iPhone 8 GPS problems

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https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-5952

Hi,

Yes I installed Non-Apple parts.

The strange thing with this GPS issue is that many people have been complaining about it since forever:

• "gps not working properly after iOS 9.3 update"
• "Wi-Fi and GPS not working after iOS 10.3 update"
• "GPS not working after update to IOS11"

What's different for you guys (and for "iPhone X GPS not working") is that you even encounter the problem with (supposedly) "brand new" replacemement iPhones.

What we all have in common is:

1. Our GPS is not working
2. Our iPhones have not been called back for meticulous scrutiny by a curious, surprised and inquiring engineering team.
3. To my knowledge the only known fix I have ever seen on "GPS not working" threads, apart from an exchange with another (if you're lucky functioning) iPhone is, at least on previous models where it's possible to do so, the replacement of the GPS and Wifi hardware for 15$.

PS: the GPS app is GPS Diagnostic, it will probably show you, as it did for me, that the GPS hardware is "installed" but will also display "No satellites".

Sigh, sometimes Apple Tech Support and even Geniuses can be useless.

One Tech Support individual on the phone did a remote test of my GPS and said it was fine even though I was deep indoors at home with no GPS reception at all! And she said my gyroscope seems to be working, so the GPS must be fine?!? As far as I know, the gyroscope assists GPS by adding altitude info etc. but its functionality doesn't prove the A-GPS chip is working. Also, the Genius at the store tested my phone using Apple Maps and claimed GPS was working until I explained that we were both in the basement of the store and showed the difference between a stationary circle (location based on Wifi/cell towers) and pulsating circles (GPS reception) - as explained to me by a GPS app developer. I also have serious doubts about what you were told at the Japanese store. i.e. that the Japanese iphone can't handle Verizon.

Using Verizon in the US requires CDMA ,as in the American A1865 model, which I guess is your current model...

(The American A1901 model doesn't have CDMA, hence the warning)

See here iPhone X - Technical Specifications - Apple (this says CDMA is needed for Verizon)

However, the Japanese iPhone A1902 appears to have the required CDMA specs:

• TD-SCDMA 1,900（F）、2,000（A）
• CDMA EV-DO Rev. A（800、1,900、2,100MHz）

iPhone X - 仕様 - Apple（日本） (I know it is in Japanese but just scroll down to the stuff with CDMA)

If the Store is refusing on technical grounds they are likely to be wrong or just giving you B/S.

(they are right about the permanent shutter noise though. It was introduced because Japan has so many perverts https://www.iphonetricks.org/til-you-cant-silence-camera-shutter-sound-on-japane se-iphone-models/)

Having said all this, don't waste any more of your vacation. It ***** you had to pay $120 for a temporary replacement.

And it ***** that they employ people who give us misleading information.

(wow, they even censor the word " s-u-c-k-s". Are we Quakers now?)

Just went out a few miles drive to test the replacement phone. Drove over a mile with the phone not on the magnetic mount and it worked perfectly on waze and apple maps. On the way back i put it on the magnetic mount and low and behold waze had red No GPS error and apple maps location was way off and wouldnt right itself. I dont think new phones are supposed to be bothered my magnets but thats seems to be the case for me. I know that some people on this thread have it happening when walking or on a non magnetic mount and i hope you find a solution but for others out there using these mounts, try taking it off. Im gonna buy a cradle mount, too much hassle to get phone replaced so im taking the easy option.

While indoors, the gps satellites can not be accessed

That's an invalid generalization. Depends on many factors, such as building materials and surrounding environment. For me, it was upstairs in a 2-storey house in a suburban setting, where I typically get a weak but usable signal from several satellites. Here's a screenshot from a GPS diagnostic app in the same place this morning to illustrate.

Whether it's diagnostically relevant is hard to say as there are so many other factors - base-station triangulation, Wi-Fi-based estimation, etc. but I can say some things for sure:

- it initially had my location quite accurately, whichever way it obtained it

- it drifted slowly but steadily to a point 200m away

- I have been using location-based apps in the same location indoors for years on iPhone 6 and have *never* seen a drift anywhere close to this magnitude

So whether the difference is in the GPS hardware, different weighting of the various location mechanisms (due to software, hardware, relative quality of antennas or other reasons), differences in power saving policies, Galileo support on the new phone doing something hinky, or none of the above I can't say, but I mentioned it in case it might point someone in the right direction.

I’m having the same problem with my iPhone X. GPS doesn’t keep up and drifts, making it unusable. Contacted phone support who scheduled a Genius Bar appointment for me. They swapped the phone but I’m having the same issue with the new phone too.

