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iOS 10 stuck orientation bug

Morac

Morac

macrumors 68020
Original poster
Dec 30, 2009
2,336
701
Frequently (anywhere from every few hours to days) on my iPad, the screen orientation gets stuck and the screen will no longer rotate. Sometimes it gets stuck in landscape, other times in portrait.

Restarting the iPad fixes this, but I also found a list of steps that will resolve the issue, though they may need to be repeated multiple times to do so.

1. Orient the device the way it is stuck.
2. Enable the orientation lock (Swipe up)
3. Wait 5 seconds
4. Return to home screen
5. Wait 5 seconds.
6. Lock screen.
7. Wait 5 seconds
8. Rotate the device to a different orientation.
9. Unlock the device.
10. Remove orientation lock from step 2


Does anyone else have this problem? Is it fixed in iOS 10.1 beta?
 
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I have definitely come across this a few times in iOS 10.0.2. Has something to do with the accelerometer being messed up. Mine always locks in landscape mode, so when I launch Real Racing and try to steer, I just go in a straight line.
 
Yup. Bug that needs to be fixed.
[doublepost=1476556280][/doublepost]Mine will be in lock on portrait and sometimes something triggers landscape and it gets stuck until I hit the power off and on button
 
I concur. I usually keep my iPad locked in landscape, but one night it suddenly switched to portrait on its own, and wouldn't switch back. I had to unlock it via Control Center (which was on) to get it to rotate back, and then lock again.

Another edge case ("then don't do that") is when a portrait-only app run, and quits, the screen wigs out and displays broken halves of both. Past iOSes have handled it gracefully, but 10 doesn't.

Sounds are buggy as well.
 
I've shortened the fix down to the following.

1. At the lock screen, orient the device the way it's stuck and turn on orientation lock.
2. Wait a few seconds and lock the screen.
3. Wait a few seconds and rotate the device.
4. Wait a few seconds and press power to display lock screen.
5. Turn off orientation lock.
6. Repeat 1 to 5 if orientation still stuck.
 
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I've had this on FaceTime on my iPhone 6S (iOS10.1 beta).

My fix is to quit the call, open Safari, rotate the screen (it works) then go back into FaceTime and call again.
 
Morac said:
I've shortened the fix down to the following.

1. At the lock screen, orient the device the way it's stuck and turn on orientation lock.
2. Wait a few seconds and lock the screen.
3. Wait a few seconds and rotate the device.
4. Wait a few seconds and press power to display lock screen.
5. Turn off orientation lock.
6. Repeat 1 to 5 if orientation still stuck.
Click to expand...


This works. Lock it turn it off wait some seconds and turn it back on and disable orientation lock and it should work.
 
Webterractive said:
This works. Lock it turn it off wait some seconds and turn it back on and disable orientation lock and it should work.
Click to expand...

Actually you don't even need to lock the orientation. Simply hold the device the way the screen is stuck, lock the screen, wait a few seconds and then turn the screen, wait a few more seconds and unlock it.
 
Morac said:
Frequently (anywhere from every few hours to days) on my iPad, the screen orientation gets stuck and the screen will no longer rotate. Sometimes it gets stuck in landscape, other times in portrait.

Restarting the iPad fixes this, but I also found a list of steps that will resolve the issue, though they may need to be repeated multiple times to do so.

1. Orient the device the way it is stuck.
2. Enable the orientation lock (Swipe up)
3. Wait 5 seconds
4. Return to home screen
5. Wait 5 seconds.
6. Lock screen.
7. Wait 5 seconds
8. Rotate the device to a different orientation.
9. Unlock the device.
10. Remove orientation lock from step 2


Does anyone else have this problem? Is it fixed in iOS 10.1 beta?
Click to expand...
[doublepost=1481444664][/doublepost]Hi, I found that if you are using the camera magnifier option in settings i.e. When triple tapping the home button the camera magnifier appears.
When your screen orientation is stuck then triple tap, then close it, this cures it for me, but only temporarily unfortunately as a week or so later it comes back.
I haven't tried but I suspect turning off the option may fix it.
 
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Morac said:
Actually you don't even need to lock the orientation. Simply hold the device the way the screen is stuck, lock the screen, wait a few seconds and then turn the screen, wait a few more seconds and unlock it.
Click to expand...

Just so I'm sure of this, and I'm on iOS 10.1.1 on a iPad Air 2 64GB:

•If the screen orientation sticks on portrait lets say, keep it on portrait and lock the screen (meaning hit the power button or if you have one, close the Smart Cover).

•Then wait say 5 seconds, then turn it over to landscape and wait 5 seconds again, then "unlock" the iPad by pressing the power button/opening the Smart Cover.

•Then press the home button since iOS 10 switched to it instead of the "swipe screen to open", and it will not be stuck?

