My iPhone 7 Home button not working – how can I fix it?

Fixes for iPhone Home button not working issue

The iPhone home button not working is not an uncommon issue. Due to its extensive use, it is not unusual to find the home button not working on iPhone as it should or has become less responsive. In fact, I have also come across a user making the query – my iPhone 7 Home button not working, how can I fix it?

The iPhone home button not working or has become unresponsive is a most frustrating and annoying issue because it is the single button in non-Touch ID-enabled iPhone models, that has multiple functions and is central to using iOS devices. Besides its standard tasks of returning you to the home screen and letting you quickly switch between apps, the iPhone Home button wakes up the lock screen, opens the multitasking interface, summons Siri, and does several other functions. Because of such extensive use of the button, it is not unusual to find sometimes, the iPhone 6 or iPhone 7 home button not working and getting stuck.

In this article, I am going to show a few good options to fix either by yourself or by some professional repair agency in the worst situation, if you find the home button iPhone not working properly.

iPhone Home button not working – major causes

When you see the home button not working on iPhone the question may come up in your mind – why is my home button not working?

When the users report that their iPhone 6 or iPhone 7 home button not working or for that matter if the issue is with any iPhone model, there may be a number of reasons behind this problem.  No matter how careful you are about keeping your iPhone safe and sound, there is still a chance of the iPhone home button not clicking eventually due to the effects of normal wear and tear. Normally, the cause of the home button not working on iPhone falls into three categories:

• Hardware problems;
• Software problems;
• General wear and tear;

Software problems and general wear and tear can usually be fixed at home, but if you see your iPhone button not working as it should, because of a hardware problem, you may have to take the help of a professional agency providing an iPhone home button repair service.

Hardware problems

Hardware problems are usually caused due to physical or liquid damage to your phone. Sometimes, if iPhone’s display, which is physically attached to the home button, is damaged or if your iPhone got wet, you may find the home button not working. One of the cables that connects the home button to the logic board to carry the home button signal, can also be damaged which may cause the iPhone home button not working issue.

Software problems

You may also find your iPhone home button stuck or not responding correctly to the signals sent by the hardware of the device if your phone’s software becomes corrupted or overloaded in the background.

If your iPhone has been very slow lately or if you notice apps have been crashing or if you find your iPhone home button won’t work after upgrading your device to a new version of iOS, a software problem may be the cause of the home button not working iPhone.

General wear and tear

In some cases, and especially when your iPhone is used in dusty or dirty environments for a prolonged period, the home button on iPhone can become less sensitive to touch. With the kind of little spaces that the home button’s edge has, it is very much possible that your home button not working on iPhone due to dust clogged in it. Now that you got the answer to your query – why isn’t my home button working, here’s what you should do if you face such a situation.

What to do when my home button isn’t working on my iPhone?

When the home button not working on iPhone, the biggest problem is that you cannot return to the Home Screen. Basically, you get stuck inside your apps. Now, what to do in such a situation?

Fortunately, there is a feature called ‘AssistiveTouch’ in your iPhone ‘settings’ that can virtually replace the Home button and let you take full control of your device. Here is how to turn on assistive touch iPhone and show the virtual Home Button on your iPhone’s screen:

1. Open iPhone home button settings;

2. Go to General > Accessibility;

3. Scroll down to the section labeled ‘Interaction’ and tap on AssistiveTouch;

4. On the next screen, toggle AssistiveTouch to the green ‘On’ position;

5. A white circle with a grey box will appear on the screen. Tap this circle to expand it to a big box on the screen. The square ‘Home button’ at the bottom of the box functions exactly like the physical home button. You can use the button even if there is a hardware problem. The grey box remains visible and usable in all apps;

What to do if the iPhone home button doesn’t work

When assistive touch for iPhone is enabled, its menu is superimposed on the home screen menu. If you find assistive touch for iPhone confusing, you can disable the feature in the device’s settings menu to return to the iPhone’s standard mode. If you don’t want to completely disable ‘Assistive Touch’, you can hide the assistive touch menu to use the device in standard mode while leaving the ‘assistive touch’ feature activated.

However, ‘assistive touch’ isn’t a real fix, but it is a good temporary solution. It will hold you over until you fix the ‘home button not working’ issue or you’re ready to purchase a new phone.

How to fix an iPhone home button when not working

Now let us see how to fix home button on iPhone when it is not working due to any of the causes mentioned above.

Hardware issues

If you guess your iPhone Home button not working because of a hardware problem, take a close look at the button and your iPhone’s display, for any possible damage. On inspection, if you discover any physical or liquid damage to your phone, you can doubtlessly conclude that your iPhone home button won’t work properly because of a hardware problem. In such a case your device needs to be taken to a professional repair agency for iPhone home button repair.

If you’re still under warranty and your phone doesn’t show signs of accidental damage, you can straight away head over to an Apple Store or Authorized Apple Repair Center (you can also make an appointment with the Genius Bar) or start a mail-in repair on getsupport.apple.com. As long as you’re covered by a warranty, the company may go for your iPhone home button replacement or perform any necessary repairs free of cost.

When your iPhone is out of warranty and requires repair, if you go to any repair agency other than Apple there is an important limitation. Although the iPhone Home button repair or replacement can be done by any agency at a cost much less than Apple (iResQ is a high-quality Apple device repair agency), only Apple can re-enable the Touch ID, the fingerprint sensor built into the Home button. Touch ID contains security features that link a specific Home button to a specific iPhone, and for security reasons, Apple is the only company that can crack the code. Therefore, if you have a Touch ID-enabled iPhone and get your phone repaired by anyone other than Apple, the Home button will function without the Touch ID functionality.

