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Released September 16, 2016. Model 1660, 1778 Available as GSM or CDMA / 32, 128 or 256 GB / Rose gold, gold, silver, black, and jet black.

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Home button working but not Touch ID after screen replacement

I replaced an iPhone 7 screen for a customer yesterday, and I tested the home button haptics which worked fine. So I assumed touch ID would work as well (it’s the original home button of course).

I’ve never experienced this before. In the past it’s always worked or it hasn’t - or maybe sometimes the touch ID worked but the haptics didn’t which usually turned out to be a bad flex on the replacement screen.

This time, it’s a little weird. Home button works perfectly fine, but touch ID doesn’t. I’ve had her hard restart the phone to no avail. Funny thing is, the phone seems to think that touch ID works. When adding a new fingerprint, it doesn’t fail at the screen where you register the fingerprint, it just doesn’t register anything.

She’s coming by later today for me to take a look at it. I’ve got a few ideas on what to look at, but I’m interested in seeing if anyone else has had a similar issue and may have some troubleshooting ideas. Here’s what I’m going to try:

  • Reconnecting all flex cables
  • Loosening the tri-point screw right on the home button. I’ve read some people had issues when it was tightened too hard.
  • Try original screen to rule out bad replacement
  • Try DFU restore

Anything else I should have in the toolbox?

Answered! View the answer I have this problem too

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That’s a good list of things to try/verify. I would add a close inspection, preferably with magnification, of the Home Button flex cable. Usually TouchID fails completely, not partially so perhaps there is a tiny tear in the flex.

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Thanks a lot for the suggestion. There was indeed a small tear on the flex cable on the replacement screen. I remember there being a lot of tiny glass fragments that I had to clean out during replacement. Maybe one of them got underneath the shield plate and damaged the flex. It must have been a very specific connection that got damaged! Luckily the home button itself was still intact, so the issue got resolved with a new screen.

Thanks for your help.

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There is not much you can do for this problem—in my experience this will almost always be a microtear in the cable which is very common. You can rule out the screen, but this is most likely going to require a trip to Apple or living without fingerprint sensor function.

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Hi Jessa

Thanks a lot for your suggestion. Luckily, it turned out to be a faulty flex on the screen replacement. I noticed a tiny tear in it, perhaps from a stray piece of broken glass so that might have been it. Afterwards I also noticed a tiny piece of plastic sitting on the connector of the home button flex. But at that point, the customer was out the door and the workday was done so I haven't yet tested if that was the culprit - although I doubt it.

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Andreas Martin Mørch will be eternally grateful.
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