This is a reader video found on Macrumors forums illustrating something weird. When the guy holds the iPhone in his hands, touching the outside antenna band in two places, he drops reception. Placing the phone down gets him 4 bars.

We’re not sure if he’s doing something particularly weird, like holding the metal antenna in such a way that it’s shorting out. But it is strange. Or, it could be just a bug in the software, showing no bars and no reception even when you do have reception. But, he does hold the phone with the glass, and it doesn’t have this reception issue.

If you’ve got an iPhone 4, we’d like to have you test this out too, and contribute to YOUR iPhone 4 review. Test holding it in various ways, like one finger on the glass and one on the metal, or any combination that you think might produce different results. Let us know what you find.

Update: Make sure to test this while you’re IN a call too, to see if the call drops. This way we can determine if it’s just displaying bars incorrectly, or if it really does impact your reception.

Update 2: Here’s a video from Foundry Architect (same guy as above), with Wi-Fi off, that illustrates the same issue.

Update 3: Another confirmation from Chris Morris where he shows the problem, where it doesn’t lose service, but loses about 4 bars.

Chris also said he tested the hands thing while in 5 calls, and said that none have dropped so far. He had a conversation for 10 minutes while the phone was displaying no signal with no problem. This might point to a display issue? But how does that explain the images below, in Update 4? Weird. Here’s him making a call while the phone shows 0 bars.

Update 4: Reader Chris Sheehan did a speed test with the phone sitting down, with his hands on the phone, and one with his hands on but with a leather case on it. They’re in order, and the one with his hands on the bare phone is really bad times.

Chris also says he went do dial a number when he lost signal with his hand on it, and could not get a call out.

Update 5: Reader Garrett Hampton has the same, and his illustrates dramatically going from 5 bars to 1 bar, back to 4 bars. This is worrying.

Update 6: Reader Tobias directs us to this article, in which a Danish professor who’s an expert in antennas, predicted that human touch would interfere with the antenna, because it’s on the outside of the phone.

Update 7: Reader Sam says it only happens to him when touches the left side, connecting both antennas. I wonder, maybe there’s some kind of weird way of holding it where you don’t connect both antennas?

Update 8: Reader Steven confirms! His jumps from 5 bars directly to one bar…on EDGE.

Update 9: Reader Justin also confirms.

Update 10: The cynical view is that this is a known issue, and is one of the reasons why Apple is finally releasing the first-party bumper case, where they previously just let third-parties take care of it. [Apple Store]

Update 11: Commenter tineras has the same issue too. He said he repeated it 20+ times with similar results each time. It won’t even start the test if he holds the phone at the start of the test.

Update 12: TotheFloor‘s video shows what happens when he’s in a call. When the phone hits 1 bar, he can still make a call, but not when it’s “searching for signal.” He says when he’s in a call and the phone drops to 1 bar, the person on the other end can’t hear him.

Update 13: FameFoundry narrowed it down to touching the left side and the bottom (left) portion of the phone. They tested it multiple times with multiple people, indoors, outdoors, in various locations (even shoes vs. no shoes) and it drops exactly the same every time.

Update 14: Look! Reader Adam posts this video of his phone not having this problem. Very interesting.

Update 15: Reader Lucas confirms the bar droppage.

He also tests making a call, and the bars continuously drop, but they haven’t dropped the call. So the call is still active at one bar, but they’re still connected.

Update 16: Reader Erik confirms what FameFoundry (Update 13) found, which is, if you don’t touch the bottom of the phone, you’re fine. But as soon as you connect the left side with the bottom, that’s when reception starts to drop.

Update 17: Reader Eduard reproduces this by placing down the phone on its side and using not (just) his hand, but a key. He bridges the two antenna pieces, left and bottom, and drops the reception clearly.

Update 18: German Giz Reader Jean-Marie has the same issue…in Germany. Again, it’s when he closes the circuit between the left and the bottom portion of the phone.

Update 19: Reader Henry suggests putting some nail polish to see if it insulates and blocks the connection between the two pieces.

It seems to me that if you applied a bit of clear nail polish to the bridge between the two antennas on the iPhone, there would be no debilitating connection. The clear nail polish would barely be noticeable.

This does rely on an assumption: the problems are caused by the two antennas being electrically connected as you hold the phone. As far as electromagnetic interference in the LF/HF spectrum, I don’t know. If that’s the problem, it obviously won’t help.

Also, worth keeping in mind: nail polish based on nitrocellulose in an organic solvent is highly flammable. Nitrocellulose itself is the primary ingredient in most smokeless powders. I would suggest using a newer polymer-based nail polish. If using the latter, be careful with the dosage, as it is based on a conductive solvent. This paragraph makes the venture sound high risk, but really, I’ve used nail polish on several CPUs, with no major problems.

So if anyone tests this out and it does fix the issue, let me know!

Update 20: We’re also getting tips of people reproducing this problem on 3G and 3GS, albeit not nearly as dramatically as on the iPhone 4 going from 5 bars to “searching”. But when we test this ourselves with our older phones, we can’t reproduce it at all, sometimes actually gaining a bar when the phone is held.

Update 21: Reader Nathan made a video to illustrate that a case DOES work, using an older Otterbox rubberish case to insultate the phone. In particular, the side and bottom from making a circuit.

Update 22: Reader Brian’s 1 year old inspired him to make a new way to hold the phone.

