Keyboard Suddenly Won't Appear — Can't Type on iPhone

By Kevin Shaw, 21 December, 2023

Forum

iOS and iPadOS

iPhone 14 Pro.
The keyboard will not appear when double tapping into an edit field for either text or numbers on iOS.

I have done the following:
Restarted phone.
Restarted VoiceOver.
Updated to iOS 17.2.1.
Turned off BlueTooth (so the phone doesn't think it's paired to a Bluetooth keyboard).

The only workarounds are dictation and using the handwriting option from the rotor.

Does anyone have a solution to this?

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Comments

RE: Keyboard Suddenly Won't Appear — Can't Type on iPhone

Yeah, I had that problem awhile back & had to reset the phone. P!I!T!A!!!

Before you reset

Try the following:

1. Go to Settings > General > Keyboard.
2. Under the 'Keyboards, Heading', it should read, "Keyboards (2) button".
3. Regardless of the number, double tap here and then double tap 'Add new keyboard, button'.
4. Add whatever you want, even if it is one you already have, i.e. English (US).
- Note: You can choose English (US) and then the 'Qwertz' layout, which essentially swaps the 'z' and 'y' keys.
5. Save and exit, go into a text field and see if your Keyboard pops up.

Really hope this helps you out. 😅

A fix

Hi. I had this problem a few months ago, iPhone 15 pro IOS 17.

When I one finger double tap and do not hear VoiceOver telling me the cursor position, I move focus to the edit box and one finger tap and hold until I get a haptic bump (one second or so). If I still don't hear VoiceOver telling me where the cursor is located, I move focus to the edit box again and do the one finger double tap again.

I didn't have to take these steps often. Usually once straightened things out. the main thing is to be sure to select the edit box by moving focus to it and only then doing the one finger double tap.

If this is a focus issue..

Why not move your finger to said edit field, then (while holding said finger in place) tap once with another finger? Might seem tedious, but if it works. . . .

How about connecting then disconnecting a hardware keyboard?

This fixed it for me once: Connecting a hardware keyboard, in my case an Apple Magic Keyboard, then disconnecting it again. It seems the event of a hardware keyboard going away does the trick.

Fixed: not a VoiceOver Issue

I've solved this issue. Apparently, it's not a VoiceOver issue.
I tried the suggestions here including pairing and unpairing hardware keyboards, fiddling with adding a new keyboard and no luck. I ended up having to reset my settings.
This fixed the problem, but reset my phone settings. Note that when you do this, all of your alarms get removed from Clock. Good thing I woke up early.

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