Google Pay on Wear OS in an Unsupported Country

Historical note: This guide is from September 2020. Google Pay has since been rebranded to Google Wallet, Wear OS has moved to much newer versions, and Google has tightened region checks — so some steps (especially account creation and proxying) may no longer work as written. It's preserved here as a snapshot of what worked at the time.

Things I will guide you through

Setting up a virtual machine in one of the supported countries.
Installing and configuring the Permanent Proxy app on your watch.
Creating a Google account in one of the supported countries.

Setting up the virtual machine

Selecting hosting

I'm going to use Azure (I had a $100 credit to burn). It works just as well on AWS (free tier available) or Google Cloud ($300 credit for new accounts).

Setting up the machine

Preferably select Ubuntu 18.04 as the operating system.
Allow inbound and outbound connections for these ports:
80 — proxying connections to/from your watch.
443 — proxying connections to/from your watch.
22 — SSH, otherwise you won't be able to access your VPS.

Installing & configuring squid (proxy)

Update the system and install squid:

sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get upgrade
sudo apt-get install squid

Open the config file:

sudo nano /etc/squid/squid.conf

Add the following line:

http_access allow all

Then change http_port 3128 to http_port 80 (use CTRL+W to search for the line). Save with CTRL+X, then Y.

Finally, restart squid to apply the changes:

sudo systemctl restart squid

Permanent Proxy

Read the Permanent Proxy installation guide for how to install it on your watch.

Once it's installed:

Enable developer options: Settings > System > About, then tap Build number repeatedly until developer mode is active.
Enable Bluetooth debugging under Developer options: turn on ADB debugging and Debug over Bluetooth.
Configure Permanent Proxy to use your proxy:
Open the Permanent Proxy app.
Tap request permissions and allow it.
Tap Proxy address, enter your VM's IP, and tap the search icon.
Enter port 80 and tap the search icon again.
Back in the main menu, tap Set proxy and you're good to go.

Google account

To create an account in the same country as your proxy, connect your phone to the proxy and create a Google account in Chrome's incognito mode.

Connecting to your proxy

Go to Settings > Network & Internet > Wi-Fi > cog next to your network > pencil (edit).
Under Advanced options, change Proxy from None to Manual.
Enter your VM's IP as the proxy hostname and 80 as the proxy port.
Save and continue.

Creating a Google account

Open incognito mode in Chrome and search for "google account (name of the country)".
Create a Google account.

Add the Google account to your watch

Add the new Google account to your phone via Settings > Accounts.
On your watch: Settings > Personalisation > Accounts, tap Add Google Account.
This opens the Wear OS app on your phone — select the new account and continue.
On your watch: Play Store > Accounts, tap the new account.

Enable Google Pay with the new account

Open the Play Store, search for Google Pay — it should now appear.
Tap it and select Enable.

Google Pay should now be in your app list.

Known issues

Adding a card fails with an error that it's not possible to add a card right now.
Fix: Remove all your Google Pay cards (on mobile) and try again. After adding them on your watch, you can add them back on your phone.

Tested on

Tested on 2020-09-25 with:

Google Pixel 4 XL
Rooted with Magisk (Hide props)
Android 11
Fossil Carlyle Gen 5 FTW4025
Wear OS by Google: 2.18
Home App: 2.39.0.329709612
Google Play services: 20.36.15
System version: H MR1
Patch level: July 1, 2020