Fixes to Solve iPhone Ghost Touch Problem in iOS 13/12/11

You have probably heard various names that people use to refer to “touch” but have you ever heard of ghost touch? Likely not. Ghost touch is a term used to the action of your iPhone performing tasks on its own. You may have sometimes seen that your iPhone automatically opens an app, accesses a feature, and even places a call – all this without you giving any input at all.

The following guide talks more about ghost touch in detail and tells you how it affects your iPhone. Then, it offers some of the fixes you can apply to your iPhone to possibly get rid of the ghost touch issue.

Part 1. What Is Ghost Touch

Since the term “ghost touch” is not widely used, a lot of users do not know what it even means. As mentioned above, your iPhone performing tasks on its own is called ghost touch. You can think of it as a ghost touching your iPhone and performing actions without any input from your side.

A ghost touch can change a number of things on your iPhone. Many users who have faced the issue know that ghost touch has actually done many tasks on their devices.

Part 2. How It Affects iPhone

You might wonder how ghost touch can affect your iPhone as it does nothing but just touches your iPhone. As you already know, the entire functionality of your iPhone relies on just touches. You touch something on your device and it performs the action you touched on. It is what you use to operate all the functions on your device.

When a ghost touch occurs on your iPhone, it can do any action that you, as a user, can do. It can open your apps, send messages to your contacts, place calls on your iPhone, change settings options, and so on.

It can even format and reset your device to the factory settings if it somehow finds a way into your Settings app and then the reset option.

If you are experiencing the ghost touch issue too frequently on your device, you should consider finding a solution to fix the issue. If you do not do it, you might find your iPhone doing tasks that you never wanted to do – such as sending emails to your contacts with no content in the email body. Things can get worse, too, if you are not careful enough and you allow your iPhone to function on its own.

Part 3. Several Ways to Solve Ghost Touch Issues

Whether you have already faced the consequences of allowing ghost touch to run for too long on your iPhone X or you are yet to see any results of your ghost touches, you might want to find a quick fix to get the issue fixed on your device.

It is not that ghost touch is unfixable and that there is no way you can get around it on your iPhone. In fact, there are multiple ways to resolve ghost touch and get your iPhone functioning back to normal. The following are some of the ways to fix the issue on your iPhone and to stop it from running tasks on its own.

Fix 1. Get Rid of Dust on Your Screen

One of the reasons why your iPhone is running tasks on its own is because there are unwanted particles on the screen of your device. If you have not cleaned your phone’s screen for a long time, it has likely collected dust that is causing your iPhone to auto-perform tasks.

It is just the dust that is touching here and there and making your iPhone perform actions.

Use a clean cloth, preferably a microfiber one, and gently clean-up the screen of your iPhone. Once that is done, you should find that you no longer have the ghost touch issue on your device.

Also, to avoid the issue from recurring on your device in the future, make sure to keep your iPhone’s screen as clean as possible. This will also keep one of the valuable assets of your device safe and secure.

Fix 2. Remove Your Phone’s Screen Protector

The job of a screen protector is to protect the screen from any scratches. There are a number of these protectors available in the market, however, not all of them are fully compatible with your iPhone.

An incompatible screen protector could cause issues like ghost touch on your iPhone as it auto-touches some parts of your screen. A compatible one would never do it as it fits just perfectly fine on your iPhone without any part of it being in touch with your phone’s screen.

To find out if it is your screen protector that is causing the issue, simply have it removed and then see if you face the ghost touch issue. If you do not, get rid of the protector and get a new fully compatible one for your device.

Fix 3. Remove the Case of Your iPhone

Cases for iPhones are available in many varieties and just like screen protectors, some of these may not be fully compatible with your device. Manufacturers try their best to produce compatible cases but sometimes they end-up failing at the job which produces incompatible cases.

An incompatible case for your iPhone could automatically touch the parts, especially the corner ones, and that makes your iPhone perform actions on it. You will even be able to see this for yourself and you will find that your case indeed is in contact with the screen of your device.

The best way to fix the issue is to get your case replaced with a new, compatible, and high-quality one. It will help you get rid of the issue and your phone should work normally.

Fix 4. Force Reboot Your iPhone

If you are still facing the ghost touch issue on your iPhone even after removing the screen protector and the case, it could be that the issue is with the system of your device.

There could be a small and minor glitch in the functioning of your iPhone that is causing your device to auto-perform tasks. Maybe a bug remained unresolved on your iPhone and it is now automatically tapping on the options on your screen.

A minor bug or glitch can easily be resolved on your iPhone and you do not need to do much about it. All you basically need to do is force reboot your iPhone. Force rebooting clears the temporary memory of your device and gives the device a fresh start for it to perform its tasks. This fresh start should fix the minor glitch that was causing ghost touch.

The steps to force reboot an iPhone varies depending on what model of the iPhone you have. The following are the steps for each iPhone where the force rebooting method varies.

iPhone 8 and Later：If you have an iPhone 8 or a later model, then all you need to do is press three buttons on your device and it will force reboot.

