Iphone 4S getting hot?

Chr1stLike, the reset and reboot solution has worked on several phones, including mine. Not sure why you would say that it doesn't work.

Those procedures don't cause any new problems that I know of, and are faster than a full restore. So I suggest folks having this problem try the reset first before resorting to a restore. Restore doesn't seem guaranteed to solve the problem either...

--Peter

Hi maxscottdog. The data point I can contribute is that my black iphone 4s, wifi on, all the icloud stuff on, doesn't have any overheat / short battery life problems (at the moment at least!). It did seem to have some trouble along those lines when I bought it but I did a settings->general->reset->network, and a hard reboot, and that seems to have cured the problem. Doesn't seem to fix the problem for everyone though. Maybe there is a combination of bad settings (cured by the above), as well as HW problems with wifi.

--Peter

Peter - from the looks of the comments the reset/reboot only seems to be working on black iphones, not white ones. No idea why this would be since the interiors of the phones should be identical. Its possible the external materials used on the white models conduct heat more than the black ones -- only saying this because I recall the initial delays of rolling out the white iphones on previous models due to the original materials discoloring and they needed to find an alternate material to use. Not sure if thats still the case (no pun intended) but it might be possible.

Regarding the refresh I tried this as well, and endured the fun waiting of transfering all my music and apps back only to find the problem still persisted.

Time to wait online at the apple store

Dear All, update as promised.

Attended my appointment with the Genius at Milton Keynes branch of Apple. Went through the description of the issues and had to usual discussion on what I had tried. The Genius "Adam" said that he had another person with the same issues and said they felt it may of been a perception problem as the other customer was new to iPhone. As I had a long history of iPhone use he agreed that I would have a better idea of comparable battery life and operational use compared with earlier models.

Adam's solution was a swap out. Now came the dilemma, as my (online purchased) iPhone was under the 2 weeks window for 'no questions asked' return, taking a swap out from the shop would cancel that out. I could if If I wanted I could have left and returned via the online store. I personally took the swap out option, why, well if its a hardware glitch then we should have solved it (too early to report yet), if its a design fault and/or software, once the forums and complaints hit critical mass Apple will sort or provide a solution (Antenna-gate). The disappointment was that no diagnostics were carried out for them to advise me if this was an issue with the software/hardware, or frankly just the 'new' way of working with a smart phone, and in retrospect it was unlikely they would have told me.

Regardless of the two week window it is important to note your 'rights' if you find the phone 'not fit for purpose' then the company is duty bound to return your money, if you find yourselves in and out of Apple needing fixes then you can ask for a full refund and/or any attempt to repair must be reasonable, always quote Sale of Goods Act if you are having resistance.

As always my friends just a share of experience which I will hope others can gain from, its important to note my iPhone is the unlocked version purchased from Apple direct. I do get he impression when one is buying as an upgrade and/or a new contract with a provider this is a somewhat different experience?? In conclusion as always great customer service from Apple quick and fast with the focus and empathy on me the customer.

Have a great week and more power to your batteries!!!

S😎

P.S. if you are looking to take your phone back and gain a replacement - take the advantage of iCloud backup. When you have the new iPhone it is very easy to restore. Ensure though you manage the Apps that it backs up, by default it does all of them! I did the very bare minmum back up and was up and working within a minute of having the new phone. Be advised even the bare minimum back up knows which apps you had installed - which can be easily downloaded later.

Why didn't you ask for a brand new one?

You do not deserved a refurbished one after 1 week of purchase. The swap thing is really ridiculous because I think they just take phones and renew the case and glass but they do not fix the issues, they just try to mix them to other people...you can always ask a brand new one!

