iPhone 7 Plus Phone Call Sound Quality

Possible solution:

I just purchased 3 new iPhone 7's about 4 days ago. My wife and I just upgraded from our aging 4S's, my daughter from her iP6. Immediately my wife and I noticed muffled sound, and periodically when talking on the phone, I experience some of the issues noted in this thread: most notably the issue where it sounds as if I'm on speakerphone when in fact I'm not, and it is difficult to hear the caller. My wife and daughter have not had this issue, however a friend of mine also just got an i7+, and has complained about exactly the same thing.

First of all, there are 2 issues being discussed on this same thread: one is the sound you hear when talking on your i7, the other is the sound the person on the other end hears. I am ONLY referring to the sound I hear, as so far I have had no complaints about the latter.

Anyway, I went into Settings> General> Accessibility> Hearing, then selected "Mono Audio", and De-selected "Phone Noise Cancellation". Time will tell, but so far this seems to have made a significant improvement. Fingers crossed...

If anyone else tries this, and it fixes their problem, please post results.

I complained to Verizon in NY about the poor phone quality and lack of reception of DTMS signals. They checked out their network with my phone and concluded it was hardware. I was told to get a new phone. Apple checked it out and said phone was fine - even though MOST of the people I speak with complain. I convinced them to give me a replacement phone - it is still terrible! Now I am reading I won't be able to get a new phone from Verizon because of the s/n change. This is without question a hardware issue! This is the second Apple h/w issue I have had with Apple products they won't own up to. I think this time we "old" users start to use other products! AppleCare can't figure anything out- the fact is the iPhone 7 plus is first A PHONE and it is failing that task miserably

Very interesting, I'm with Virgin and thought it was the network (had 6s) 1 month ago got 7plus and no one can hear me properly. Had one guy hang up when it was a business call. £800 phone that can't make voice calls. Ridiculous

Not really. I am not having problems on every call - maybe around 50% of them. I returned to my cellular provider (Rogers in Canada), and he changed out my SIM card, and made a few other changes, but I am still experiencing the echo effect, and the sound as though it's on speakerphone. Haven't had anyone complain of me dropping off yet. The guy at Rogers told me if that didn't fix the problem, then exchanging the phone would be the next step. I will likely go that route.

This is a continuation of my Apple iPhone 7+ saga. I was told by many people, AFTER getting my replacement iPhone 7 plus from Apple, that the quality of my calls has not improved. I called up AppleCare (again) and was told that since the original phone actually passed all their tests they would not be giving me a third phone but would want to investigate the situation in depth. How they were to do this has NOT been answered BECAUSE THIS IS MY TIME THEY ARE PLAYING WITH! They want me to back up the phone, wipe it out and then try it again to ensure there is no app on the phone causing the problem. The senior support person was definitely friendly BUT he completely ignored the fact that there are MANY complaints about this problem on the forums. I don't have time to fiddle around spinning my wheels. There is OBVIOUSLY a problem which they don't want to own up to. The fact some people don't have the problem, they say, indicates it really isn't hardware. BUT the problem occurs with the other end of the call. The NON-OWNER of the phone is having the problem. The owner, ME, doesn't hear the problem. So how many owners aren't calling because they are completely unaware of the problem? I am angry! I spent $800+ for a phone that doesn't do what a phone is supposed to do! I don't just want another phone! I want the phone to make calls.

To answer questions raised by others - NO, THE SITUATION HAS NOT IMPROVED!!!! The phone stinks. STINKS!

Interesting point you bring up that it's the NON-PHONE owner who is actually having the problem. I wonder if any curious Apple techs would find better success by approaching it from that end?? It certainly is a perplexing phenomenon and one that is enormously frustrating to those in the unfortunate position of having to deal with it. Please let us know if you come across anything that looks promising towards a resolution.

Hello, I also have issues with my iPhone7. Previously I had no problems at all calling with my iPhone6, but with this phone people keep on telling me that they can't hear me or that my voice disappears. Initially I thought it was the head set, but I'm hearing it so often now while using the phone without a head set, that I'm getting annoyed about it. I've already turned off noise reduction and took the case off, but it's still a problem. Tomorrow I'm going to visit a Genius Bar here, in the Netherlands. Hopefully they can help, because after using iPhone7 for 4,5 months, I really regret buying this phone.

Hmm, that doesn't sound very promising.. Hope Apple will take these complaints seriously - even though the phone is beautiful I still need to use the old-fashioned function of calling quite often. Will update on what guys at Genius Bar will say tomorrow.

The employee at the Apple Store told me to wait for the big iOS software update coming in June. He had been testing the beta version of it and that had solved this problem with his own iPhone7, he said. All hardware checks were good.

Gert, that's the best news I've heard so far!!

Do you know what firmware version he was using? And they didn't replace yours? As I told you before I got a replacement model with the same problem and I've had this issue for months :-(.

Sorry, I don't know. He said that the problems are well known and that they are working on them. That is, the big software update that's coming in June, is being tested now. If not, he asked me to come back after the update.

I will only say I am VERY skeptical. Yes, I would be very happy if it were true, but again, I am very skeptical. The issue has not been corrected I do not have the time to backup the phone, wipe it out and then bring all my apps back one at a time, testing each one to see if the problem reoccurs. I find it very interesting NO Apple employee, has jumped in to deny this is a h/w problem. L

I had the same problem too, and drove me crazy till...

In a problematic call I've made some experiment and maybe I've found the issue:

Removing the iPhone from the cover (a very lightweight transparent rubber cover) the voice became perfect!

After remounting the cover the issue came back! I've done the test more times and every time: voice clean without cover / voice bad with cover.

The cover have holes in front of mic and speaker but maybe enveloping the iPhone change in some way the resonance of the case, making the sound worse.

I hope could help.

Taro-71 wrote:

I had the same problem too, and drove me crazy till...

In a problematic call I've made some experiment and maybe I've found the issue:

Removing the iPhone from the cover (a very lightweight transparent rubber cover) the voice became perfect!

After remounting the cover the issue came back! I've done the test more times and every time: voice clean without cover / voice bad with cover.

The cover have holes in front of mic and speaker but maybe enveloping the iPhone change in some way the resonance of the case, making the sound worse.

There is an addition mic on the back of the phone, near the camera. This is used for noise cancellation. If it is covered you will have a problem with sound quality. You can try turning off noise cancellation when the cover is on the phone: Settings/General/Accessibility - scroll down to Phone Noise Cancellation.

Mine cover is open also there.

I've also tried to deactivate the Phone Noise Cancellation before but only a little improvement was the result.

Removing the cover instead changed everything also reactivating the noise cancellation.

On my iPhone 7 Plus it's like that the "skin" cover make the mic become dull like the phone is in a box.

Maybe because the cover is removing the vibration of the phone shell itself.

Really strange but believe it or not, it works every time :O