Press the Volume Up button and let it go. Press the Volume Down button and let it go. Press and hold down the Side button and you will see the Apple logo on your screen. Let go of the button and your device will force reboot.

iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus：If you are an iPhone 7 or 7 Plus user, you only need to press two buttons on your phone to force reboot it.

Press and hold down the Volume Down and Power buttons at the same time until you see the Apple logo. Let go of the buttons when the logo appears and your iPhone will force reboot.

iPhone 6 and Earlier：iPhone 6 and earlier models of the iPhone also require only pressing two buttons for force rebooting.

On your device, press and hold down the Home and Power buttons at the same time. When the Apple logo appears on your screen, release the buttons and your phone will force reboot.

Fix 5. Update the iOS Version on Your iPhone

One of the great things about owning an iPhone is that you regularly get updates for the operating system of your device. This applies to other Apple products as well but iPhone is the device that gets the most number of updates in the Apple family.

The reason why you get a number of updates for iOS is that Apple wants to fix as many issues on their devices as possible. If an earlier iOS version had an issue, it should likely be fixed in a newer update, and so on.

That tells you if you are running a really old version of iOS on your iPhone, it is why you have the ghost touch issue on your device. Older versions of iOS are known to have issues, and as soon as a new update becomes available, you should get your iPhone updated.

You can check the current version of iOS on your iPhone by heading into Settings > General > About. If it shows anything lesser than iOS 14, 13 or 12, you are running an old version of the software on your device and you should get it updated as soon as possible.

Updating the iOS version on an iPhone is pretty easy and there are two ways to do it. Either you can use the iTunes app to update your iPhone or you can use one of the options on your iPhone to update to the latest software version.

Since updating from the iPhone itself sounds more convenient, let us check out how to do it on your device.

Step 1. Open the Settings app from the springboard on your iPhone.

Step 2. When it opens, find the option that says General and tap on it.

Step 3. Tap on Software Update on the following screen and you should see the available updates for your device. Tap on the Download and Install button to download the available updates and install them on your iPhone.

Once the updates are installed, you should find you no longer have the ghost touch issue on your device – if it was caused by an obsolete version of iOS.

Fix 6. Reset All the Settings on Your iPhone

Your phone settings define how each feature works on your device. If these settings are not properly configured or if they are misconfigured, you might want to check and fix them.

If you are not sure how to go about doing it, you can simply reset all the settings to the factory defaults. This will fix any misconfigured settings as well and you can be sure there are no errors in the settings of your device.

Resetting settings on an iPhone is a child’s play. All you need to do is access an option on your device and it will do the rest of the job for you. The following shows how to do it.

Step 1. Launch the Settings app on your iPhone.

Step 2. When the app opens, navigate to the option that says General and select it.

Step 3. Select the Reset option on the following screen and then choose Reset All Settings.

Your iPhone will reset all of its settings to the factory defaults. Your ghost touch issue should likely be gone from your device.

Fix 7. Factory Reset Your Device

The issue sometimes can be so worse that it cannot be fixed by just resetting settings on the device. If that is the case with you, you might want to try factory resetting your device.

There is a difference between resetting settings on your iPhone and factory resetting your iPhone. A factory reset wipes off all the data, settings, and basically everything you have on your device. This increases the chances of fixing the ghost touch issue and you can do it as the following.

Step 1. Open the Settings app on your iPhone.

Step 2. Tap on General followed by Reset in the app.

Step 3. On the following screen, tap on Erase All Content and Settings to reset your iPhone to the factory settings.

Wait while your iPhone is being reset to the factory settings. When it is done, you will be asked to set it up from scratch and link it with your iCloud account.

Fix 8. Restore Your iPhone with iTunes

iTunes can also help you get rid of the ghost touch issue on your iPhone. You can use the restore feature in the app to restore your device which then fixes all the issues on your device.

It is fairly easy to do the task and the following steps should help you do it on your iPhone.

Step 1. Connect your iPhone to your computer and open the iTunes app on your computer.

Step 2. Locate the icon for your device in the app and click on it.

Step 3. Select the Summary option from the left sidebar and then click on the Restore iPhone button in the right-hand side pane.

iTunes will restore your iPhone and you will then have a ghost-touch-free iPhone.

Fix 9. Contact Apple Support

If nothing worked for you and you are still experiencing unwanted touches on your iPhone, your final option would be to contact the Apple support team. They would know what the cause of the issue is and how to fix the issue on your device.

The Bottom Line

iPhone 11/XS/XR/X/8/7/6s and many other models of the iPhone face the ghost touch issue from time to time. Fortunately, there are ways to get rid of the issue as shown above. We hope the guide helps you resolve the issue and that you no longer face any unexpected touches on your device. If you still got this problem unsolved, please leave the message in the comment part. Maybe we could figure it out together.