8 bugs that make me want to switch to Android

[MacProFCP]

Before everyone tells me it's Verizon or my phone hardware, please note that every one of these problems began with iOS 17 and some with iOS 17 "updates". NONE of these issues occurred previously on my 13 Pro. Also, the phone was sent to Apple for a new battery. It was given a clean bill of health back in November, after the iOS update.

1. When opening the Phone app after it's been closed, my voicemails disappear and can take several seconds to reappear.

2. New voicemails often come late, sometimes hours late.

3. Mail "All Inboxes" can take up to 10 seconds to propagate, even when repeating the procedure (swipe left, then select "All Inboxes").

4. While e-mail notifications come through fairly quickly, downloading the message can take 20 - 30 seconds or more with attachments.

5. E-mail message previews show up right away but selecting that message now takes time to load.

6. Declining calls is impossible without unlocking the phone. Hitting the Power Button twice, worked fine in iOS 16, now only silences the ringer. While wearing a headset, it keeps ringing in my ear and I have accidentally answered calls when I grab my phone to perform another task.
*Edit: This was a setting change (Thanks ManuCH) however why Apple set this to default is beyond me.

7. Though this occurs rarely and randomly, I'll loose service for no reason. I can be at my desk and suddenly have no service. Two iPhones next to each other, one has full service and one has none.

8. Siri. I...hate...Siri. Why oh why did Siri loose what little functionality it had in iOS 16. It's calling the wrong people, giving me useless information and is activating at the wrong times. If my hands weren't always tied up with work, I'd probably just turn it off. It typically takes me 3+ attempts to get Siri to get it right.

Again, every one of these issues began with the iOS 17 update and have continued, and, in some cases, worsened, since the release.

Yes, I reset the network settings... several times. Yes, I'm sure that many of you don't have these problems, yet I can't understand why iOS and Mac Sonoma are so...terribly...bad. Sonoma may get its own post but the phone bugs are really... bugging me.

Rant, over. Period.

 

[icanhazmac]

#2 - Used to drive me insane and is the only one I experience with any regularity, although lately (past year or so) it has been much better, go figure.

#4 - Happens on rare occasion.

I never thought to chalk either of these up to iOS, I usually blame Verizon Wireless for everything.

All that said... I'd go back to a flip phone before going Android.

 

[Bigwaff]

Enjoy Android and its zero day exploits. Interested to hear how long it takes for security patches to be made available.

 

[Rich B22]

Before everyone tells me it's Verizon or my phone hardware, please note that every one of these problems began with iOS 17 and some with iOS 17 "updates". NONE of these issues occurred previously on my 13 Pro. Also, the phone was sent to Apple for a new battery. It was given a clean bill of health back in November, after the iOS update.

1. When opening the Phone app after it's been closed, my voicemails disappear and can take several seconds to reappear.

2. New voicemails often come late, sometimes hours late.

3. Mail "All Inboxes" can take up to 10 seconds to propagate, even when repeating the procedure (swipe left, then select "All Inboxes").

4. While e-mail notifications come through fairly quickly, downloading the message can take 20 - 30 seconds or more with attachments.

5. E-mail message previews show up right away but selecting that message now takes time to load.

6. Declining calls is impossible without unlocking the phone. Hitting the Power Button twice, worked fine in iOS 16, now only silences the ringer. While wearing a headset, it keeps ringing in my ear and I have accidentally answered calls when I grab my phone to perform another task.

7. Though this occurs rarely and randomly, I'll loose service for no reason. I can be at my desk and suddenly have no service. Two iPhones next to each other, one has full service and one has none.

8. Siri. I...hate...Siri. Why oh why did Siri loose what little functionality it had in iOS 16. It's calling the wrong people, giving me useless information and is activating at the wrong times. If my hands weren't always tied up with work, I'd probably just turn it off. It typically takes me 3+ attempts to get Siri to get it right.

Again, every one of these issues began with the iOS 17 update and have continued, and, in some cases, worsened, since the release.

Yes, I reset the network settings... several times. Yes, I'm sure that many of you don't have these problems, yet I can't understand why iOS and Mac Sonoma are so...terribly...bad. Sonoma may get its own post but the phone bugs are really... bugging me.

Rant, over. Period.

