Fixing a Broken or Unresponsive iPhone Home Button


If the Home button of your iPhone becomes unresponsive, restoring your device to the factory defaults can resolve the issue once and for all. On the other hand, if there is a physical damage to the button, you should take the iPhone to the service center and get it fixed as soon as possible.

If you want to use your iPhone temporarily even if there is a physical damage to the Home button, there is still a work around to it. You can enable the virtual Home button which appears within the iOS interface, and requires you to tap the button every time you want to go to the home screen.
In order to enable the virtual Home button on your iPhone, the ‘AssistiveTouch’ feature must be turned on.

Here’s how you can turn ‘AssistiveTouch’ on your iPhone to enable the virtual Home button.

    ■Switch on your iPhone by long pressing the power button.
    ■Swipe your finger on the screen (screen with the slide to unlock text) to unlock the home screen.
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    ■Once the home screen appears, tap the Settings icon.
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    ■From the Settings interface, locate and tap the General option.
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    ■Tap Accessibility from the General interface.
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    ■When the Accessibility interface comes up, under the PHYSICAL & MOTOR section, tap the AssistiveTouch option.
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    ■Once done, slide to enable the AssistiveTouch toggle button.

Note: If the above settings have been made correctly, a virtual home button will be displayed on your iPhone’s screen. You can tap the virtual home button in case the physical button stops responding.
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Note: When you enable the ‘AssistiveTouch’ feature on your iPhone and the virtual Home button becomes visible on the screen, the button remains semi-transparent in order to allow you to view the other screen contents clearly, without hiding anything behind it.

Note: It might be a bit challenging to tap the icons placed behind the semi-transparent virtual Home button on the iPhone screen. To make things easier, you can scroll the screen up or down to have a clear view of the desired icon. Alternatively you can also move the virtual Home button to any other location on your iPhone’s screen.