Thanks iperblue, yes very good point and this was a consideration. I did as you pertained asked the question and with their answer and logic was happy to take the swapout. This new model has new hardware and so the recycle of returned models has yet to really come into affect, one I would grant you would need careful consideration for something more mature like the 3GS or 4 and even the 4S as we move forward. 'Adam' was kind enough to advise as part of their stock they get new in the box and a number of new in the brown box. These are not refurbished as they come from the same factory and was too early in the product cycle of the 4S to be refurbished. Mine as those who have also suffered some type of 'out of the box' issue will be returned for refurbishment as you quite rightly said.

iperblue brings up a very good point and one we should all consider if in the same situation.

Both my 32GB black and my girlfriend's 16GB white 4S have the heat issue when we are using data where has bad 3G reception. We are using AT&T. 😟

I've got a white 16G that hadn't been getting warm/hot previously, but I did notice the poor battery life. I turned off everything including email and wifi hoping it'd help. It unfortunately didn't.

However, today after being home all day (comforatable 74 degrees in the house) I went to call my fiance, and my phone is extremely hot and dead and will not come back on. It won't respond to being plugged in either. At all. I took two phone calls this morning each lasting less than 5 minutes, and have not opened any aps. Guess I'll be visiting my local Apple store.

Update on swapped out iPhone 4S - all seems to be ok and the phone is holding charge. For me it was a hardware issue that seems at this stage not to have come back. Am lasting a full day which is originally what I was getting with the 4 with my personal usage. I can only recommend that if you have an issue you try not to work around the problems and return it promptly for replacement.

My iPhone heats up when an app uses location services or I take photos.

The battery drain for taking photos is very high (flash turned off - hdr on) I hope they sort this out I have had every version of the iPhone and this is the first time I've had this.

If I charge the iphone while using Location Services then it gets really hot and I have to remove it from its case (same one I had on the iphone 4) so that it can lose some heat.

Lets hope this is a bug, however none of my kids 3GS or my wifes 4 (my old one) exibit this issue and they are all running ios 5, so it looks like a 4S issue 😟

is it? i hv ta same problems. my white 4s get hot easily and battery run out quicker than iphone4. i have already swapped for 2times. The third one seems have the same pros. i will wait and see for few more days.

While i was asking to Genius bar, i didnt get any answer and solution from them.......they just said they didnt know wht's wrong............a bit disappointed.... 😟

When I first got my iPhone 4s the battery life seemed fine - although not noticeably better than my old 3GS.

Over the last couple of days the phone has started getting really hot for no reason and now lasts for less than half a day on a full charge with little to absolutely no use.

I've tried resetting network settings, rebooting, closing all apps etc... not happy!

I have had the same problem whilst using imaps and location services. Problem occurred whilst on the train and tracking position in zoomed in mode. iPhone 4s became very hot at the base of the handset (almost too hot to hold) and ended up exiting application and shutting down running service!. Will keep an eye on battery life!

Is the heat issue realated to the battery life issue with the new OS? Would make sense that if something is sucking extra battery it may generate more heat, being exaggerated by the increased processing power of the 4s...

any thoughts?

just to add another data point:

I have a white iphone 4s 64G purchased a few weeks ago.

I leave it on wifi all the time at home and the battery life wasn't impressive but given my usage I wasn't suspecting a problem.

Today I was out and about using the cell data network and location services to find free wi-fi cafe's...I noticed some 3G access was spotty during my venture of about 5 city blocks.

I found a cafe and put the phone in my pocket without ever connecting it to wi-fi (used the laptop instead)

all of sudden it got really hot in my pocket

First time I've noticed it doing that...took it out..noticed that edge network was active.

Killed all apps instantly and found this thread. Upon reading this thread I've done the following:

1. Reset netowrk settings
2. Turned off wifi (not using it)
3. Turned off "cellular data" (I suspect it may have something to do with bad data network)
4. Kill all apps (including anything using location services like my free-wifi finder app)

She's cool as a cucumber now with good working phone service (3 bars / ATT) but after reading this thread I'm a bit concerned the 4s may need a firmware or IOS update to resolve some of these issues.

Definately seems to be location / data network related more than wi-fi but I'm not 100% sure. Hopefully it's not hardware.