I wish I could help you find an answer to your issues, but I cannot. The only thing I would suggest is the nuclear option. If you have a backup, do a hard reset on the phone, restore and hopefully it will work. No guarantees though.
Regarding switching to Android, I was in the same boat a number of years ago when I had an iPhone 6. It fell victim to the touch-screen malady and became an incompetent paper weight. Even naively wrote to Tim Cook in hopes that if enough people did, Apple would do the right thing and offer solutions as they have done with other issues. Never heard back, not that I expected to and nothing ever came of the class-action suit, so I said I'll never buy another thing from that piece of crap company and went to Android.
After about a year, I had to swallow my pride and come back as I found Android an incomplete OS. Some things worked, others didn't. The ecosystem sucked and you had to buy competent apps to do anything. That's not even addressing the security issues.
Apple is no longer the "it just works" company it was when I bought my first Mac in 2007, however, at least it's not the "it just doesn't work" as some of it's competitors are IMO.

 

[I7guy]

For what it's worth I tried issues 1-6 and they all worked as expected on 17.4. I was listening through my airpods for the phone calls. Pressing the power button twice sent the call to VM and freed up the phone. Emails loaded (mostly) instantly. Of course, dependent on network connection. Voice mails came through immediately. In the past I have had delays, but I blamed that on Verizon.

 

[MacProFCP]

I’ve had Verizon for years and these issues all came up, literally overnight, with iOS 17 adoption.

 

[ManuCH]

Regarding #6 (declining calls by pressing the power button twice), that's a setting.

Go to Settings -> Accessibility -> Touch, and turn off "Prevent lock to end call". If it's already off, turn it on, then off again.

 

[MacProFCP]

Regarding #6 (declining calls by pressing the power button twice), that's a setting.

Go to Settings -> Accessibility -> Touch, and turn off "Prevent lock to end call". If it's already off, turn it on, then off again.

Thanks! I’ll try that

 

[ManuCH]

Some more, about #1 and #2 (the voicemail bugs): have you tried enabling this?
Settings -> Phone -> Live Voicemail
It's the new iOS 17 voicemail that supposedly works quite a bit better than the one integrated in your carrier system.

Then, #3, #4 and #5 (the email issues): may I ask what you are using as your email provider? Are you seeing these issues with iCloud emails, or some others like Hotmail, Gmail, etc?

For #7 (no reception), could you maybe ask Verizon for a new eSIM profile, or try to "reset the account" on their side? Sometimes this can fix some issues.

 

[MacProFCP]

Some more, about #1 and #2 (the voicemail bugs): have you tried enabling this?
Settings -> Phone -> Live Voicemail
It's the new iOS 17 voicemail that supposedly works quite a bit better than the one integrated in your carrier system.

Then, #3, #4 and #5 (the email issues): may I ask what you are using as your email provider? Are you seeing these issues with iCloud emails, or some others like Hotmail, Gmail, etc?

For #7 (no reception), could you maybe ask Verizon for a new eSIM profile, or try to "reset the account" on their side? Sometimes this can fix some issues.

1. The live voicemail feature was creating a bunch more issues. I turned it off. I'll try it again.

2. I have several e-mails and use both Google and Microsoft. Problems are with both.

3. I have a business account with Verizon. They did extensive testing and found no issue with the network. Again, two phones next to each other, one goes down the other is fine.

Lastly, ALL of these issues started with iOS 17.

 

[MacProFCP]

Regarding #6 (declining calls by pressing the power button twice), that's a setting.

Go to Settings -> Accessibility -> Touch, and turn off "Prevent lock to end call". If it's already off, turn it on, then off again.

this worked. thanks!

 

[ManuCH]

1. The live voicemail feature was creating a bunch more issues. I turned it off. I'll try it again.

2. I have several e-mails and use both Google and Microsoft. Problems are with both.

3. I have a business account with Verizon. They did extensive testing and found no issue with the network. Again, two phones next to each other, one goes down the other is fine.

Lastly, ALL of these issues started with iOS 17.

1. Yes, give it a try, I've seen that working fairly well

2. that's really interesting. I have my email account with Fastmail and it's super fast (hence the name I guess 😂). I would need to run some tests with Google and Microsoft. I don't have a solution for that one

3. as you have a business account with Verizon, is there some person from their support who can troubleshoot this? Did they experience that with other customers? You're not the only one with a 13PM on iOS 17. Just to exclude a coincidental hardware issue that happened when you upgraded to iOS 17, or something like that. I would pester them a bit.

this worked. thanks!

