iPhone 7 Plus Phone Call Sound Quality

Hi Andrew,

So - the "solution" with the phone having to be set-up as new is not a very convenient one - exactly for the hassle of redownloading of apps, settings, missing the messages. But it does show, that this is definitely a software bug.

I have been doing back-ups since the iPhone 4 through 5S, 6 Plus, 6S and now 7 for the last few years. I remember an incredibly irritating battery bug in iOS 4 or 5, when my iPhone 4 would have battery depleted overnight by 80% (the "in use" and "standby" times were the same). Since then I needed to set up the phone as new and then used this backup for later phones. Another battery bug at around 5S made me set-up yet another "new phone", and this back-up I've been using until now I think.

There is one other thing - if you set up from iCloud back-up, it is not really a full copy of the phone. To make a 1-1 copy including passwords you need to use iTunes. Then even all app data, downloads ect ect is restored.... along with potential bugs. But there might also be bugs in the iCloud backups as well 🙂

Either way - please do some testing - I'm curious if your issue will be finally resolved.

From what I remember from people in this thread, some have set-up the phones as new - and their problems were still there....

Apple Support had me set up my 7+ as a new phone on more than one occasion with no improvement in call quality. Pip129 I agree with you what is the point of having a backup and restore process that causes issues if you restore a backup to a different model IPhone. After all, I thought one function of the restore process is to facilitate restoring your old Iphone to a newer model when you upgrade. In my opinion not being able restore makes a mockery of ICloud.

I'll test with some real calls tomorrow and report on how well the other people hear me. I've been forced to use headphones to make calls until now. I agree it's far from an ideal solution! The biggest pain is reinstalling and setting up all the apps as I use computer generated 20 character random passwords which are different for all accounts! Oh, well at least I can make phone calls again!

Both iPhone 7 my first and replacement were updated with a back up done through iTunes and not the cloud.

So I have setup my second phone as a "new" iPhone and the problem was surprisingly still there. I have on the third phone setup as a new iphone, disabled the hearing aid thing and noise cancellation, reset network settings, new SIM card, numerous resets, tried data only, no case or screen protector, tried wifi only calling and nothing has worked, and a new Apple ID. Verizon even disabled my LTE and it was the same issue. Also did connected diagnostics with Apple and the guy couldn't hear me but said the phone is working. Now Verizon has me marking my calls by dialing #832 after every call I get. At this point I don't even want a iPhone anymore I want to go back to android since I can't use my phone to talk to anyone.

Oh man..... hiyat - it seems you tried everything..

Now I'm thinking that some of us here on this forum might be the "unlucky" ones to get and keep getting faulty units. Apart from the possible software problems with noise cancellation, there might be batches of phones which e.g. have 1 of the 4 microphones out of order - and if the phone switches to one of them, the audio cannot be heard on the other end of the line. If you have this bad call quality all the time, it would be probably a mixed hardware/software issue.

In my case - the bad quality is occassional and appears randomly, which would suggest a software problem I think.

I have and that's what's so frustrating. Now my wife has the 6s plus and can make a phone call sitting in the same spot and no problem what's so ever. So I don't see how it could be Verizon's issue either the 6s plus works fine and the 7 sounds muffled, distant and sometimes only hear every other word.

At least now your wife has a phone with a headphone jack 🙂 ///

I think that maybe the carrier settings make the phone exhibit the issue with voice transmission - this could very well be related to only the new model. So a fault of both the producer and the carrier, who have some incompatibility?

It has to be both Verizon and Apple. I know I should have kept my 6s plus.

Ok I have a thought - I will make a test using a different sim-card from another carrier (now I am using Orange - Poland). It's curious if the problem would still be persisting.

I've tried that with my second and third replacement iPhones they came directly from Verizon with brand-new SIM cards.

So I'm on replacement phone number two and have an appointment to swap it out again on Thursday. I have the iPhone 7+ on Verizon. EVERY phone call I'm being told I sound like "a robotic voice breaking up underwater in a tunnel" which is the same problem the last one had.

My boyfriend also on Verizon also on an iPhone 7+ has NOT had this issue AT ALL with his. So clearly it's not Verizon and it's not all of the 7's.

I've been watching this forum since I had the issue on the first phone and I've noticed that there's people complaining from Verizon, TMobile, AT&T, and some European carriers.

I've noticed that some people have gone through several replacements and eventually got a working one. I've also noticed people that are on over 5 replacements and still having the problem.

I've tried turning off voice on LTE (which I shouldn't have to do anyway because that's how you get voice and data at the same time LIKE NAVIGATION).... and STILL the problem persists. So it's NOT that either (and noticed others reporting that too).

So yeah. How many replacements do I go through before I try to get a refund and either downgrade to a 6S+ or give up all together and join the evil Android train on the Pixel? Because it's getting really annoying.

Friday my cat passed away and while I was at the ER vet Thursday night trying to call a family member and debate what to do on the CPR or DNR form - THEY COULDNT HEAR ME because of the breaking up robot voice (they ended up just driving down). But come on. I don't have a landline what if I have to call 911!?!?!?!?! I'm sure most of us don't have any other phone than our cell phone (statistics back this up actually).

This is just unacceptable and it's VERY CLEARLY an issue with the iPhone 7 itself (or a microphone in it that's broken?)

Apple.... how you handle this is going to influence your customers. I am holding off getting a new MacBook Pro because of this. But you know what speaks volumes to customers? Admitting mistakes and rectifying them in a timely manner. Even if you do it silently. Just get some info together on the bad batches and good batches and get people a working replacement! I am dreading having to go through several replacements to find one that's not a lemon (like many people on these forums are experiencing).

I have contributed and been following this post for a while, I am on AT&T and have done the sim card replacement, with no changes to the audio quality on the distant end. back to an apple issue in my opinion....

thank you all for the posts. i just got my replacement iphone 7+, people hear me less than the one it just replaced.

it's a 7+, 128gb, on at&t. the earpiece on my 6 was dying, so i figured i'd upgrade. really regretting this.

traveling soon, so looks like i'll fix the 6 and return the 7+.

getting 4 or 5 replacements seems just silly. i'm ****** because the extra camera really is a great thing. smh...

Take your iPhone out of the leather case, and try to make a call again.