On the ride home tonight Waze had me miles from where I was as a floating blue dot. When I stopped in my driveway it finally routed me home. It was going to be a 4.8 mile drive. Glad I had some idea where I was. This is obviously the worst it’s been but it daily has a hard time staring the drive home from the city

I had same issue on my IPhone X, even the replacement set also started showing similar issue , so for the first time I just didn’t have urge to continue using an Apple product after paying so much for it. I returned the phone back and back to my IPhone 6 .

I really hope Apple finds a fix for the same .

I just hope it’s not a hardware issue and a s/w update would fix it, but then again not sure how I don’t see any gps issues on my iPhone 6 !

Few screenshot I took, before I handed over the phone back to Apple.

I have been experiencing the same probkem

Since i bought an iphone 8. Never had any issues before with my iphone 6.

Have looked through many forums until i tried the following and finally i think i might have something that works.

1. I downloaded and installed GPSDIAGNOSTIC. this app showed me that my phone was not connecting to any satelitte. Everything else seemed fine. ( in Waze, google maps and in apple maps i could bever get accurate gps lications for where i was, especially when moving in a car).

2. I then found a suggestion on waze to resetmy networks (which i had tried many times before) and then to do a hard reset (which for an apple 8 is to press on plus volume switch, minus volume switch and then power switch in that order so that they are all pressed at the same time at the end. You then hold until you see the apple sign or the emergency countdown and then close the phone’s power). Lo and behold when i rebooted there were the satelitte bars in GPSsatelitte and my position was now accurate on all 3 map devices.

3. But when i opened waze the satelitte bars suddenly disappeared. So i rebooted again and the bars were back. So my conclusion is that there is some bug beteeen Waze and apple 8’s ability to capture satelitte signals.

I am in day 2 of my experiment. My plsn is to not use Waze for a couple of days and to see what happens. Is there are no further problems when not opening waze then the evidence will suggest that, at least in my case, the problem is with Waze.

Is anyone else able to replicate these results? Here is the link to the waze advice page:

According to GPS Diagnostic my satellite quality is pretty bad. The accuracy is even worse in reality than this app suggests. In fact, all my other mapping apps give consistently worse accuracies than GPS Diagnostic.

I also recorded a short route to demonstrate how bad the situation is. On green line is the route that gps tracked and on red line the route that I actually walked.

Speaking of logs, my phone is constantly spewing about 20 of these a second - wonder if it's related:

default 21:26:40.021566 +0100 locationd #Warning Tried injecting when not running

Not just me either (mind you this post is about iPhone 7 on iOS 11)... iOS 11 locationd spewing errors

I'm having the same problem with the same car.

I actually swapped out my original X after troubleshooting quite a bit with Apple. Also thought it was my magnetic dash mount (connected to the CD slot), but replaced that with no luck. Today started searching the forums again and came across this post where another person mentioned the '13 Sonata and iPhone X GPS issue:

Re: Why is my GPS not working on iPhone X?

As you can see, that person was able to find some success mounting it to the left side of the dash. Not a great solution, but some evidence that something around the center console must be causing interference. I'm going to play around a bit this week. Discouraging, but at least I'm not crazy?

I reached out to some tech websites a couple of weeks ago as well. That, in addition to making logs with Apple Feedback - iPhone - Apple

Developers can also submit a bug log.

This is all getting pretty old and it's pretty ridiculous Apple doesn't acknowledge an issue. It's sad, but I think I'm hanging onto hope for my X just because I have my business 6S with me if I get in a GPS hole and need good accuracy the X can't give me in a required moment.

Maybe I need to take Apple's advice and trade in my Sonata 😟 Yeah right

Finalizer wrote:

Glad it worked for you.

Unfortunately, for many people here, the problem exists even when you are a pedestrian.

So apps like Uber, Google Maps, CityMapper etc don't work.

I also spoke with a senior before Xmas and I am waiting for follow-up up. Will keep you posted.

I tried everything possible, i even went ahead and bought a new wifi/GPS antina as a replacement 😢.

The beta program was my last try, if this was not worked i would have changed the antina 😝.

Just try your luck with the public beta program and enroll your device 🙂, Hope it will work for you too! .

The below given links will be useful.

https://beta.apple.com/sp/betaprogram/guide#ios

https://beta.apple.com/sp/betaprogram/redemption#ios

Best Regards,

Jithesh

I just sent Apple support this other thread about GPS problems started by someone with an iPhone 6 and a 5s.

GPS not working after update to IOS11

Thread active every day since 14 weeks.

1786 people clicked on "I have this question too".

Not much of an isolated problem indeed.