Location Lock
Reduce what can leave when you are away.
You choose trusted places and a lower rolling allowance for everywhere else. Apple Watch checks location before approval.
What it protects
A lower Away Limit reduces what someone can force you to approve.
If someone takes you away from a trusted place and pressures you to approve a transfer, the lower Away Limit still applies.
You choose the Away Limit before you need it. Apple Watch applies that smaller rolling allowance everywhere outside the trusted areas you saved.
Before approval
Apple Watch checks location for itself.
Apple Watch uses its own location to determine which allowance applies. The iPhone and a connected dApp cannot tell the watch that you are inside a trusted area.
- 01Enable Time Lock and save the first trusted place on Apple Watch.
- 02Choose a lower rolling Away Limit.
- 03Within 400 meters of a trusted place, your normal Time Lock allowance applies.
- 04Everywhere else, the watch uses the Away Limit.
No instant escape
Expanding the higher-limit area takes time.
The current policy stays in force while a less restrictive change waits through Time Lock.
Adding another trusted place or raising the Away Limit starts a countdown under your current Time Lock policy. The existing policy remains in force until the change is ready.
You can lower the Away Limit or remove a trusted place immediately. Removing the final trusted place disables Location Lock, so that change must wait.
When location is uncertain
The higher limit requires a verified trusted location.
While Apple Watch determines its location, the Away Limit applies. Your normal allowance returns only after the watch verifies a trusted area.
If Location Services are off or the watch cannot establish a usable position, approval stays blocked until the watch can verify its location.
Location privacy
Trusted places are not restored without your approval.
Apple Watch stores the coordinates in its device-only Keychain. They do not sync through iCloud.
An encrypted Recovery Sheet or Photo Backup can carry them. You choose whether to restore those locations on another watch.
Limits
A saved place is not a judgment about safety.
The 400-meter radius only selects which allowance applies. Location Lock does not know whether a place or person is safe.
Location Lock cannot stop someone who maintains control through the Time Lock delay.