A growing number of iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max owners are reporting an intermittent crackling, popping, or faint ticking sound from their phone’s speakers. Most reports point to the earpiece/top speaker, though some users say they’ve heard it from the upper or lower speaker too. The complaints started showing up on the MacRumors forums and Reddit shortly after the phones went on sale in September, with people describing it variously as a brief pop, a faint click, random crackling, or the kind of short static pop you’d get from pulling out an aux cable.
There isn’t one consistent trigger. Users have reported the sound while switching apps, opening or closing pop-ups, bringing up the keyboard, adjusting brightness or volume, receiving notifications, setting a timer, opening an app where a muted video autoplays, using voice dictation, making cellular calls, toggling Airplane Mode, or just playing audio at higher volume. Some people say it happens only occasionally, others say they can reproduce it fairly reliably. Both the iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max are affected, though the Pro Max shows up more often in early reports.
Hardware or software?
Nothing currently points to a defective speaker component. A few details have pushed people toward suspecting a software or audio-routing issue instead: the sound shows up during ordinary system UI interactions and not just during audio playback, it has reportedly disappeared temporarily for some users, disabling keyboard sounds stopped the popping for some forum users, and similar reports have surfaced on some older iOS 27 devices too, though that’s based on user reports rather than anything Apple has confirmed. At least one user who exchanged their iPhone 18 Pro Max for a new unit ran into the same issue again, which makes a simple defective-unit explanation less convincing, though it doesn’t rule it out either.
Did iOS 27.0.1 fix it?
No. Apple’s September 28 update fixed the Face ID restart bug, a camera color artifact, and a touchscreen bug, but the release notes don’t mention the speaker issue, and early reports say updating to iOS 27.0.1 didn’t make it go away.
Has Apple said anything?
Not about this specific issue, as of September 30. Apple’s general troubleshooting guidance for distorted or crackling audio covers checking for cases or screen protectors blocking the speaker, cleaning the speaker openings, and testing the speaker or seeking service, but that’s standard guidance rather than an acknowledgment of this particular problem.
Some affected users have also mentioned separate audio-quality complaints, like a raspier sound at high volume or a sharper, higher-frequency character on the Pro Max, but those are subjective reports and distinct from the intermittent popping issue itself; there isn’t enough evidence yet to call it a widespread quality defect.
| Issue | Status |
| iPhone 18 Pro affected | Reported |
| iPhone 18 Pro Max affected | Reported |
| Crackle/pop/click | Reported by multiple users |
| Widespread issue | No evidence of that |
| Hardware defect confirmed | No |
| Software bug confirmed | No |
| Fixed in iOS 27.0.1 | Not reported as fixed |
| Apple officially acknowledged this issue | Not yet |
| Future software fix possible | Possible, unconfirmed |
This is a separate report from the Face ID/restart bug that iOS 27.0.1 already addressed, and for now the two haven’t been tied to the same underlying cause.
M Adnan Akram is the founder and lead writer at Phoonomo, covering mobile technology with a primary focus on Apple and the broader smartphone industry, alongside emerging developments in AI. He follows product launches, spec leaks, and industry trends closely to keep readers informed with timely updates.
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