iPhone 14 Pro Signal Issues

lucas1312 wrote:

Swapped between the two largest carriers in my country and both get low signal so it’s clear where the problem is coming from.

A tower that isn't properly configured for the frequency you are being assigned to.

Swapping carriers doesn't necessarily switch towers or local device to tower frequency.

Do you mind listing who the two carriers were?

Cellular telephone signal bars are not comparable across devices. They’re an arbitrary and approaching fictional representation of signal. More bars is usually better, but anything past one bar is just “more bars”, and not any sort of cross-comparable measurement. (Same goes for the “analog” gages shown in modern vehicle dashboards, these days.)

There are articles on the ‘net that describe accessing a “Field Test mode” and using that for potentially viewing dBm signal strength measurements, but that’s all dependent on the specific hardware involved, is undocumented, subject to change, etc. Whether any if that is available, or works for the phones here?

TL;DR: if your phone connects and works, it works. If the iPhone does not connect and does not work, then contact your carrier initially and then Apple if it needs a repair, or try a different carrier if the iPhone is working but is not connecting where you need to use it. If y’all want to compare bars, well, have at. Comparing bars is whole lot like comparing pubs. Most folks have their own individual criteria for making that comparison. 🤭

Like many times before, this is a device issue that will require a workaround through apple software “updates”. Those who are insisting it is a carrier tower issue only, are obfuscating the problem. I have been working the last two weeks with tmobile tech support engineers testing both the new iphone 14 and the samsung s23, with the same carrier, same tower connection and at the same residence location. The iphone 14 suffers from signal degradation far more than the samsung s23. If you reside near the edge of a coverage area, do yourself a huge favor; stay away from the newest iphones until apple finally gets around to patching their devices signal reception issues. Still can’t make a voice call without dropping a signal on my iPhone 14 while the Samsung s23 sitting next to it with the same connection has no problem.

Complete reset without backup, erasing esim and instaling it again fixed this issue for me. I guess there is some errors while restoring everything from backup from older devices.

I have one physical and one esim installed from two different network.

Likely not, but if your retailer is willing to swap out your device, you can certainly try it.

I asked as sometimes cellular vendors announce whether they are sharing towers or not and I wanted to try to find out whether they were in fact doing so but wasn't able to find out much.

Sadly, though they may take being asked to check the tower as a joke it's truly the only way to get it fixed.

Can you try driving around 40 km away and see if you have similar poor results communicating with a different cell tower?

I have spent hours on the phone with tmobile technical support. I switched from an iphone X max to this 14. The X max consistently had twice the bar signal this 14 gets. Previous posts have strongly suggested the root of the problem is that the latest phones(Apple as well as Samsung) try to use a frequency that;

1)was not available on X, 12 and 13, and

2) has not been optimized by the tower operators.

Did the T-Mobile tech confirm to you both phones located in the exact same physical locations are being assigned to the exact same frequency bands? Just having them connect to the same cell tower is not enough.

For example, the iPhone 14 supports the following 5G NR frequency bands:

n1, n2, n3, n5, n7, n8, n12, n14, n20, n25, n26, n28, n29, n30, n38, n40, n41, n48, n53, n66, n70, n71, n77, n78, n79

The Galaxy S23 appears (Samsung themselves don't specify) to support:

n1, n2, n3, n5, n7, n8, n12, n20, n25, n28, n38, n40, n41, n66, n77, n78

So if the iPhone 14 is assigned to a frequency in bands n14, n26, n29, n30, n48, n53, n70, or n71, you may see drastically different performance characteristics simply because the S23 cannot use those frequencies.

Contact your carrier.

I just spent a week in Alaska and the 14 Pro Max's performance was exemplary in rural areas with signal as it was in Anchorage or is in the suburban area I which I live normally.

Are you comparing your iPhone's 5G signal with an older phone's 4G signal?

A 5G signal does not have the range that 4G does.

Contact your cellular carrier and complain to them; I explained why here:

iPhone 14 pro has poor signal. - Apple Community

Wi-Fi calling will help, if your carrier supports it.

Otherwise, complain to your carrier - they have to fix it as it's an issue with your local cell tower(s).

Have you had your phone examined at your local Apple Store? It could be an issue with your specific phone.

Genius Bar Reservation and Apple Support Options - Apple

Do an Internet search and you will find people with the latest Android devices are complaining of the exact same issues because it's a carrier problem.

From one thread on another forum:

Reception is very poor in Galaxy s22 ultra, don't know if it's just me, but, I've noticed online that so many people are having the same problem with this device.

I've tried to use different devices such as galaxy S20 Ultra or galaxy S10 plus and even IPhone 12 pro. All these devices seem to have a better reception comparing to my current Galaxy s22 ultra.

[ … ]

Samsung seems to be not listening to its customers and not responding to this matter at all.

So will those people then switch to iPhones?

There are tens if not hundreds of millions of iPhone 14 owners who use Verizon who are not experiencing this issue because it's all dependent upon conditions at and the configuration of your local cell towers; if you drive a few miles so your call is routed through a different tower, you may have no issues at all.

This has nothing to do with modems per se, rather it’s the cellular radios that connect to the towers.

Most people do not have signal issues and in fact many find it to be the best.

I know personally I no longer drop calls in areas I used to with past iPhones.

That having been said, I know it doesn’t matter if your phone is unusable to you, so the biggest thing you can do at present is call and complain to your cellular carrier.