Software issues

As mentioned earlier, you may find the Home button on your iPhone not working correctly if your iPhone’s software doesn’t respond the way it should when you press the Home button. If your iPhone button not working due to software-related issues here are some feasible methods for getting this resolved:

Method 1: Restart your device

First, try the least invasive troubleshooting step – turn off your iPhone and turn your device back ‘on’ again. When your iPhone is turned off, all the programs that keep your iPhone running, including carrying out the process of the event like ‘Home button press’, are forced to shut down. When you turn on your device again, those little programs start afresh. Sometimes that is enough to fix any minor software malfunction. If this does not fix your home button not working issue, just move on to the next method;

Method 2:  Re-calibrate your iPhone Home Button
Sometimes re-calibration of the Home button of your iPhone has been found to fix the issue if you find your iPhone home button stuck or unresponsive. It is not clear how and why this method works, but it seems to work quite well and makes the Home button more responsive than before. In case you find the home button on iPhone not working properly, just follow these simple steps to re-calibrate the button:

• Launch any app that came pre-installed on your device such as Notes, Weather, Calendar, or anything else;
• Press and hold the Power (Sleep/Wake) button for about 4 seconds until the “slide to power off” slider appears on the screen;
• Release the power button and press and hold the Home button until the “slide to power off” slider disappears;

That’s all. You will notice that the app gets terminated by this re-calibrate action and also your Home button on your iPhone becomes more responsive and work better now. Try repeating the process a few more times if the process did not have any effect on the first attempt.

If this method does not fix the issue and your iPhone Home button doesn’t work even after this, then just move on and try the other methods.

Method 3:  Restore your iPhone

Restoring your iPhone is the most common fix for major software problems causing the ‘iPhone buttons not working’ issue. This would help to resolve your ‘iPhone home button not working’ problem in most cases. By restoring your device you erase and reload all the software on your iPhone. If you make an appointment at the Apple ‘Genius Bar’ to fix a Home button issue, the technical persons there will always restore your iPhone to make sure it’s not a software issue before making a repair.

To restore your device do the following:

i. Back up your iPhone to iTunes or iCloud before restoring your device as a safeguard against data loss. To backup do the following:

Backup with iTunes: Connect your iPhone to your PC, open iTunes, and select your iPhone when it appears in iTunes. Click “Back Up Now” and your iPhone will be backed up on your computer without encryption;

Backup with iCloud: First of all, make sure your iPhone is connected to a WiFi network. Go to Settings > iCloud > Backup and turn it on, and choose ‘Back Up Now’ to backup your iPhone to iCloud;

ii. Now, connect your iPhone to iTunes and select it under ‘Devices’. Find the ‘Summary’ tab, then click ‘Restore’. This will restore your iPhone back to its original settings keeping all your contents intact;

After the restore process is completed the problem with the Home button on your iPhone is expected to be resolved permanently;

Method 4. Clean the Home button

Prolonged use of your iPhone in a dusty environment may make your iPhone Home button not working correctly or make it less sensitive, due to dust clogging the edge space of the button. Instead of spending money on repair, clean the Home button on your iPhone by yourself. Press the Home button and blow the dust away with a blast of air. Repeat the process a few times and it might help you get back your iPhone Home button in normal working condition.

You may also like to read this post: iPhone volume buttons not working- try these 6 proven fixes

Frequently asked questions

Let me now address some of the  common queries relating to the iPhone home button:

What to do when the home button not working on iPhone?

As already mentioned in the post, iPhone has a feature called ‘AssistiveTouch’ in your iPhone ‘settings’ that can virtually replace the Home button and let you take full control of your device. To activate this,

Go to Settings > tap ‘General’ > select ‘Accessibility’, then scroll down to the section labeled ‘Interaction’ and tap on ‘AssistiveTouch’. Now toggle ‘AssistiveTouch’ to the green ‘On’ position.

How can I open my phone when the home button on my iPhone not working?

To open your iPhone without pressing the ‘Home button’ go to,

Settings>Tap ‘General’>Select ‘Accessibility’>Tap ‘Home Button’.

Then toggle the switch to the ‘on’ position.

Now you can open your iPhone with Touch ID without having to press the home button.

How do I reset my phone when the home button not working iPhone 7?

1.   ‘Backup’ your iPhone by connecting it to a computer using iTunes;

2.   Next, go to Settings > General > Reset > Erase All Content and Settings;

5.   Restart your iPhone and go through the initial setup;

6.   After the setup is complete, check the Home button;

You might also like to read: iPhone touch screen not working -fix it in 5 simple steps

Conclusion

Although the issue of the iPhone home button not working has been quite widespread, it has been observed that more recent Touch ID-enabled iPhone models are less prone to such problems than earlier models. Compared to the old physical button, the touch-sensitive home button on iPhone has been designed to be more durable and responsive. Powered by the Taptic Engine (technology that provides tactile sensations in the form of vibrations to the users), the Home button for Apple provides haptic (use of the sense of touch in a user interface) feedback when pressed. In order to prevent the Home button from being worn out too easily, Apple has introduced a pressure-sensitive Home button on iPhone 7 and 7 Plus.

Before I conclude let me make it clear that the fixes suggested here to resolve the ‘home button not working on iPhone’ issue are applicable not only to solve ‘iPhone 6 or iPhone 7 home button not working‘ problems but also are applicable to other versions of iPhone. Moreover, these fixes should work well for home buttons on the iPad and iPod Touch also.

If you have any other better solutions for the

‘home button not working’ issue, please share the same in the comment section below to help others who may be struggling to fix their home button not working on iPhone