Line Travelling Down Screen

[blairh]

Experiencing a problem on my iPhone 17 that I have never seen before. The best way I can describe it is that a quick line (for lack of a better word) is seen on my screen pretty often when refreshing or visiting a new webpage in Safari. It travels from top to bottom. It lasts probably less than a second. It doesn't happen every time I visit a new page, but often enough where it troubles me.

I did a reset from backup with no avail. Hard reset as well.

I have an appointment set up at Apple tomorrow.

Has anyone encountered anything similar ever with their iPhone?


Edit: Had the issue resolved at the Apple store. Had to restore and download directly from a Mac.

Edit 2: The issue returned after an hour of use at home. Not sure what to do now.

 

[S.B.G]

Sounds like some kind of display defect. When you get to your appointment with Apple, see about doing an exchange for a new one.

 

[Fred Zed]

Experiencing a problem on my iPhone 17 that I have never seen before. The best way I can describe it is that a quick line (for lack of a better word) is seen on my screen pretty often when refreshing or visiting a new webpage in Safari. It travels from top to bottom. It lasts probably less than a second. It doesn't happen every time I visit a new page, but often enough where it troubles me.

I did a reset from backup with no avail. Hard reset as well.

I have an appointment set up at Apple tomorrow.

Has anyone encountered anything similar ever with their iPhone?

I posted this as soon as I installed iOS 26 on my 16 PM. It’s also occurring on my 17 PM. It’s irritating as … happens only in safari.

Nothing to do with hardware. I even posted a video about it earlier.

https://imgur.com/a/77QVtKz

 

[blairh]

I posted this as soon as I installed iOS 26 on my 16 PM. It’s also occurring on my 17 PM. It’s irritating as … happens only in safari.

Nothing to do with hardware. I even posted a video about it earlier.

https://imgur.com/a/77QVtKz

I don't have a static line. The best way I can describe it is that it looks like a line or something alone those lines are moving rapidly down the screen at times.

I did not have this issue with my 16 Pro Max running iOS 26.

 

[blairh]

Sounds like some kind of display defect. When you get to your appointment with Apple, see about doing an exchange for a new one.

I hope they will let me.

They don't have sage locally so I might have to settle for another color, sadly.

 

[Puonti]

Has anyone encountered anything similar ever with their iPhone?

Sounds like I might have, on an iPhone 16 Pro Max. I figured it's an issue with iOS 26 Safari's HTML renderer as it only happens on some pages. The "line" I've seen moving down the length of the page looks like a horizontal divider graphic, possibly with a faint drop shadow effect.

If it's the same thing you're seeing, it's not a hardware issue.

 

[blairh]

Sounds like I might have, on an iPhone 16 Pro Max. I figured it's an issue with iOS 26 Safari's HTML renderer as it only happens on some pages. The "line" I've seen moving down the length of the page looks like a horizontal divider graphic, possibly with a faint drop shadow effect.

If it's the same thing you're seeing, it's not a hardware issue.

I did not have it before with my 16 Pro Max running iOS 26.

 

[blairh]

I was able to capture it on video.

 

[Fred Zed]

I don't have a static line. The best way I can describe it is that it looks like a line or something alone those lines are moving rapidly down the screen at times.

I did not have this issue with my 16 Pro Max running iOS 26.

I don’t have a static line either. I have exactly the same as what you have. Occurred on my iPhone 16PM when I upgraded to iOS 26 and persists on my current 17 pro max.

 

[blairh]

I don’t have a static line either. I have exactly the same as what you have. Occurred on my iPhone 16PM when I upgraded to iOS 26 and persists on my current 17 pro max.

Take a look at my video. Is that what you have?

 

[Fred Zed]

Take a look at my video. Is that what you have?

Yes.

 

[Puonti]

That looks similar to what I've been seeing, though I use a light theme.

 

[blairh]

Here is an update. I went to the Apple store. They had me restore from their Mac. Set up as new. At the store the issue was gone after the restore as new.

Got home. Was setting up my iPhone. Issue returned after an hour.

It appears to only be happening in Safari.

iPhone passed all diagnostic tests in-store. Not sure what to do. Should I exchange? See if it changes in a future update?

 

[goldmac2006]

Sounds like some kind of display defect. When you get to your appointment with Apple, see about doing an exchange for a new one.

Likely it is.

OP:
Was your new iPhone 17 dropped in any way?
Was it like that since you got it and first set it up? You should exchange the defective iPhone if you saw it in the first place like that.
Did you sit on it, like have it caseless in your back pocket?

 

[blairh]

Likely it is.

OP:
Was your new iPhone 17 dropped in any way?
Was it like that since you got it and first set it up? You should exchange the defective iPhone if you saw it in the first place like that.
Did you sit on it, like have it caseless in your back pocket?

iPhone has never been dropped.

Was not like this when I first got it. Probably started happening after roughly 4 days of use.

The iPhone has not been dropped. I never place my iPhones in my back pocket.

Honestly at this point I think I'm just going to live with it unless it gets worse.

 

[Puonti]

I'm convinced it's a software issue in Safari / WebKit and will get fixed eventually. The signs are all pointing at that. I recommend just waiting this one out.

 

[goldmac2006]

Here is an update. I went to the Apple store. They had me restore from their Mac. Set up as new. At the store the issue was gone after the restore as new.

Got home. Was setting up my iPhone. Issue returned after an hour.

It appears to only be happening in Safari.

iPhone passed all diagnostic tests in-store. Not sure what to do. Should I exchange? See if it changes in a future update?

iPhone has never been dropped.

Was not like this when I first got it. Probably started happening after roughly 4 days of use.

The iPhone has not been dropped. I never place my iPhones in my back pocket.

Honestly at this point I think I'm just going to live with it unless it gets worse.

Hey, could you possibly swap it out? The Apple Genius mentioned that the problem seems to be Safari-specific, but I’m still curious.


Also, have you accidentally done anything to the screen that might cause dead pixels, like cranking up the brightness too much on the OLED Super Retina XDR display? Screen burn-in and dead pixels can also happen. Just try to avoid using very bright wallpapers.

 

[goldmac2006]

I posted this as soon as I installed iOS 26 on my 16 PM. It’s also occurring on my 17 PM. It’s irritating as … happens only in safari.

Nothing to do with hardware. I even posted a video about it earlier.

https://imgur.com/a/77QVtKz

Hey, is that flicker you’re seeing actually visible? I can see it.

It might be likely a bug in Safari. It looks like a black flicker on the screen.

Are you all okay with installing betas on your iPhones? I was wondering if you could try the iOS 26.1 beta to see if it fixes that issue?

 

[Fred Zed]

Hey, is that flicker you’re seeing actually visible? I can see it.

It might be likely a bug in Safari. It looks like a black flicker on the screen.

Are you all okay with installing betas on your iPhones? I was wondering if you could try the iOS 26.1 beta to see if it fixes that issue?

It’s a software bug for sure. Since it started with iOS 26 on my iPhone 16 PM and continues on my 17 PM only within Safari.

 

[S.B.G]

Honestly at this point I think I'm just going to live with it unless it gets worse

It’s your call of course, but I’d exchange it for a different one. A brand new device with that kind of issue isn’t something I’d settle for.