If the wrist shows no number, the request is one that has to be answered on the phone.
Nothing about the origin of the request — browser, device, location — is shown on the watch. If you want to see that before answering, answer from the phone instead. A wrist approval is meant for the moment when you are looking at the sign-in screen yourself; it is the wrong tool for deciding whether a request you did not expect is genuine.
Answering
Check that the number on your wrist matches the screen you are signing in on, then approve. On Apple Watch the notification carries Approve and Deny as separate actions, and the same two choices appear if you open the request in the watch app. On Wear OS the whole notification is the Approve control: tapping its body, its Approve chip, or the action Wear draws beside it all do the same one thing, and it opens the watch app straight into a signed approval. There is no deny on a Wear OS notification — to refuse, leave it alone until the attempt expires, swipe it away, or deny from the phone, which received the same request.
The request stops being answerable once the sign-in attempt behind it expires, which is five minutes from when it started. A notification sitting on your wrist after that will do nothing when tapped — the attempt it referred to is gone, and you should start again from the site.
Why it will not answer on its own
The watch will only offer an approval when it is unlocked and actually on your wrist. Taking it off locks it, and a locked watch does not present sign-in approvals.
This closes the obvious weakness of wrist approval. A watch left on a desk is not a device somebody can walk past and tap, and one taken from you is not useful without also being worn and unlocked.
Your phone still has to be nearby
On Wear OS, the approval reaches your watch by way of your phone. The phone receives the request and relays it. If the phone is switched off, out of range or has no connection, the watch will show nothing at all — not an error, simply silence.
This is the most common reason for approvals appearing on some occasions and not others. If your watch has gone quiet, check whether your phone is with you before assuming something is broken.
When nothing arrives
Work through this in order — it is roughly the order of likelihood:
- Is the phone nearby, on, and connected?
- Are notifications allowed for the Linxy App on the phone at all?
- Is this a sign-in the watch can approve? Only a browser that remembers you (Welcome back) comes to the wrist for approval; anything else is answered on the phone
- Are LinxyPass approval notifications switched on in the App? They are a separate category and may have been turned off with everything else
- Is the watch showing notifications from the phone at all, and does its screen wake for them?
- Is the watch unlocked and on your wrist?
- Has the attempt already expired? Five minutes is the whole window
You are never stuck. Everything the watch can do, the phone can do, and everything the phone can do you can also do by scanning the Mark or typing the six-digit code. The watch is a convenience layered on top of routes that all still work.
Symptoms, causes and fixes
| Symptom | Cause | Fix |
|---|---|---|
| Nothing reaches the watch | The phone is out of range, off, or offline — or notifications are not allowed for the Linxy App | Bring the phone into range and allow notifications; approve on the phone meanwhile |
| Apple Watch says Confirm on your iPhone | The sign-in needs the number picked — a typed username or email, not a browser that remembers you | Answer it on the phone and pick the number |
| Wear OS shows no number, and approving fails | Same reason: the sign-in needs the number picked | Answer it on the phone |
| No chime and no watch alert since I reinstalled the App | Notification permission was never granted to the new install | Approve one sign-in on the phone and allow notifications when asked, or turn them on in the phone’s settings |
| Approvals stopped after I muted Linxy | The approval category was switched off with the rest | Turn LinxyPass approvals back on. It is its own setting |
| The notification arrives but the screen stays dark | The watch is not set to wake for notifications | Enable screen wake on the watch |
| Tapping the notification does nothing | The attempt expired | Start again from the site |
| I brushed the Wear OS notification and it signed me in | On Wear OS the whole notification approves | The sign-in is genuine and bound to your watch. If you did not intend it, sign out of the site; on the phone, prefer approving there when you want a deny option |
| No approval option while the watch is off my wrist | A locked watch does not present approvals | Wear and unlock it, or use the phone |
| The watch shows less detail than the phone | Those details were not known for this request | Nothing is hidden to save space. Treat sparse detail with more care |
| I approved on the watch and the phone still shows the request | The prompt goes to every enrolled device | Ignore the leftover. The attempt is already settled |
Things people commonly get wrong
Related reading: Signing in with LinxyPass, What LinxyPass is, Devices and settings, and Your devices.