Apple will finally fix the iPhone 16 freeze/restart bug with next week’s update

While some people are surely loving their new iPhone 16, many users have been afflicted since their launch last month by a serious bug causing their phones to freeze, ignore touch inputs, and then randomly restart. But it looks like the end is finally in sight, with the rollout of a major software update which is understood to contain a fix.

As Macworld reported in September, numerous iPhone 16 owners have complained of display “dead spots” which, if touched, cause the entire screen to become unresponsive to taps and swipes, and the phone to restart. Not every unit is affected, but there have been enough reports to get Apple’s attention: on Reddit, on MacRumors’ forums, and on Apple’s own Community pages.

For a worryingly long time, Apple didn’t appear to have noticed or was unable to solve the problem. iOS 18.01 arrived on October 3 without affected owners noting any improvement (indeed I can confirm that my iPhone 16 Plus, which currently runs iOS 18.01, had the problem this morning), while as of its seventh beta, iOS 18.1 didn’t seem to contain a fix either. But it has now been confirmed (via MacRumors) that the public release of iOS 18.1 will patch the issue. This is officially mentioned in the update’s release notes, which emerged yesterday alongside the release candidate.

Why did it take so long for such a serious bug to get fixed? Maybe Apple’s software department has just been busy because this has been something of a cursed update cycle. Only last month iPadOS 18 had to be pulled after bricking the M4 iPad Pro, while the Apple Watch faced a mirror image of the iPhone 16’s problem when users reported “ghost touches” earlier this year.

iOS 18.1 is expected to roll out on Monday, October 28. It’s easy to update your iPhone; simply open the Settings app, go to Software Update, and follow the prompts. The update contains other patches and fixes, as well as new Apple Intelligence features for the iPhone 16, so it’s well worth installing at your earliest convenience.