iPhone 8/ 8 plus home button cracked

Hi There!

The same thing happened to my five month old iPhone 7 (which has the same ‘home button’ as the iPhone 7+, 8 and 8+) while charging for less than half an hour, unattended and untouched for that time. After removing it from the charger, a crack was there, and home button itself and Touch ID to not work.

This issue was resolved by taking the phone to the nearest Apple repairs, and them replacing the button for $169, as I did not have Apple Care, and it was classified as ‘accidental damage’.

The new button works the exact same as the original one, along with the Touch ID feature (contray to what many third party websites say).

I hope this helps!

I have the same problem I have had my phone for about 30 days and I went to bed it was fine I checked the time and then i went to sleep and I woke up I went to touch the home button it burned me and I looked and it had a crack on it and No one touched or anything so I don’t know why The home button was cracked and not working.

I’d think this isn’t necessarily common, but I don’t believe impossible from normal use. You need to apply some force, and if there’s a defect in the crystal it could break under normal use. The same thing could happen with screen glass, but of course the default is to assume that it was dropped.

The haptics could possibly be involved since it’s shaking the home button in place of a physical button with a bit of travel. I knew a professor who was a materials fatigue specialist. He was often consulted in court cases as an expert witness. He would look at broken materials (like a broken axle) to determine if they were damaged from fatigue or from a single impact.

I’d see if this can be escalated, since the blanket denials of warranty service isn’t acceptable.

Agree it’s not common relative to number of units sold, but this is absolutely an issue of product defect. When my home button cracked, my phone went into perpetual boot loop simultaneously. When I took it to the Genius Bar, the tech said the logic board was fried. There is no freaking way anyone can convince me the two issues aren’t related.

It takes a significant impact to do the kind of damage the pictures are showing. Yes, I know everyone has said that didn't happen. I don't believe that. Such an impact could also cause damage to the logic board, especially if any kind of moisture got in through the cracks.

same exact crack on my phone, continuous loop proceeded. it was never dropped or anything, i don't understand how if the material is so strong then how do i not have scratches on the rest of my phone? Apple needs to fix this problem and refund those who have had to pay already. With the amount of people having the same issue theres no way its just coincidence anymore

I too experienced this same issue. Right now I am in the process of getting my phone repaired by Apple for the same cost. There was no impact to the phone, a reset had begun, when reset finished there was a warning saying touch ID could was not working. Then I noticed a hair line crack on the home button..

reading "Level 9 (74,453 points)" doesn't leave any doubts following.. will follow.. sort of a loyal, local witness here, there, everywhere

Yes, I know everyone has said that didn't happen. I don't believe that

The fact that you don’t believe it doesn’t make it any less true. The funny thing about what you’re saying and what the rest of us are saying is that we were there and experienced it first hand, and you’re just an opinion.

My iPhone 8 was 10 days old and was treated like a newborn baby. There was absolutely no damage on the device...it had been placed in an otterbox as soon as it came out of the packaging, it was never dropped, for christ’s sake it had never even seen a drop of rain! No...the thing spontaneously cracked and went into boot loop. That’s the simple fact. I was there (you weren’t). I experienced it (you didn’t).

My last iPhone was a 6 s Plus. It fell off my treadmill one day and I stepped right on the home button area. Absolutely schmucked the thing. The screen cracked and fanned out all the way up the phone. It was so cracked that the glass around the home button actually became a bit sharp. The screen was a complete write off. Oh...except the home button, which came out totally unscathed.

So, while I realize you are a random internet expert like so many others, it’s apparent you need to give this some more thought. The home button is made out of sapphire glass, and is recessed in a device that in many cases has a protective case and/or screen protector on it. Short of someone dropping a heavy metal spike exactly on the home button, there is next to nothing in the way of an “incident” that would CRACK a home button and not also do damage to the screen/screen protector around it.

My daughter plugged her pristine, perfect 15 day old iphone 8 plus into the charger, set it on her night stand and woke up the next morning with a cracked home button. Two days out of warranty. Grrrrrrr.

If your iPhone home button not working or you have completely broken it, here is a complete guide on how to fix your unresponsive home button: https://www.howtoisolve.com/home-button-not-working-iphone-8-iphone-8-plus-not-v ibrating/

Do NOT accept anything less than a replacement phone! The Genius Bar needs to run diagnostics and it will be revealed that the logic board is toast. They also need to log the issue complete with a picture of the home button crack. The only way this can be identified as a known issue is for everyone having this issue to take it in and have the Genius bar log it. That will help others down the road who will also inevitably have this problem.

Hold Apple to account...they are in the wrong if they blame the user for a home button button crack where there is clearly no other damage present to the glass or glass protector around the button and the phone is in boot loop. No...it doesn’t sound plausible for a spontaneous crack to appear, but that’s what’s happening and while this may not yet be a “known issue”, it is happening to enough people that it’s a fault in the phone.

That's a nice assumption, but we simply don't know what's causing this as of yet.

Do please take your phone in so that the issue can be logged through Apple Stores as that's how engineering will find out that it is an ongoing issue.

Since this is a rather rare issue, it's not surprising that most Apple Stores have never heard of it.

Please note that it being rare in no way means that it's your fault, it's just that it isn't happening to most owners.

No. It shouldn't matter if we have applecare. We didn't cause the damage to these phones. The same exact thing just happened to my son's phone. He didn't drop it. The home button has a tiny crack that you can hardly see and it went into boot loop. I can't even turn it off and it's burning up. I hope this piece of garbage doesn't start a fire. This is a brand new phone and I don't even want them to repair it. I want a new phone because this one is a lemon!!!!!!

Same thing just happened to me this past week! I woke up in the morning to my phone working perfectly normal. It was still on the charger when I came back from the bathroom and suddenly it was cycling through boot mode... I ended up dong a manual reset on it and it seemed fine until I realized my home button wasn't working. I looked at the button which felt hot to the touch and - what do you know - a hairline crack had suddenly appeared. There was absolutely no pressure or forced applied to the phone during that time. It was on my bed and never even moved. So I end up taking it to the Apple store and they tell me it's going to be $29 to fix (even with AppleCare+) because it is considered physical damage and to replace the home button they would have to replace the entire screen. Kind of annoyed, but at this point I'm also just thankful it's not more expensive. Anyway, I was going to cave tomorrow and take it to get repaired. BUT this is when it gets even worse. Tonight after I got home from work my battery died. Upon putting it on the charger it started going through boot mode again! ***?! Only this time it wouldn't come out. It's hour 2 and my 3 month old iPhone 8 Plus is officially bricked. I am beyond furious. Not only was I going to pay for it be repaired, but if I had... it would have bricked itself anyway!? And then what? Total nightmare. I have read on here that people have paid hundreds of dollars with this same problem and their phones could potentially brick themselves soon like mine did? Unacceptable. I'm just lucky my phone bricked itself before I paid to repair. Apple needs to respond or fix this, it's bad enough they have been ignoring for this long.