OR...

Do all the "lock the screen" directions given mean the Control Center lock button? Meaning follow directions as above but just use this Control Center "screen lock" instead of the power button/smartcover "lock"?

My iPad hasn't gotten stuck again tonight (thank God) but I know it's just a matter of time...
Thanks for the help & clarification...
 
This is still a problem with iOS 10.2. Not been able to pin down a root cause either.
 
JRSIVMusic said:
Just so I'm sure of this, and I'm on iOS 10.1.1 on a iPad Air 2 64GB:

•If the screen orientation sticks on portrait lets say, keep it on portrait and lock the screen (meaning hit the power button or if you have one, close the Smart Cover).

•Then wait say 5 seconds, then turn it over to landscape and wait 5 seconds again, then "unlock" the iPad by pressing the power button/opening the Smart Cover.

•Then press the home button since iOS 10 switched to it instead of the "swipe screen to open", and it will not be stuck?

OR...

Do all the "lock the screen" directions given mean the Control Center lock button? Meaning follow directions as above but just use this Control Center "screen lock" instead of the power button/smartcover "lock"?

My iPad hasn't gotten stuck again tonight (thank God) but I know it's just a matter of time...
Thanks for the help & clarification...
Click to expand...

Actually I've found if it gets stuck simply just lock the screen wait a bit and unlock it. It doesn't happen that often for me anymore. About the same as when the keyboard stops working.
 
Count me in too as being hit with this issue... :( At random times my Air 2 (bought in January this year, so as good as new, and updated to iOS 10.2.1) will wake up with a frozen orientation, 99% of times portrait. This happens while waking with the home button, with the power button or when opening the smart cover, in every possible orientation, etc... Up until now I've just not been able to determine any common thread between the timing of these occurrences and outside factors. And in my case the only way to restore rotation is to slowly lock-wake cycle the screen two or three times.

I have noticed though that I can reliably tell whether the rotation will be frozen when I wake the screen, as the time between hitting the power button/home button/opening the smart cover and an image appearing on screen is delayed by 1 to 3 seconds, compared to pretty much instantaneously otherwise.

Moreover, it seems that when such a freeze happens that the system is no longer reads/receives signal from the accelerometer, as using a sensor readout application at such a time sees the accelerometer signal being 'frozen' in neutral position. (I've tried to see whether forcing rotation by way of assistive touch would 'unstuck' the accelerometer signal, but unfortunately no dice...)

Because it's so random and I'm unable to reproduce it on demand, it's impossible to show the issue to the geniuses in the Apple store. I'm mostly anxious whether this issue is just software related (and thus possibly fixable in the future) or whether it is an indication of a faulty accelerometer or other hardware part...:confused: Because in the latter case I'd definitely like to get it fixed by Apple, but not being able to reproduce the problem when I need to explain it makes it rather hard to convince them something is not right...
 
Grogglenoggle said:
Because it's so random and I'm unable to reproduce it on demand, it's impossible to show the issue to the geniuses in the Apple store. I'm mostly anxious whether this issue is just software related (and thus possibly fixable in the future) or whether it is an indication of a faulty accelerometer or other hardware part...:confused: Because in the latter case I'd definitely like to get it fixed by Apple, but not being able to reproduce the problem when I need to explain it makes it rather hard to convince them something is not right...
Click to expand...

It's a software bug. Although there's no guarantee when it will finally get fixed.
 
Begs the question: what's the best way for us mere mortals to bring this issue to attention to Apple?
 
I've not run into it for awhile. I figured it was fixed in 10.2.1.
 
Well, I'm running 10.2.1 and I can assure you it's still there unfortunately. If only I could find a way to reliable reproduce the bug, then it would be a lot easier to file a bug report, because now it's so absolutely random... I've had up to two weeks without it happening, and then suddenly it'll happen a few times in a couple of hours or days. The delay in the screen turning on when it happens and the fact that the accelerometer readout is stuck in neutral position does make me believe that somewhere a readout or connecting process is crashing, but no way for mere mortals like me to figure that one out... And the non-reproducable randomness makes it all but impossible to have the iPhone configuration tool at hand to get to the console readouts when it happens... :/

I guess in my case it's not really a critical bug as sleep-wake cycling a few times gets rid of it, but still would be nice to not have such issues on an expensive piece of tech like this. That, or it is a covert push by Apple to make us upgrade to M9 equipped Pros, as my GF never encounters this issue on hers. :Dhaha

(Apparently there are now 80+ iPad Air 2 users on the Apple Support Community forums reporting screen rotation issues, so it seems this might be a 'feature' exclusive to the M8 coprocessor in these devices. Hopefully one of the Apple gods will deem us worthy of attention one day:oops:haha)
 
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