Some iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max owners have spent the first few days with their new phones dealing with freezes, sudden restarts, support calls, restores, and even replacement requests. Apple now says relief is close.
The company has confirmed to 9to5Mac that a software update addressing the rebooting problem is in development and should arrive early next week. The confirmation clears up an important question for affected owners, some of whom had started wondering whether their brand-new phones were dealing with faulty hardware.
A software fix changes the picture
We previously covered reports of iPhone 18 Pro models freezing and restarting around failed Face ID authentication. At the time, Apple had not acknowledged the problem, and some users were being told by support that their devices could be faulty.
9to5Mac was able to reproduce the behavior on an iPhone 18 Pro while attempting to authenticate inside the Passwords app. The phone stopped responding before restarting, with a panic log appearing afterward in iPhone Analytics. Apple has not explained the underlying cause or said exactly which iOS version will carry the fix. The software update also means owners experiencing this particular rebooting problem should not need to exchange their phones simply to get rid of it.
Some owners have already tried almost everything
Reports from affected iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max owners suggest the rebooting problem has already led to a fair amount of troubleshooting. Users have tried resetting Face ID, reinstalling iOS, running Apple diagnostics, and contacting support, while some have considered or gone ahead with device replacements after the crashes continued.
In some cases, Apple Support reportedly treated affected devices as potentially faulty, which pushed owners toward replacement units even though the underlying issue now appears to be something Apple can address through an update.
The situation is a headache for affected customers and for Apple. The company has had messy iPhone launches before, from the iPhone 4’s “Antennagate” and the iPhone 6 “Bendgate” controversy to the camera-shaking bug that affected the iPhone 14 Pro shortly after release. Freezing, unresponsive phones, and unexpected restarts now add another blemish to a brand known for reliable hardware and polished software.
