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My XS did something similar yesterday. Came back to my desk and screen was black. Wouldn't respond to any of the normal things, just looked completely dead so I was going to log it as a fault with Apple. Came back 10 minutes later and the phone was working, notifications on the screen etc so it hadn't rebooted.
 
This is happening to my iXs Max as well. It shuts down, and restarts all by itself. It's happening with a 2-5 minute interval. I have scheduled a phone call tomorrow. I've been on iOS 12.1 beta 3 and 4, and now on the official release of 12.0.1.

Update: Talked to Apple Care over the phone, they ran a remote diagnostic. He didn't know much about the results, but he tought it was something with the battery.
 
The one thing I observed was that the battery showed 1% after boot up and again iOS crashed and on reboot showed 47%. Something related to how the battery capacity is being conveyed to the OS.
I have kept my battery % > 50% after that and haven't seen it happen again
 
The one thing I observed was that the battery showed 1% after boot up and again iOS crashed and on reboot showed 47%. Something related to how the battery capacity is being conveyed to the OS.
I have kept my battery % > 50% after that and haven't seen it happen again

You could be on to something - this happened to me on the one day where my phone's battery was probably 30% or less. I specifically remember I meant to charge it before going out, so I thought it had maybe just run out of battery, but then realised it was nowhere near the red mark.
 
Well, most of you with issues are on a beta...

I have never experienced this issue on my iPhone XS Max 512GB and I only run the official releases. I count on my phone for too much to take the risk on having fun with experimenting.
 
This also happened to me about a week ago, completely dead and did the procedure but still took about five minutes to get it up and running. Phone is non beta.
 
My xs max has just done this. It's now stuck on the black screen with spinning wheel and i have tried everything.
 
Wow! I just upgraded my iPhone X to an XS Max 512GB model yesterday, and this evening, I ran into this black screen/dead phone issue already!

(I've used my X since I bought it back in April without any problems at all, until the other day. The earpiece speaker started acting up where I could only hear people talking through it faintly and with a slight metallic distortion sound. I took it in to Apple for warranty service and their diagnostics verified the earpiece was bad. They tried brushing it out with a brush but it only helped slightly. It still kept failing the diagnostics. So they told me to come back in an hour and they were going to replace the whole touchscreen glass that the earpiece was attached to. When I got back, they announced that repair attempt had failed. At that point, they were going to give me another new phone (or maybe refurbished -- as they didn't clarify that part?). I just decided to take the $500 trade credit on my X and move up to this new XS Max to get the bigger screen and more storage.)

I hadn't even gotten around to copying my music collection back onto it yet, and I already had it freeze with this black screen of death. Very odd because the trick to hard reset it DID work for me on the second try, and the battery says 85% charged.
 
Take it into an Apple Stire there’s a good chance they’ll be able to boot it up
(Happened to me with another iPhone)
Worse scenario is they’ll give you a new iphone
 
Bought a iPhone XS for my daughter for Christmas. First mistake: never buy technology and let it sit under a Christmas tree while the warranty/return policy is running. On Christmas day she updated to the latest iOS. After less than a week of usage her phone is dead black. This occurred while it was fully charged over night. She used it in the morning for a bit of social media, put it away and then came back to a dead phone. Up volume, Down Volume and side switch resetting multiple times has done nothing. Connecting it to her computer is a no go. As a lifetime Apple consumer I use to have great respect for the products and OS, but the company has failed miserably to scale quality with quantity over the last ten years. Will post outcome from visit to Bellevue, WA Apple store.

Followup: According to my daughter, an Apple store technician apparently was able to power up the iPhone XS using some kind of power cord and another device (despite our attempts to use several different power cords at home). The technician backed up the phone onto my daughter's computer and then provided her with a brand new phone. He offered no guarantee that the new phone wouldn't die a black screen death. Either way the new phone is up and running and the problem was handled quickly and professionally by the Apple technician at the Bellevue, WA store.
 
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I've had this happen to two XS phones now. In the first case, my phone occasionally would power itself off and then come back on of its own accord in 10-15 minutes or so. It won't power on no matter what I did. I took it to Apple twice who found no hardware fault, but shortly after leaving the store on the second visit it happened again so I went back and they couldn't get it to power on so replaced it.

The replacement phone started acting up over the last two weeks. It would drop phone calls (not call failed) and occasionally I'd come back to use it and it had obviously restarted - the phone would be asking for my passcode having been in a case with the front flap down. I took it to Apple last week who ran tests and came back with no fault found, so told me it was a carrier issue (which it clearly wasn't) but they weren't prepared to do anything.