Update 23: Reader Joe called up Apple to ask about the reception issues, and they said…

Their answer? “Get a bumper” and “it’s not their problem”.

I told the CSR that if their solution is to buy a bumper, why aren’t they giving them out for free? Again, she said not her problem.

Quite an infuriating call – while I sympathize with the verbal beat-down that many of the Apple CSRs will be getting over this problem, they need a better solution than to recommend fixing the problem with their own rubber cases…

Update 24: Reader William has the same issue, and his reception drops quite fast.

Update 25: Reader Patrick tests his with a case and without a case, showing that it is the case that’s protecting it. This means that the theory that just holding the phone—any phone—with your hand will cause it to lose reception isn’t the reasoning here. It’s actually the contacts between the left and bottom that’s doing it, since he holds his phone the exact same way (plus there’s an additional case over it).

Update 26: Reader Carlos confirms that his issue is fixed by a case as well.

Update 27: Tech mag T3 does a side-by-side with the naked iPhone 4 losing signal, and the iPhone 4 with bumper case not. However, the way they hold the bumper-ed iPhone might not make contact with both the left and bottom sides (if it were naked), but it’s bumpered, so it doesn’t matter anyway.

Update 28: One theory is this conductivity problem could be related to moisture on your hands. If you have this problem, try drying off your hands and trying again. If you DON’T have this problem, try making your hands wet, and trying it. Tell us what happens.

Update 29: Reader Greg just wrote in that he can force a dropped call from 3 bars by doing the “trick”.

Update 30: Reader Rich applied some Scotch tape and actually solved his problem. Here’s what he did.

Update 31: Here’s my own test, using my right hand to hold the phone. connecting the two antenna pieces (left and bottom). I confirm it.

Update 32: Just made a little image illustrating the right way and the wrong way to hold the phone.

Update 33: Kyle finally tests it with a bumper. First he shows the phone dropping bars with no bumper on, then he slaps the bumper on and holds it in the exact same position. No bars dropped.

Update 34: Reader PhilippaHalongelic posts this video, showing what happens to loading a page when the hand is off the two antennas, and then on the two antennas. It hangs while grabbing data.

Update 35: Here’s a British user showing off download speeds where he just barely touches the antenna at the death point.

Update 36: And a video by Reader Matt that shows a 3GS losing reception in the same way, from 5 bars down to 2 bars quickly.

Update 37: Here’s reader Jason testing it in on an AT&T Microcell three feet away from the phone, dropping from 5 bars to searching. He also says that he can hear the degradation in voice quality just by touching the metal, so he has to pinch the phone during calls like a crab monster. (He didn’t call himself a crab monster, those were my words.)

Update 38: Wired reader Ryan says that by placing a bit of black electrical tape over the problem bits, the metal bands on the bottom, he was able to double his download speeds.

Update 39: PC Mag confirms the issue.

Update 40: Reader Peter says he can’t reproduce the issue on his phone, and he measured the two sides of the antenna with a multimeter (without touching the phone) and he didn’t find there to be any resistance there. Not sure what this means, if anything. But it is an interesting addition.

Update 41: Finally, Apple’s official response to the problem. Unfortunately it’s either “don’t hold it like that,” or “use a case.” Those aren’t acceptable solutions.

Update 42: Oh man, Reader Mark says that if you use the Bumper case, you can’t dock the iPhone Bluetooth Travel Cable. Really, you can’t. He called Customer Support, and they acknowledged that there was a problem with these two things acting together.

Update 43: Reader Javier says he got a Griffin Reveal for iPhone 4 case, and although it’s a nice case and all, it does not help the reception issue at all. He holds the phone as he does w/o the case, and the bars still drop. He mentions that it might be a defect in his phone itself (or maybe just bad reception in his area), since his phone always has 0 bars when he pulls it out of his pocket.

Update 44: Reader Mike says he got the Incipio Soft Shell for iPhone 4, and that does nothing to help reception problems either. Avoid those if you’re looking for a case for this reason (and not for just protecting your phone).

Update 45: Reader Ryan points out, along with other readers, that the death grip kills phones inside, but if he goes outside and performs the same grab, nothing happens. Could be just an indoor penetration issue?

Update 46: Found a YouTube video by Insanely Great Mac that illustrate dropping calls, not just losing bars. It might be because his reception is not very great to begin with (1 or 2 bars on the iPhone 4 in a call to start).

Update 47: Reader Rodrigo got AppleCare to send him a free black iPhone 4 bumper after complaining.

Update 48: Reader David says he got the Griffin Reveal case, and it DOES fix the reception problem for him. (What the hell is going on?)

Update 49: I just ran the SpeedTest app while holding the phone gingerly, by the top, and holding it in the death grip. Gingerly got me 2200kbps/1200kbps, death grip got me 440kbps/630kbps. The bars only changed from 5 bars to 4, which means the bars are not a super accurate measure of performance. At least, of performance change.

I did the same test on 3GS, and went from 1454kbps/238kbps to 1072kbps/187kbps. Still a change, because there’s more meat for the signal to traverse through, but not nearly as dramatic a difference as on the iPhone 4.

Update 50: Rosa performed the same SpeedTest in two configurations: regular death grip, and death grip but with the Bumper case on. Her results: 3651kbps/1276kbps with bumper, 1862kbps/209kbps in death grip. That upload took a huge hit, with bumpered being five times as fast as bare grip. Download only at two times as fast. Still, pretty large change.

Thanks tipsters! Keep sending these in.

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