I'm glad it did!

 

[MacProFCP]

3. as you have a business account with Verizon, is there some person from their support who can troubleshoot this? Did they experience that with other customers? You're not the only one with a 13PM on iOS 17. Just to exclude a coincidental hardware issue that happened when you upgraded to iOS 17, or something like that. I would pester them a bit.

We had some issues and my rep looked into it. I wasn't satisfied and e-mailed the executives. That caused a storm for the local team who had their engineers review everything in our area and conduct extensive testing. Their network came back clean.

 

[icanhazmac]

Lastly, ALL of these issues started with iOS 17.

Not at all discounting your experience but mine is almost exactly the opposite. I have had far better response times for VM notifications lately but I cannot pinpoint when exactly it got better. It was one of those things that just stopped happening. From a hardware standpoint I have changed a bit lately as well, maybe 2 years ago I dumped my 8 for a SE and then late last year got a 15pro. I cannot say that I have received a late VM notification since the 15pro, I am very sure I had hours late notifications on my 8 but cannot remember with the SE.

 

[ManuCH]

We had some issues and my rep looked into it. I wasn't satisfied and e-mailed the executives. That caused a storm for the local team who had their engineers review everything in our area and conduct extensive testing. Their network came back clean.

It's good they did at least that! What I meant is that they could run some sort of "trace" on your line, and come back with an answer on what causes your loss of signal when it happens.

Usually mobile carriers can do that on business customers, and then tell you if your iPhone is broken, or what else might be going on. In the end, it's about solving the issue, and I don't believe that just living with the fact that iOS 17 causes your 13PM to behave that way is acceptable.

 

[MacProFCP]

I have been an Apple customer for over 20 years and an Apple user for much longer.

I am frustrated to no end by the bug infestation and, more importantly, apathy from Apple. I use my phone for business and these things literally costs me money. Missed voicemails is missed jobs and missed jobs is lots money.

I am trying desperately to get these things fixed but....

 

[ManuCH]

I absolutely get the frustration.

At your place, for the things that are still wrong, I'd do the following:

• Email: use Spark email app instead of the built-in one. Or, as you use Microsoft and Gmail, use Outlook and the Gmail app. All that surely works better.
• Reception issues: keep pestering Apple and Verizon until they offer and end-to-end solution that works. If it doesn't work, sell the iPhone and buy a new model. Or switch to Android if you're too frustrated.

In the end, one needs to draw the line. I am happy with my Apple products (even though not without some frustrations), but I totally see why someone wants to try Android at some point.

 

[iphonefreak450]

Smart move. Thinking doing the same.

Apple is a fashion company more so than a tech company. Lack of innovation, bugs in the software, no major design changes each year it’s always been the same.

Samsung on the other hand, has always been up to their game as far as technology is concerned. And with their KNOX security system, it’s even more secure than an iPhone.

 

[one more]

And with their KNOX security system, it’s even more secure than an iPhone.

KNOX is a business-only platform, however, no?

 

[MacProFCP]

I am going to try a different solution: I purchased an iPhone 14 Pro with iOS 16 installed. Hopefully that will work as I rarely, if ever, experienced these problems before the upgrade. I’ll let you know how it turns out.

 

[d3n]

Sorry to hear that! I’ve got a couple of severe problems with iOS17(.4) as well, especially with PDFs and the Share Sheet constantly crashing and freezing everywhere. Very frustrating. Hope your semi-downgrade solution works for you!

 

[iphonefreak450]

At least Android phones still have a headphone jack.

The amount that people pay for an iPhone which doesn’t have a headphone jack is ridiculous.

 

[ThrowerGB]

I started having problems with an iPhone 11 Pro Max recently when it came back from having its battery replaced. The major chain store who did the work took a few minutes to pop in a new SIM and that fixed the problems.

 

[sjsharksfan12]

I'm thinking about going back to Android because notifications are better, and I know Android Auto works on my car and Car Play does not.

 

[MacProFCP]

So I finally fixed ALL the bugs…by buying an eBay iPhone with iOS 16.

Magically, everything works again! Same apps, same email providers, same Verizon network.

#AppleIsTheProblem