What To Do if your iPhone is Stuck on the Apple logo

If your iPhone is stuck on the Apple logo, you have likely just performed a software update or your phone has just crashed. It has partially rebooted and got stuck. You see a black screen with the Apple logo in the center but there’s where it ends right?

This happens fairly often apparently and there are four main ways you can fix it. The first technique needs nothing aside from your phone, the others require a computer, USB cable and iTunes while the last requires a trip to see a Genius.

Hardware problems can also cause your iPhone to get stuck on the Apple logo. You should still perform these basic steps first just to make sure it isn’t a simple software or firmware issue.

Before trying to fix an issue, it is always useful to understand why it happened in the first place. What changed recently? Did you perform any updates? Add a new app? Remove or change an existing app? Make any changes at all to your phone? If you did, it is possible that change that is causing the problem. If you didn’t make any changes, it is more likely something within the phone firmware or hardware.

Was the iPhone connected to your Mac or PC while rebooting? This is a known weak spot in updates where iTunes instructs a reboot during an update, the computer sees a cable disconnect and turns off the cable, the phone reboots, computer sees a new device and wants to either scan it or check it before allowing a connection. This can cause the phone to freeze during the implementation of the update.

Fix iPhone stuck on the Apple logo

The iPhone and iOS in general is a very stable system that work well together.
Nothing is perfect though so there are times when the hardware or the software doesn’t play ball. This is one of those times. Fortunately, seeing your iPhone stuck on the Apple logo is very rarely terminal.

Reboot your iPhone

If the phone has been stuck on the Apple logo screen for a few minutes with no change, force a reboot. Hold down the Home and Sleep/Wake button for iPhone 6 or power button and volume down for iPhone 7 for a few seconds until the phone switches off. Leave it a few more seconds and then hold the Sleep/Wake button down again to boot it up.

If you’re lucky, your iPhone will boot normally and you can begin using it as normal. If you’re not so lucky, try the next step.

Force the iPhone into Recovery Mode

Recovery Mode is more useful, especially if iTunes was performing an iPhone update at the time. As mentioned above, if you had your phone connected to your computer via a cable, this can cause a pause and then a corruption with the update. This is a very common cause of an iPhone getting stuck on the Apple logo.

1. Connect your iPhone to your computer via a cable.
2. Turn off any antivirus or security apps that scan USB for changes.
3. Open iTunes and wait for it to recognize your iPhone.
4. Press and hold the Sleep/Wake and volume down button on an iPhone 7 or Sleep/Wake and Home button for iPhone 6 until you see an alert message.
5. Select Update in iTunes.

This will cause iTunes to reload iOS. This should not mess with any of your data, contacts or files.

If reloading the OS doesn’t work, you next have to try a default firmware update.

DFU to fix iPhone stuck on the Apple logo

A DFU is a Default Firmware Update and is not something to be done lightly. If you got this far, DFU is the next logical step.

1. Connect your iPhone to your computer via a cable.
2. Turn off any antivirus or security apps that scans USB ports.
3. Open iTunes and wait for it to recognize your iPhone.
4. Press and hold the Sleep/Wake button and volume down (iPhone 7) for 8 seconds. Use Sleep/Wake button and Home button for iPhone 6.
5. Release the Sleep/Wake button but keep holding volume down or Home button. You should see an iTunes message that says ‘iTunes has detected an iPhone in recovery mode’.
6. Release the Sleep/Wake button.
7. Allow iTunes to restore the phone.

If there is nothing wrong with the hardware, this should have the iPhone booting properly again. If the DFU restore was successful, the phone should reboot on its own into iOS and you can begin using it again as normal.

If none of these methods work to get your iPhone past the Apple logo I’m afraid it’s time to visit your nearest Apple Store!