Kaitlyn Cimino / Android Authority

It’s bad when a bug is causing certain app features to malfunction. However, it’s worse when the bug won’t even let you open the app at all. That’s a problem some Galaxy Watch owners have been experiencing lately. Fortunately, it appears the issue may already have a fix available.

Some Galaxy Watch owners have recently reported an issue where apps are refusing to open. One Galaxy Watch 8 Classic user has taken to Reddit to report that they can’t open Gmail, Google Calendar, or WhatsApp. After tapping on these apps, the splash screen will show for a few seconds before returning to the app drawer.

Several users confirm they are experiencing similar issues with their Galaxy Watches. One of those commenters adds that they may have found the root cause of the problem.

According to that Galaxy Watch owner, the problem is a Wear OS 6 bug where a “zombie process” (a process that has completed execution but still has an entry in the process table) is causing a deadlock due to an OS-level kernel glitch. As they explain, a “ghost” thread gets caught in the watch’s memory when the app tries to close. So when you try to reopen the app later, the OS sees the old process and aborts the launch because the process can’t be killed.

As mentioned earlier, there may be a fix available if you’re also running into this problem. The same user says that they recently installed the May 2026 security update on their Galaxy Watch 7. Since installing the update, the user claims the bug has yet to rear its ugly head again.

Have you been having trouble opening apps on your Galaxy Watch lately? Let us know in the comments below.