iPhone 16 Pro users are vexed by UI freezing and camera woes

I’ve had a rather fulfilling experience with the iPhone 16 Pro so far, but the start was anything but. During the first setup, the phone froze and I had to start over again, simultaneously dreading the possibilities of lost data or a booting hell.

Over the course of the next few weeks, I have repeatedly run into a non-responsive screen issue, prompting me to hit the lock button and start again following an unlock protocol. These stutters plagued me in multiple spots, from the camera app to the Mail app, despite switching form the beta to the stable iOS 18 channel. It seems I was not alone.

Apple Discussions / Digital Trends

Digital Trends searched through dozens of pages on the official Apple Community discussions forums and a trove of posts on Reddit. What we found was a repeating pattern of two major issues — overheating (apparently related to battery drain) and random freezing, especially in the camera app.

Reboots, lags, and app glitches

For some users, the core problem is unpredictable restarts, which raise their head out of the blue. In some cases, the phone reboots while charging without any warning, while others report that it just happens mid-way through using the phone. “In the process of using it, it suddenly went black,” writes one user on the Apple Discussions forum.

Reddit / Digital Trends

It appears that the random restarts don’t have anything to do with running half-baked public or developer beta software. On the contrary, folks running the stable version of iOS 18 are encountering the problem. Notably, in an overwhelming number of cases, the random restarts happen multiple times on a daily basis.

Another recurring theme is just general lagging throughout the UI and buggy animations, something that won’t go away with a regular system restart. But as this report suggests, the hardware shortcut of power + volume button is also failing its restart protocol in some instances.

Reddit / Digital Trends

“Once if not multiple times a day and it seems like everytime I wake up it does it overnight and not until I unlock my phone will it push my notifications I got,” says another user complaint on the Apple Discussions page. The screen going totally black is an issue that frequently appears in user reports.

Camera app is the real culprit?

But the more serious problem appears to be the camera app. Multiple users have shared videos recreating the weird behavior where the camera app freezes while dialing up the zoom level, or simply while hunting for focus lock. For a few, the app crashes even at the basic chore of clicking a picture without any fancy tools applied.

Apple Discussions / Digital Trends

“I have found that when I try to take pictures with my iPhone 16 Pro Max it won’t take pictures and the Camera app crashes,”mentions one of the user complaints on the Apple forum. And it seems the fancy new audio mixing feature is also creating problems for early adopters.

For some users, the woes aren’t limited to the camera app. In some cases, the in-app camera UI for other apps such as Messages also makes the iPhone 16 Pro stutter and tiggers a screen lock. The issue even extends to the Photos app and the in-built editor system, it seems.

“iPhone 16 pro camera app crashes every now and then when I open it through photo app or through any other app having integration to camera,” reads another report on the Apple Discussions forum.

Reddit / Digital Trends

The camera app issues take a rather vexing form while editing, especially Live Photos. It seems the Photos app automatically closes mid-way through editing and also discards whatever progress users had made to it. For some users, capturing 4K videos has been the culprit, while others report that ultra-wide videos are making things go haywire on their iPhone 16 Pro.

“So I’m on my second iPhone 16 Pro within five days and still having the same issue – not being able to edit Live Photos if I change the key photo,” writes another miffed owner. Notably, a force reset doesn’t seem to offer any reprieve.

A few other reports mention that the camera app crashes more frequently when trying to click pictures at high magnification levels, around 5x or more. A handful of iPhone 16 Pro owners had a diagnostic test run by Apple support, but the analysis didn’t provide any solution.

The problem isn’t limited to the camera app only, it seems. For a few users, even Siri, Settings, and other native apps are raising hell. Third-party apps such as Amazon are also acting up for iPhone 16 Pro users.

Reddit / Digital Trends

“It has been crashing constantly. The settings app and the calendar app are the worst culprits. Calendar just freezes, you cannot drill down to the day. The settings app just turns black and then crashes. Multiple times the whole phone restarts,” says another report on the official Apple forum.

There are also reports of lag with the built-in keyboard, something I can personally attest to, as well. On a few occasions, I have noticed that the keyboard simply refuses to type in words, even though the keycaps have recorded the touch strokes.

“I type a lot of notes and documents on my phone and this is definitely a glitch that is slowing down my work,” claims another user’s post, who ran into keyboard issues with their new Apple flagship.

So far, we are not sure whether the issue is due to a faulty update, or resulting from app-related bugs. So far, Apple is yet to acknowledge the aforementioned iPhone 16 Pro issues and release a fix. We’ll keep you updated as soon as the company doles out any solution via a software update or releases any advisory steps.