iPhone 5 camera not working after ios 7 update

I've also had this problem, tried all suggestions on this forum I think with no joy. Went to Genius Bar this afternoon who told me it was hardware problem and needed new phone. As a last ditch hope started looking at any answers to problem on web and came across a YouTube clip with some replies. One guy suggested the following and hey presto my camera works again- am v happy!!

Press down hard on top right of phone on front where camera is positioned at back, then turn phone off and back on again. If doesn't work first time give it a couple of go's. Hope it works for others!

got same problem - rear camera does not work anymore. re-installed 3 times - configured as new problem did not fix. Apple store mentionned it was a firmware issue. out of warranty, but luckly I live in Québec, Canada and there is a law that protect consumers: regardless of manufacturer warranty, a product shall last a reasonable amount of time. A telephone worth 700$ that I pay over 3 years shall last at least three years.

Yes we have the similar law here in Germany. But the customer has to bring the proof that the error is not caused by himself. And that is only possible with an expensive expert report.

Good luck in Quebec. I hope you have a more liberal law.

Radcl77 wrote:

I've also had this problem, tried all suggestions on this forum I think with no joy. Went to Genius Bar this afternoon who told me it was hardware problem and needed new phone. As a last ditch hope started looking at any answers to problem on web and came across a YouTube clip with some replies. One guy suggested the following and hey presto my camera works again- am v happy!!

Press down hard on top right of phone on front where camera is positioned at back, then turn phone off and back on again. If doesn't work first time give it a couple of go's. Hope it works for others!

That worked for me, pressing on the top, but only for a while. I took some photos and then a pink or white line appears in the screen and the app freezes again. But if a repeat the process of pressing the top and restarting the phone, its works again. Is this a hardwear issue then? Because until now i thought it was software related, because of the IOS 7.

heres an update on what I think is wrong... I'll start off by saying that earlier in this thread (https://discussions.apple.com/thread/5327076?answerId=24383605022#24383605022) i posted about the horrible service i received from an apple store, and how I was left to deal with things myself. I ended up just accepting the camera was never gonna work, and then on a day my screen would no longer turn on, i went to AT&T and bought an iphone 5s at full price.

with the old phone no longer working, i decided to do an experiement. Using a new camera module I ordered off ebay, I swapped out the old camera, then jiggled wires until my screen worked again. This leads me to believe that the camera issue that everyone here is reporting is actually a hardware issue, and after thinking about it, its likely inthe autofocus mechanics in the camera. Not dirt. Not wires. Not software. Replacing the camera was not an easy task either, and I can imagine this is why Apple would not want to offer a replacement. However, I will most certainly guarantee it is the fix everyone here needs.

126K VIEWS AND NO SOLUTION YET?!? NOT EVEN AN OFFICIAL RESPONSE?!?

Don't pretend to be premium while ignoring this thread like some Chinese junk manufacturer. WAKE UP GUYS!!!

Yesterday I got a new iPhone 5 with the same problem, months after the issue was first raised. IF APPLE IN ITS ARROGANCE COULD JUST ACKNOWLEDGE THE PROBLEM, NEW PROBLEMS COULD BE PREVENTED.

I have been having this same problem since I upgraded the sortware to IOS 7 in September 2013. With some luck, sometimes the camera works with the lens in the centre above the screen works, which is good only to take a selfie. At most times, the camera function just hangs. Brought my phone to Apple service centre here in Singapore and was told that my problem is an isolated case which they have never encountered, and since my phone has passed its 1-year warranty period, I will need to get a new phone or I could buy a re-furbished phone, from them. Now that I have read and found out that the problem I am having is not "an isolated case" and with so many reports and the problem hasn't been fixed, all I can say is "shame on you, Apple".

I had this problem with the rear camera on my iPhone 5 (7.0.6) but I fixed it by uninstalling the "iTunes Festival" app. I don't know why this app would have caused my problem, but I uninstalled it and now my camera works again.

Hy there,

This is a very bad joke. So, I have the same problem as all of you (as I allready describe it in a comment one month ago). I played arround with allmost everything. First a restore process got back the camera function for about 24h. Than again gone. This worked seweral times. In the mentime this does not get the cammera app working again.

