Face ID is running into problems on the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max less than a week after Apple’s new phones went on sale, with three separate issues now surfacing.
One causes Face ID to fail when authenticating a locked app. The iPhone can then freeze before eventually rebooting to the lock screen.
A second problem prevents Face ID from being set up at all, displaying a “Face ID is Not Available” message during enrollment.
The third involves Require Attention for Face ID. Even with the setting enabled, Face ID can authenticate when you’re not looking directly at the screen.
That setting is supposed to verify that your eyes are open and directed toward the iPhone before Face ID approves authentication. If it isn’t working correctly, the problem goes beyond the inconvenience of Face ID occasionally failing.
Face ID hardware changed this year
Apple changed the Face ID hardware arrangement on the iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max, moving the infrared camera beneath the display near the top-left corner.
The change helped Apple shrink the Dynamic Island, but there’s no evidence yet connecting the relocated sensor to the Face ID problems.
Screen protectors are another potential complication. Matte and privacy protectors can affect how light passes through the display, making them worth considering when troubleshooting an under-display sensor, although Apple hasn’t identified them as a cause.
The three problems may not share the same explanation either. An iPhone rebooting after Face ID authentication is very different from the hardware being unavailable during setup or Require Attention failing to behave correctly.
Apple is preparing a fix
Apple has confirmed that a bug-fix update is coming next week, and a separate report indicates an upcoming iOS 27 update will specifically address Face ID problems on the iPhone 18 Pro models.
That makes software the first place to look, particularly for the authentication crashes, but it doesn’t establish what’s causing every issue.
The problems don’t appear to affect every iPhone 18 Pro or Pro Max, and it’s still too early to know how widespread they are.
Face ID is also responsible for considerably more than unlocking your iPhone. It’s used to authenticate Apple Pay purchases, access passwords, unlock protected apps and approve other sensitive actions throughout iOS.
That makes these early problems particularly frustrating on a phone that has only been in customers’ hands for a few days, especially when one of the reported behaviors involves a security setting that’s supposed to prevent Face ID from authenticating unless you’re actively looking at the screen.