Yesterday morning, phone was fully charged, switched itself off at half past nine in the morning and wouldn't come back on. Got to Apple last night who were really good in seeing me without an appointment. As like the first time they replaced the phone, they couldn't resurrect it or get any info out of it at all, so I'm now on my 3rd iPhone XS.

Apple claim they've not heard of this issue before, but the really frustrating thing is that unless the phone is actually DOA when they see it, it seems to pass their tests, so you may get short shrift. The first phone exhibited signs it was on its way out, but would usually recover whereas the second one never exhibited the problem until the first time it happened and wouldn't recover from it.

The phones have never been jailbroken, never had betas running on them and I've tried restoring both as backups and as fresh new phones when the issues started happening. I only use official apple charging cables, so I'm at a loss as to why I've had two of these die on me.

I did ask if I could swap the XS for another model but that wasn't possible as the repair system only gives them a scripted option and they weren't willing to speak to a manager, so fingers crossed for third time lucky.
 
Happened to me today for over an hour. Nothing I did brought it back up. Did a google search and found the fix.

  1. Press and quickly release the Volume Up button.
  2. Press and quickly release the Volume Down button.
  3. Press and hold the Side/Power button until the Apple logo appears.
 
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Happened to me today for over an hour. Nothing I did brought it back up. Did a google search and found the fix.

  1. Press and quickly release the Volume Up button.
  2. Press and quickly release the Volume Down button.
  3. Press and hold the Side/Power button until the Apple logo appears.

In my case that didn’t do anything - the phone was totally dead and wouldn’t even pass a current. Glad it worked for you though!
 
Weird stuff! Remember Chrysler electrical systems doing same thing. Poor solder connections or plugs. Nothing more frustrating than intermittent electrical problems that don’t show up during testing.

Gonna be fun when autonomous cars are crashing. Computers, what could go wrong?

Even the aliens had problems, Roswell crash.
Course without that how could we have reverse engineered this stuff.
 
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Damn, it just happened on mine. The hard reset did work at the first try so hopefully it’s not a hardware related problem and will not happen again. Never dropped, zero water damage chances. Do someone got this and then it stopped and goes right away?
 
It could be software or hardware but it seems to be somewhat common. Happened to me twice since I got my Max so I can live with it every few months vs the hassle of swapping it out and possibly get the same thing. More trouble then it’s worth.
 
Black screen bug, been around for ages and it affects all devices. Symptoms: black screen, phone won’t turn or or appear to charge. Reality: device is on but screen not displaying. Cure: reset device.

E.g. hold home+ power or vol up, vol down then hold power till it resets.
 
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So, third iPhone XS and it happened last night. Totally dead and unresponsive, wouldn’t do a thing regardless of whether it was plugged in or what button combo.

But this time, a couple of hours ago I plugged it in again and it started charging from zero. Looking at the battery usage, it just drops off from 50% charge to 0 at the time it died last night.

I only ever use official apple cables and chargers, so I am stumped as to what is causing this - let alone for three handsets in succession. I have zero confidence in the phone so may go back to apple again and see what they are willing to do.
 

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Another Genius Bar appointment made for tomorrow. I think over the three phones that's six trips in to the Store as I was turned away twice with "no fault found". I'll take in my charger and cables too this time as that's the only thing I can think of which may be faulty.

Does anybody know where I stand legally this this in terms of what Apple have to do. I've worked in technology for 20+ years so I understand that a customer coming in with an intermittent (and repeating) fault is the worst. I also have no idea what's causing this, but I don't want another XS. I'll drop down (so to speak) to a XR rather thank risk another one of these.
 
My Max did this a couple days ago for the first time. Was fine an hour prior, went to use the phone, nada. Dead. Nothing I did would get it back. Tried everything in the book. I was like shiat. I got a great screen and now I get to chance it with a replacement and a screen lottery! Then a minute later after trying the same force restart, it came back.

Makes zero sense to me.
 
Hopefully they will address this issue in the next iOS iteration. It seems like it’s a software problem tbh, phone just shuts off thinking there’s an empty battery.
 
Am back with the same phone having had the store set it up as a new phone while connected to a laptop which apparently is recommended compared to over the air reset as it will do a complete wipe and reinstall of the firmware ensuring nothing at all is carried over to the new phone.

They were at a loss to explain what was happening and I've checked all the obvious things. The chances of having three faulty iPhones in a row with the same fault is absolutely tiny, which I understand, but the only other things he's suggested around power, chargers etc I've tried.

Let's see what happens this time...

What I would say to anybody else with a similar issue is to take a screenshot of their battery usage as they literally can't argue with that and it backs up your case because again, my phone passed all diagnostics tests with flying colours.
 
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