I just got the new iPhone and some bubbles keep popping up. I tried tapping them, but nothing happens. All I get is a grey bubble like when an emoji doesn’t show up properly. Anyone know what’s going on?
Those mystery bubbles are annoying! If you tap them randomly, sometimes it gives you different results. Have you tried restarting your phone?
Skyler said:
Those mystery bubbles are annoying! If you tap them randomly, sometimes it gives you different results. Have you tried restarting your phone?
Yeah, I tried tapping them, but it’s just the grey bubble thing showing up. It’s like when an emoji doesn’t load properly. Any other ideas?
@Indra
Haha, I was just messing with you! But for real, try doing a force restart:
- Press and quickly release the volume up button.
- Press and quickly release the volume down button.
- Press and hold the side button (ignore the slide to power off).
- When the Apple logo appears, let go of the side button.
@Skyler
Make sure not to keep holding the button during step 4 or it’ll go into recovery mode instead.
Quincy said:
@Skyler
Make sure not to keep holding the button during step 4 or it’ll go into recovery mode instead.
That only happens if you have the phone plugged into power at the same time.
@Indra
Could it be something related to the new AI emojis? Try typing something in the box and see if it changes.
@Hartley
Yep, that’s the same thing I had. It’s apparently a bug from data migration. It got fixed for me after a couple of updates.
Parker said:
@Hartley
Yep, that’s the same thing I had. It’s apparently a bug from data migration. It got fixed for me after a couple of updates.
I’m on 18.4 Beta 2 now and it’s still not fixed for me.
@Tamsin
I thought the 18.2 release sorted it out for everyone. A bunch of people I know had this issue and all of them got it fixed with 18.2 or maybe 18.3 when the emoji keyboard went bigger.
@Tamsin
I got it sorted out on one of the 18.2 betas.
Honestly, iOS 18 is just a mess. Nothing but problems.
I think those are custom stickers you made using the photos app on your old phone. Looks like they didn’t transfer properly. Had the same problem when I upgraded. It fixed itself after a while, probably when the recent emojis list updated.
Try deleting the US keyboard and adding it back. That worked for me when I had this issue. Found the solution from an old discussion where someone suggested it and it actually saved me a lot of frustration.
@Ozzy
I tried that, but it didn’t help. It seems to be a problem when you restore from a previous backup on the stock pre-release iOS 18 that ships with the phone. Even if you do a factory reset and restore a new backup, the issue stays. What worked for me was updating iOS 18 to the current post-release version and then restoring from a non-corrupted backup.
It just proves that Steve Jobs is gone and Apple’s quality control went with him.
Looks like some kind of dark circles glitch.
Try restarting the app. If that doesn’t work, just restart your phone.
Briar said:
Try restarting the app. If that doesn’t work, just restart your phone.
How do you restart iMessages? It’s happening on every app I use.