iPhone 5 rear camera is not working

good day

I recently bought my iphone and i have the same problem my rear camera turns purple with streaks and froze. After i restart it works and after long hours of standing the same problem happens again. Can apple do anything about this problem?

I've got a brand new iphone, probably about a week old and I'm suffering with the same problem. Black screen on the camera and all of its apps including facetime. I have checked restrictions and they're off, I have reset all my setttings and also erased my content settings a couple of times as well but it still doesn't work.

Thinking I may have to take it back to apple again 😐

This recently happend to my iPhone 5 and i went through all of the steps indicated by Apple above and it did not do anything.

I am getting very frustraded with Apple of late and now really considering going with the new Samsung S5 when it comes out in a couple of weeks.

You'll find it under Settings -> General --> Accessibility. Be aware that this changes the way the phone handles touch commands.

FYI This procedure fixed the camera software for 2 days, but today it's not working again. Flipping Voiceover on and off does nothing. Seems like a software problem.

I also tried most things on my iPhone 5 which is about 18 months old. At first the Accessibility setting trick worked. But now it does not work any more. I have also had the crash where for no reason the phone freezes, the screen shows stripes and then it goes black. When you plug it into the Mac, iTunes says, "phone in recovery mode" and that I must restore it. I have not restored it. Because I want to stay at iOS 7.0.6, NOT because my phone is jailbroken, but at least I still have the option. I won't upgrade the OS until a jailbreak is available for that version. I have managed to get the phone out of recovery mode using instructions given on YouTube in various places. The phone works fine but not the camera.

Oddly, one day the camera started working again. But after working for a while it went back to being black and non-functional.

On the suggestion of an Apple store genius, I've submitted a claim to my credit card's insurance company to see if the phone will be covered under the card's extended warranty insurance, which doubles the manufacturer's warranty. If I get a new iPhone out of this, that would solve things, though one wonders how long the camera will last in the new one? If anyone has any more tricks on how to fix this, please post.

This is my problem as well. The camera shows a black screen. Front camera works but when you switch to back camera it shows a blurry picture. I recently added the most recent update(April 2014). This is a huge issue. Help! I've tried all the fixes on this post......turn off, reset, restore. Nothing.

After escalating my issue up a few times, I finally got them to agree to replace my phone without charging the $289. It was a free replacement, but it wasn't easy.

I lost thousands of pictures. That stinks!

I hope the new iPhone 6 comes out ASAP and there aren't issues with it.

Hi RCWEICH,

Can I ask you how you went about escalating? I woudl really appreciate any specific tips you have on how to escalate and get the service that we all deserve when we have a faulty, very expensive piece of Apple hardware.

My camera/video also does not work. I could not believe that 3 weeks after my 1 year warranty ran out (it actually broke 1 week after warranty but I spent time researching and trying home fixes) that Apple would not replace my faulty phone. There was no sympathy, no flexibility, nothing, only the fact that I "just have faulty hardware" on the camera. The technician offered "well the front camera still works" (not true, only about 15% of the time) and that *his* phone that he got on the day they were launched works just fine.

I did ask to talk to to a manager who explained that only apple care customers get the extended warranty. Well, I was not offered that option, because 1 month after purchasing my original phone, it broke and they gave me a replacement, and at that point you cannot even get applecare. He calmed me downa dn I left, considering my options of paying $300, or trading it in for a $270 credit towards a new phone (where I"d pay $540) or using my plan upgrade to pay only $50. Problem is, we don't want to use upgrade and sign another 2 years with phone company.

Anyway, this poor customer service was unexpected and so surprising that so many devices are not functioning so soon after the warranty expires. Thanks for any tips you have! 🙂

For sure it is indeed a software issue.

I had the samen problem, it came by surprise, it went away by surprise.

I cannot explain why it went away... It just did.

Restoring a backup and even restoring factory settings did not solve the problem when it occured. After 2 weeks of trying evenrything I gave up. Warranty was refused, I was starting to look around what to buy instead. Dissapointed in Apple. A week after all my efforts, while normally using, I tried just out of curiousity if I could take a picture. Ans yes, to my surprise it worked again. I did not use the camera for some time, since I thought it was broken. It almost seems as the camera overheated and needed a week without use to cool down. Off course it has nothing to do with heat, it's just figure of speaking.

Now more the a week further, camera keeps on working fine.

Same problem front-camera with an Iphone 5C , tried several options

- reset/reboot -> doesn't work

- restore to factory settings -> doesn't work

- restore to previous backup -> doesn't work

- switching voice over on and off -> doesn't work, take care because trying to switch-off voice over is extreme frustrating and almost drove me mad

- switch grid off -> on -> doesn't work

- put the device in the refrigerator -> this works surprisingly for three minutes

- pressing on each corner of the screen -> doesn't work

- installing app 'camera awesome' -> doesn't work

- second attempt put the device in the refrigerator -> this works or another three minutes

Any other suggestions very welcome.

Genius! That actually worked! I still can't believe this as I went to the iPhone repair shop, they've replaced the camera and said it didn't fix the issue (luckily they haven't charged me for that!) So, I was trying to get a faulty iPhone to replace the mainboards, but run into problems with locked phones. Then started googling again and found this solution. It turned out the issue was hardware but purely software.

Thanks so much for sharing Miso.

UK77, stop trolling and trying to convince newbies to delete their photos, that's not nice what you are doing. Deleting photos and videos has and cannot have absolutely no impact on this camera issue.

Oh my, this fixed my camera and flash light problem. I was just about to give in and send my phone away for a hardware fix. I've spent the last few days researching this, doing resets and all sorts of magic combos of actions. This worked for me. Well done Miso117

I Have the issue of the forward facing camera just deciding not to work, out of all of the suggestions I think different ones work for different people, my personal feelings on this issue is like with all business who capture a particular market like apple having hooked all age generations on there products.

<Edited by Host>

According to what i've red i can say it is a hardware issue maybe loose contact on the camera hardware which prevents the phone from detecting the camera that's why we cannot use it. Maybe we have left the phone in such a hot place like inside the car parked in a direct sunlight which makes the metal surface of the phone hot and might loose the connections on the inside. i've put my phone in the freezer right now and held a vice grip on the camera with a piece of cloth to prevent any further damage from the pressure, near the power button which makes loose contacts from the inside to connect to each other again and putting the phone in the cold place like freezer might help to reconnect loose ends. I'll reply what will happen after few hours.