Fix iPhone 7 Cant Download And Install Apps

by

Some iPhone owners encounter uncommon problems from time to time. In this troubleshooting episode, we discuss what you need to do if you find your #iPhone7 not installing apps for no reason at all. We also discuss two other issues so we hope you’ll find our suggestions helpful.

Below are specific topics we’re bringing for you today:

Problem 1: How to troubleshoot your iPhone 7 that won’t download and install apps

I have done a network reset. Signed in and out of iTunes. Updated through computer. Backed up. Everything I have literally spent two hours. Looking at things to do and nothing has happened. Updated billing info. EVERYTHING. I can not download apps on my phone. I can delete them. But not download.

When i go to an app in the app store. Beside the app will say “get.” I tap “get.” And it has a loading icon. Ya know the never ending spinning circle. For hours. Nothing happens. No input passoword or touch ID. And thats it. I can sign out. Reset phone and sign back in. And keeps happening. Im seriously considering sawing this phone in half. PLEASE HELP. — Monster91295

Solution: Hi Monster91295. There’s a variety of possible reasons why your iPhone 7 is unable to install apps. Let’s discuss each one of them as well as the solutions to fix them.

Cellular connection may be spotty or weak

If you only use mobile data when downloading apps, try to see what happens if you connect to a wifi network. Sometimes, unreliable cellular connection causes interruption during updates. Be sure to connect to a known reliable wifi network and try downloading apps again. The easiest way to know if you are in a good wifi network is by streaming videos. If the videos don’t stutter or waits for it to load for a long time (buffer), you’re good to go.

Apple ID bug

Sometimes, apps won’t install due to a bug in App Store. Make sure that you sign out of your current Apple ID first. After that, you can restart the phone before signing back in to the same Apple ID. here’s how:

  1. Tap Settings.
  2. Tap iTunes & App Store.
  3. Tap the Apple ID menu.
  4. In the pop-up menu, tap Sign Out.
  5. Tap the Apple ID menu again and sign in with your Apple ID.

Clear App Store cache

If signing out and signing back in won’t fix your issue, the next good thing to do is by deleting the App Store cache to refresh it. Aside from fixing possible bug that prevents it from downloading apps, it’s also a useful troubleshooting step if you’re not getting any updated content when you tap any of the tabs. For example, if you want to check the Top Charts tab but no result is provided, it’s most probably an App Store cache issue. What you want to do next is to clear the App Store cache. Once the current cache has been purged from the app, you can continue what you want to do or attempt another download.

To clear the App Store cache, follow these steps:

  1. Open App Store app.
  2. Tap any of the tab buttons (Featured, Top Charts, Explore, Search, Updates) at the bottom. Do this for 10 times.
  3. The app will quickly reboot itself.

Restrictions feature must be on

iOS devices have an option to block unauthorized download and installation of apps called Restrictions. While this feature may not be very useful for average users, it’s a great way for IT administrators of companies or organization that supply iOS devices to their employees or members. Restrictions feature can be enabled to prevent installation of additional apps that a company may not trust. To see if this feature is enabled, you can do the following steps:

  1. Open Settings app.
  2. Tap General.
  3. Tap Restrictions.
  4. If prompted, enter your passcode
  5. Check the Installing Apps menu. If the slider is set to off/white then updating apps is blocked. Move the slider to on/green to restore the updating feature.

If you happen to be using a company-provided device and you won’t be able to disable Restrictions normally, talk to your IT administrator about it.

Device may not have enough storage space

Obviously, you won’t be able to add any more content to your phone if there’s not enough storage space left. If you haven’t checked your device’s storage yet, follow these steps:

  1. Tap Settings.
  2. Tap General.
  3. Tap About.
  4. Look for the Available line. Whatever figure you see should be the available storage space for your device.

If you want to free up some space in your phone, we suggest that you start with non-system critical files like photos, videos, etc. You can move them to either a local storage like iTunes in your computer, or upload them to your iCloud account.

Device time and data may be incorrect

There are other potential issues that can arise when your device uses incorrect time and date. If you are fond of changing your phone’s date and time, be sure to set it back to automatic so it uses your network’s date and time. Here’s how:

  1. Tap Settings.
  2. Tap General.
  3. Tap Date & Time.
  4. Move the Set Automatically slider to on/green.

Return all software settings back to their factory defaults

We are not aware of any hardware malfunction that can prevent an iPhone from installing an app so the reason for your problem is most likely software in nature. This means that resetting all phone settings back to factory defaults must fix it. If you haven’t tried this solution yet, follow these steps:

  1. Create a backup of your files via iCloud, iTunes, or both.
  2. Open Settings app.
  3. Tap General.
  4. Tap Reset.
  5. Tap Erase All Content and Settings.
  6. If prompted, enter your passcode.
  7. Tap Erase iPhone.

