Debug on real Apple Watch: Application Verification Failed

It turns out you also have to add the UDID of the Apple Watch to the Apple Developer Portal, and update your Development provisioning profile to include this UDID.

The UDID can be obtained in Devices window of Xcode. After pairing, the info of the Apple Watch will automatically display below the info of your iPhone.

At the time of writing, this seems to be documented nowhere, and the error message on the Apple Watch wasn't particularly helpful. So I wish this try-and-error lesson would save you some hassle.

The UDID issue as described above can be the culprit, but in my case, that was handled automatically by Xcode. Looking at the device log (menu Window>Devices) showed:

companionappd[350] : failed to install WatchKit application, error: (Error Domain=LaunchServicesError Code=0 "The operation couldn’t be completed. (LaunchServicesError error 0.)" UserInfo=0x14e2f690 {Error=ApplicationVerificationFailed, ErrorDetail=-402620394, ErrorDescription=Failed to verify code signature of : 0xe8008016 (Entitlements found that are not permitted by provisioning profile)})

... a problem which didn't get caught in the build process, nor was explicitly shared with me in the on-screen errors.

So, I looked at the entitlements:

Yes, I did have to manually add that beta-reports-active in order to submit to TestFlight.

It seems that you needs the flag if you're using TestFlight (and anything other than the default Entitlements), but you need to not have the flag if you're debugging locally.

My solution to this contradiction therefore is to have two entitlements files, like so:

So far, so good. App and Watch Extension are running as expected.

Basically you need to perform two steps:

• Add the UDID of your apple watch to the developer portal
• Update your provisioning profile to support the watch

XCode can manage the whole process for you:

1. Deploy the App to your iPhone/iPad

2. Start the WatchKit App also on your iPhone/iPad (not in the simulator)

3. Choose Fix Issue, when the code signing error message appears

4. Select your Development Team and let XCode do the rest

I've also written a short tutorial for this.