Today I tried a new thing and it got me a funny outcome.

As probably for all of you, the flash function does also not work! I found a fix for that :) (I know, not helping at all, and I do not know for how long this would work). I went to settings-general-restrictions and enabled them and restricted the cammera app. After that I disabeled the restriction again, and guess what?! The flash is working again (not the cammera thou)!

So if ANYONE tries to tell me again that this is a HARDWARE FAILURE, than I WILL HIT HIM IN THE FACE THROUGH THE SCREEN OF HIS BROWSER WHERE HE POSTS THIS!!!!!!

Apple SHAME ON YOU for this! I am a power Apple user (3x iPhone, 2 x iPad, 1x iMac and 1x AppleTV in the house) but this is the first time I am looking seriously to the new SAMSUNG GALAXY!!!!!

Again, SHAME ON YOU APPLE!

If it is a HARDWARE failure, how can you explain that after tweaking with different software options (reset, restore and other solutions here) the camera works again for a while before failuring again? If it would be a HARDWARE problem, nothing you do on a software level should fix the problem, not even for a limited time!

i'd explain this to be hardware related two ways.... 1, if it wasn't, why does the phone still work after replacing the camera? that really should say enough.... but 2) isn't it possible the temporary software solutions we've tried only clears an image quality control mechanism, then over time (for example if autofocus gets fixated on piece of internal speck, or the focus mechaninism stops working), the camera is programmed to turn itself off?

its like this. Pretend you're an up-tight photographer... and the subject you're asked to shoot just wont sit still or hides behind a big black dot... or whatever. eventually when photos become so bad that its unacceptable, you'd probably say "Enough!" then storm out and refuse to take any more pics until changes have been made.

Resetting the software is like hypnotisng the photographer to forget the day before... but chances are if his cameras broke, hes gonna get upset again.

Well, we really apreciate your kind of explanation or, in my opinion, your point of view.

The fact is that, suddenly, from nowhere, thousands of perfectly functioning devices under warranty, outside warranty, well treated, poorly treated, black, white, 4, 5, 5S, old, new, etc etc etc. All this devices, decided to suffer from an hardware issue.

Just like you, without any type of conclusive explanation, i consider it to be some kind of software related issue.

Cool would be, if Apple, lost some time and resources to analyse this issue and, regardless of being a software or harware issue, tell their customers and users something.

At least, that's what i expect, i do not want a new iphone i just want Apple to tell me something about this issue, and if i have the right to a new one, better, if i do not have that right, well... that's ok anyway.

Now, please tell us something.

132770 Views and 372 replies and yet no serious explanation.

With 0 official solutions provided , i guess it might be time for apple engineers to consider this following global issue, hardware or software related it was.

Not that i am only facing this camera-flashlight bug, but i lately noticed a new problem striking the volume bar in the control center making it frequently disappear !

Thank you Apple...

Well, we just have to agree on disagreeing.

1. You have o point there... But it does not answer the question.

2. Well if that would be the case, than Apple is realy going crazy. Deciding to implement a software algorythm that shutts down your cammera from working, when the system considers that the image quality (lack of focus or whatewer) is poor! That would be simply nuts. Let the cammera take the bad pictures so that people know there is a problem. Why the **** would they develop an algorythm that stops the cammera from working when the quality of images are bad??? And anyhow... wouldnt it have been logical than to implement some kind of an error message that tells you the cammera is "dead"?

And anyhow, if this would be true, than after the "temporary fix", the cammera should be able to take only 1 shot and than fail again, becouse the sistem aknoledges again the mallfunction.

As I said, point no 1. is kinnd of logic... alltough, the failure of so many cameras is verry unlike, but point no 2 is verry shaky.

We will have to agree to disagree :)

But in any case, an official statement from apple would be verry welocme. Apple guys.... are you sleeping or is the apple wrotten?????????

So, since we do not get any statements from Apple I think that waiting for a solution in ios 7.1 is kind of a whishfull thinking :(