Install updates

To minimize bugs from developing in the future, be sure to keep your software and apps up-to-date.

Problem 2: iPhone 7 keeps getting duplicate SMS from Android devices

When receiving a GROUP text from an Android phone, it looks like the message was typed twice. I’m not getting notified twice, just two messages in the same text. This only happens in a group text. not an individual text and only from Android phones. Another member of my group text has an iPhone 6 with Sprint as her carrier and she doesn’t have this issue. It seems to be an AT&T issue because my son and I are on the same account and he has this issue as well. This just started in the last month or so. — Debie Stahl

Solution: Hi Debie. A bug like this is usually caused by a coding mistake or glitch so what you can do in this case is very limited. Since there’s no direct way to confirm if it’s indeed a coding problem in the messaging app, or if it’s something else, these are the ones that you should try:

  1. Contact AT&T and report the bug
  2. Perform basic app troubleshooting
  3. Temporarily use a different messaging app

Contact AT&T and report the bug

Letting AT&T know of the issue may help if it’s a known issue that they’re monitoring. If other users are affected, someone must have already reported the problem and ticket may have already been created to track it. What you can do in this case is to simply wait for a solution in the form of a patch.

Basic app troubleshooting

App troubleshooting in iPhones is often very simple and easy to do. Some of them may consist of one or two solutions while others may have more. In your case, the best thing that you can do is to skip the common ones like restarting the phone and force closing the app. We suggest that you try to do the Reset All Settings instead. Here’s how it’s done:

  1. Open Settings app.
  2. Tap General.
  3. Scroll down the list and tap Reset.
  4. Tap Reset All Settings option.
  5. If prompted, confirm the action by tapping Reset All Settings.

Once you’ve reset all settings, apps and software settings should all be returned to their default state.

Use another messaging app

If you think receiving duplicate messages from Android phones is annoying and there’s still no fix in sight, consider using a different messaging app in the meantime. For example, you can use messaging apps that works across platforms like Facebook Messenger or Google Hangout as alternatives.

Problem 3: iPhone 7 rear camera shows a black screen when used

Hi guys! How are you? My name is Vanesa and I live in Argentina.  I have an Iphone 7 bought in USA. For some reason my camera stopped working. For selfies it works fine, but the regular camera will just show a black screen. The lenses are not cracked and the phone did fall, that I know. At the beginning, it won’t focus, and then it just went black.  I know it’s challenging to identify an issue like this. But do you know how can I fix this? I obviously restarted the phone a few times. And it’s been like this for a month at least.  I would really appreciate any recommendations that you may have. Thanks a lot in advanced! — Vanesa Rothberg

Solution: Hi Vanesa. Without the full history of your device to help us, there’s no way we can tell you what is happening to the camera at this time.  To give you a fairly general idea on where the issue may lie, we suggest that you restore the phone from a previous backup and see if that will fix the issue. If you haven’t created a backup before at all, you can still Restore your iPhone and set it up as a new device.

To restore an iPhone 7, follow these steps:

  1. Create a backup of your files. You can do that in a number of ways but the fastest and most effective way is by using iTunes in your PC or Mac. If you don’t want to create a backup at all, you can simply erase everything on the phone by following the steps in this link.
  2. Connect your iPhone to your computer with the cable that came with your phone.
  3. We assume you remember your phone’s passcode so simply enter it when you’re prompted for it.
  4. Select your iPhone once iTunes asks you for the specific device.
  5. Once you’re in the Summary panel or screen, select the option that will restore your device (Restore).
  6. Confirm by clicking on Restore button.
  7. Wait for a few moments while iTunes restores your device to its factory settings. It may also take some time if iTunes will need to install an updated operating system version.
  8. After this factory reset, all software settings should be restored to their defaults.

Now that your phone’s software has been returned to a known working state, the rear camera app should work as expected. Unless the problem is caused by hardware error, both selfie and rear camera should not work fine. That said, if the rear camera remains problematic and still not working, you should consider sending the phone to Apple so it can be fixed.