No gloves allowed: iPhone 7 home button needs skin contact

The iPhone 7
The iPhone 7 and its new home button.

The iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus come with a fancy new home button that drops the internal mechanics for a static version that's force sensitive instead - a similar approach to the one used on the trackpads for the most recent MacBooks.

Now that the phone is out on the streets, users have been playing around with the handset, and a new discovery has been made - the new-look home button only works with skin-on-iPhone contact.

If you're planning on wearing gloves this wintertime it looks like you might have to whip them off to get anywhere, although based on user testing being reported on the web, some gloves designed for touch interfaces are proving compatible.

Touch and go

The discovery was made by Brit Mike Hurley, who tweeted out his discovery with an appropriately unimpressed emoji.

Of course the home button isn't just used to unlock the phone - it gets you back to the start on iOS, lets you access Siri, activate multitasking and so on. Because you can no longer physically push the button down, you're out of luck with gloves.

And with iOS 10 ditching swipe to unlock, it's going to be a lot harder to get into your phone in the first place. Apple hasn't commented so far, but we'll let you know if it does.

Enjoy our iPhone 7 vs iPhone 6S speed test:

Via MacRumors

David Nield
Freelance Contributor

Dave is a freelance tech journalist who has been writing about gadgets, apps and the web for more than two decades. Based out of Stockport, England, on TechRadar you'll find him covering news, features and reviews, particularly for phones, tablets and wearables. Working to ensure our breaking news coverage is the best in the business over weekends, David also has bylines at Gizmodo, T3, PopSci and a few other places besides, as well as being many years editing the likes of PC Explorer and The Hardware Handbook.

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