The control panel on your iPhone is full of useful shortcuts. Is the control panel of your iPhone not responding? With these five solutions you can solve the problem.
IPhone control panel not responding? That’s how you solve it
With the control panel you can quickly open the camera, timer, calculator or flashlight, for example. You can also quickly pause or skip your music from here and quickly turn your WiFi, Bluetooth or data connection on or off.
On an iPhone 8 (or older), you open the panel by swiping up from the bottom. On the iPhone X, you can find the menu by swiping down from the top right corner. It may happen that your control panel does not respond and therefore no longer opens. There are several steps and solutions to make the menu work again.
1. Restart your iPhone
A minor flaw in the software may cause the menu not to respond. To get this out of the way, restarting your iPhone is often enough.
You do this by switching the iPhone off with the lock button and then turning it on again. This works slightly differently on the iPhone X.
→ Switch off the iPhone X and restart it in 4 steps
2. Clean your screen
Due to moisture, dirt or dust on your iPhone screen, your smartphone sometimes does not respond, or opens things that you actually did not select. So clean your screen well, for example with a microfibre cloth.
3. Using the control panel in apps
Does the panel open from your home screen, but not when you are in an app? Then the problem can be solved by adjusting your settings.
To do this, open Settings and go to ‘Control panel’. Here, check the option ‘Access from apps’ so that it is green. In this menu you can also set up and edit your control panel via the option ‘Adjust controls’.
4. Turn off VoiceOver
When you use VoiceOver, the control panel doesn’t always work well. VoiceOver is a function that, for example, helps visually impaired people use an iPhone. It reads out pieces of text that you select.
To open Control Center when using VoiceOver, use three fingers to swipe it open. If the panel still doesn’t respond, turn off VoiceOver. You always have to double tap where you want to go. To do this, go to ‘General’ in the Settings app and then to ‘Accessibility’. In the ‘VoiceOver’ menu you can toggle the switch for this.
5. Cover off
A smartphone cover or screen protector can in some cases reduce the response of the touchscreen. Have you tried everything, but the control panel still won’t open?
Remove your iPhone from the case and possibly also from the screen protector. After this, try to open the control panel again. If it does work, it is useful to use a different case or brand of screen protector.
Broken screen sign
If nothing works and your control panel does not appear, a malfunction of your screen could be the cause. To fix this, the screen must be replaced. Always check with Apple itself if there is still a warranty on your device, and have it repaired. Or repair your iPhone yourself, if it concerns a device that is out of warranty.
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