How to Fix a Stuck or Broken Home Button on an iPhone

Home Button Not Working?

There are a number of different physical features that work in unison for the iPhone experience you know. The touchscreen is the main focus of the iPhone frame and where you put all central commands. The power button is up top and can reset things back to the base. Without the Home button, which is the circular button directly below the iPhone’s touchscreen, none of these things will be useful. As a physical part of the iPhone that you are in contact with quite a bit there can be a number of problems that you may encounter with the Home button. If your iPhone’s Home button begins having problems or becomes unresponsive there are a number of different things you can try.

Blockage

One very common situation is that there is a physical interference to the Home button being read. Irritants and dust can get into the connection port at the bottom of the iPhone and can cause a distraction from the proper purpose of the iPhone. You can try to repair this by taking a clean toothbrush and sticking the bristles into this port. Brush freely so that you can try to get anything that may be up there. Canned air or blowing into this port can also be useful. You may not be able to fix this on your own and instead an Apple Store employee may have to open it up to clean it.

Water

A lot of times you have to look back to what may have happened to it. If you got water anywhere on your iPhone that can likely be your issue. If you have tried most everything else and are convinced that this was water related you can try to dry it out. This can usually be done by just putting it in a warm and dry place and leaving it for quite a while. In extreme cases you can try wrapping it in a towel and baking it in an oven. Do not let the temperature go over 135 or 140 degrees and do this for a few hours. Make sure this is your last ditch effort.

Reset

There are always software solutions for this that include the normal reset functions of the iPhone. If this is the first time this has happened you should try to turn the iPhone off and on and see if this has an effect on the unresponsive iPhone. You can also try to restore it to its factory settings, and this is easily done right from your iTunes account. You can try the restore function at various levels from your settings themselves, but if you have consistent problems with the home button you are going to want to strip everything from your iPhone. If you do this you have to make sure to do a full iPhone back up ahead of time otherwise you may lose contacts, media, or applications.

Apple Store

In this situation Apple can actually be helpful, which is uncharacteristic. Usually a blockage or physical problem can be repaired and often it is a factory defect. Remember, if you are using a protective case this may be to blame for unresponsive iPhone Home buttons. If the solution is not dealt with by purely opening up the iPhone and cleaning it you may have to actually send it back, but if there are signs of physical trauma to the iPhone itself it will likely cancel out any protection over the device through the warranty. This is going to be especially true if there was any water damage.