Due to ghost touches, the iPhone automatically starts opening apps. The phone can also make unwanted calls, or send meaningless emails, among other things. If you recently updated your iPhone’s iOS, you may experience ghost touches due to an iOS bug. In the worst-case scenario, ghost touches can occur on the locked screen, preventing you from entering your password or PIN, and potentially locking you out of your phone for safety. This issue has been reported on almost all models of iPhone and can sometimes prevent users from accessing specific letters or numbers on the virtual keyboard.
Prerequisites to Troubleshooting
Charge the iPhone with a genuine iPhone charger. If you already use a genuine charger, try another Apple charger (such as an iPad charger). You may try a new cable as well.Whenever you fail to use your iPhone during the troubleshooting process, locking/unlocking your phone may stop ghost touches momentarily and give you time to complete the steps
How to Fix Ghost Touch on Your iPhone?
Once the prerequisites are completed, you can move to the solutions down below.
1. Force Restart the iPhone
You will experience ghost touches on your iPhone if the input modules of your phone are in an error state. Here, force restarting the iPhone will do the trick as the modules will be reinitiated with the default configurations.
2. Update the iOS of the iPhone to the Latest Release
A bug in the iOS might be triggering ghost touches on your phone and updating the same will resolve the issue.
3. Remove the Screen Protector and Clean the Phone’s Screen
You will get ghost touches on the iPhone if there is dust/dirt on the phone’s screen or under the screen protector. This can be fixed by removing the screen protector and cleaning the phone’s screen. Make sure no liquid gets inside the phone when cleaning it. Moreover, you cannot reuse the screen protector after removing it. If you are using a 3rd party screen on your iPhone (not the genuine one), then you will need a good screen protector. The genuine screen has a coated layer to resist static electricity and sweat/oil but many third part screens do not have this layer. You can test this by using a cling film/saran wrap on the screen.
4. Uninstall the Conflicting App
If an app is not compatible with the iPhone or is coded poorly, it can cause auto touches on the phone. Uninstalling the conflicting app will solve the problem.
Boot the iPhone into the Safe Mode
Uninstall Facebook
If ghost touches do not occur in the safe mode, then a 3rd party app is most probably causing the issue. The Facebook app is reported to cause the issue and if you have it, then uninstalling it will solve the problem.
5. Disable Mobile or Cellular Data
There are several iPhone models wherein the data chip, which handles the 3G, 4G, or 5G data transfers, is situated near the touchpad. In places where the data signals are weak, these chips may emit higher levels of RF, which can lead to static current on the touchscreen. As a result, the phone may register ghost touches that resemble a finger touch. To fix this, disable mobile or cellular data on the iPhone.
6. Enable Always on Display
If the ghost touches are a result of a bug that is triggered when the phone’s screen dims out, then enabling Always on Display will resolve the issue, till the bug is patched by Apple.
7. Edit Accessibility Settings on the iPhone
Accessibility settings on your iPhone hold different configurations relating to touch. If these settings are not correct, you will experience auto or ghost touches. To fix this, edit the accessibility settings of the iPhone.
Disable Tap to Wake
Disable Vibration and Haptics
Touch Accommodations
Enable Assistive Touch
8. Reset the iPhone to the Factory Defaults
If none of the above methods worked for you, you can go ahead and reset your iPhone to factory defaults. This will reset all settings and potentially resolve the bug as well.
Through iPhone Settings
Through iTunes or Finder
We will discuss the process for iPhone 8 or above. If the solutions mentioned above do not resolve the issue, it is recommended to reach out to Apple or have the phone inspected for a potential hardware problem. It is possible that the phone’s screen or battery could be defective.
