How to Fix GPS Not Working
Step-by-step fixes for GPS not working on iPhone and Android. Covers location settings, compass calibration, battery saver issues, network resets, and more.
You are following directions and suddenly your phone announces "GPS signal lost" right in the middle of an unfamiliar intersection. Or the blue dot on your map is confidently pointing you into a lake. Or it just spins in circles and never figures out where you are.
GPS issues are frustrating because they always seem to happen at the worst possible moment. The software fixes are quick, free, and worth exhausting before you assume the antenna has failed. Google's own troubleshooting sends you to a repair shop only after a phone fails to get a signal outdoors, fully charged, under clear sky. We will walk through the fixes from simplest to most thorough, so you can stop at whichever step gets your GPS working again.
Check that location services are turned on
This sounds obvious, and it is still the first thing to rule out. Apps cannot use GPS if your phone's location services are disabled at the system level. On iPhone, go to Settings, then Privacy and Security, then Location Services. Make sure the main toggle at the top is on. While you are here, scroll down and check that the specific app you are using (Maps, Google Maps, Waze, etc.) is set to "While Using the App" or "Always." Apple's support page walks through these settings in detail. On Android, open Settings, then Location, and make sure "Use location" is toggled on. You can also pull down the Quick Settings panel and tap the Location tile. If it is grayed out, tap it to turn it on.
Toggle location off and back on
Even when location services are enabled, the GPS radio can get stuck in a bad state. Toggling it off and on forces your phone to drop its current satellite connections and establish new ones from scratch. Turn location off, wait about ten seconds, then turn it back on. Open your maps app and give it 30 seconds to a minute to get a fresh fix. GPS.gov sets out what actually governs the fix you get, which is satellite geometry, signal blockage, atmospheric conditions, and the design and quality of the receiver itself. A phone that has been switched off, or has traveled a long way since its last fix, has more work to do and takes longer to sort itself out. Do this test outdoors with a clear view of the sky. GPS signals are high-frequency and low-power, so walls, roofs, and even dense tree cover can block them.
Restart your phone
A restart clears out temporary software glitches that may be interfering with the GPS hardware. It closes every app and background process and starts the phone's software, location services included, from a clean boot. On iPhone the buttons depend on the model. On iPhone X and later, hold either volume button and the side button until the power-off slider appears. On iPhone 6, 7, 8, and the second or third generation SE, hold the side button on its own. Slide to power off, wait 30 seconds, then hold the same button again until the Apple logo appears. On Android, hold the power button and tap Restart (or Power Off, then turn it back on). Once the phone boots up, open your maps app and check whether the GPS locks on. A restart costs you a minute, so it is worth doing before the longer fixes below.
Turn on Wi-Fi and Bluetooth scanning
Your phone does not rely on GPS satellites alone to figure out where you are. Modern smartphones combine GPS with Wi-Fi access points, cell towers, Bluetooth beacons, and internal sensors like accelerometers and gyroscopes. When any of these extra signals are missing, your location accuracy drops. On Android, go to Settings, then Location, then Location Services (or Wi-Fi and Bluetooth scanning on Samsung devices). Make sure both Wi-Fi scanning and Bluetooth scanning are turned on. These features help pinpoint your location even when you are not actively connected to a Wi-Fi network. On iPhone, Location Services automatically uses Wi-Fi and Bluetooth when those radios are enabled. Make sure Wi-Fi and Bluetooth are both on in Settings, not just in Control Center (which can disconnect without fully disabling them).
Good to know: If you are navigating in a car and the GPS keeps losing signal, check whether your windshield has metallic window tint. Some tint films contain metal particles, and metal between your phone and the sky weakens the signal before it arrives. If you are not sure what is on your glass, the installer or the vehicle paperwork will say.
Calibrate your compass
GPS tells your phone where you are, but the compass (magnetometer) tells it which direction you are facing. If the compass is poorly calibrated, your blue dot might be in the right spot but pointing the wrong way, which makes turn-by-turn navigation feel broken. Open Google Maps (on Android or iPhone) and tap the blue dot that represents your location. If it shows a wide, faded beam instead of a narrow directional arrow, the compass needs calibrating. Tap the "Calibrate" option if it appears. The calibration method is the same on both platforms. Hold your phone and move it in a figure-eight pattern, rotating your wrist so the phone tilts in all directions. Do this for about 15 to 20 seconds. Watch the beam rather than any accuracy label. It should tighten from a wide fan to a narrow arrow, which is how Google describes it too. Depending on Street View coverage where you are standing, Maps may open its Live View calibrator instead and ask you to point the camera at the buildings around you. Either one does the same job, so follow whichever you get.
Turn off battery saver mode
Battery saver is one of the sneakiest GPS killers. On many phones, it quietly disables GPS when the battery gets low, especially when the screen is off or your maps app is running in the background. You will not get a notification that this happened. Your navigation just silently stops updating. Google's GPS troubleshooting page confirms this behavior. On Android, go to Settings, then Battery, and turn off Battery Saver or Power Saving Mode. On iPhone, go to Settings, then Battery, and toggle off Low Power Mode. If your battery is low and you need GPS, plug your phone into a charger or a portable battery pack instead. That way you get both working GPS and enough power to reach your destination.
Heads up: Some Android manufacturers add their own battery optimization on top of the standard battery saver. Check Settings, then Apps, then your maps app, and look for battery optimization or background activity settings. Make sure your maps app is set to "Unrestricted" or allowed to run in the background.
Check for software updates
GPS issues sometimes come from bugs in the operating system itself. Phone manufacturers regularly release updates that fix location accuracy problems, patch GPS driver issues, and improve how the phone talks to satellites. On iPhone, go to Settings, then General, then Software Update. On Android, go to Settings, then System (or About Phone), then System Update. Install any available updates, then restart your phone and test GPS again. If your GPS problems started right after an update, you are not alone. OS updates occasionally introduce regressions in location services. In that case, the fix is usually the next patch update. In the meantime, restarting your phone and resetting network settings (the next step) can help work around the issue. This is also the point to work out what is actually broken. Google suggests installing a third-party GPS status app, which reads the raw satellite fix directly. If that app locks on while your maps app still will not, the problem is the app rather than the phone, and reinstalling the app beats resetting your network settings.
Reset location settings, then network settings
On iPhone, try the lighter reset first. To put all your location settings back to the factory default, Apple's Location Services page says to go to Settings, then General, then Transfer or Reset iPhone, tap Reset, then tap Reset Location & Privacy. Apps then stop using your location until you grant them permission again, so expect a few prompts afterward. If that does not help, resetting network settings is the heavier fix. It clears all saved Wi-Fi passwords, Bluetooth pairings, cellular settings, and VPN configurations, which helps when the Wi-Fi and cellular positioning in step 4 is the part that has gone wrong. On iPhone, go to Settings, then General, then Transfer or Reset iPhone, then Reset, and tap Reset Network Settings. On Android, go to Settings, then System (or General Management on Samsung), then Reset Options, and tap Reset Wi-Fi, Mobile, and Bluetooth. Your phone will restart. After it boots up, reconnect to your Wi-Fi network (you will need your password), then open your maps app and test GPS. Neither reset erases your personal data, photos, or apps.
Heads up: Write down your Wi-Fi passwords before you do this. You will need to re-enter them for every network your phone was connected to. Your Bluetooth devices will also need to be paired again.
Factory reset as a last resort
If you have tried every step above and your GPS still will not work, the issue may be a deeper software corruption that only a full factory reset can fix. This erases everything on your phone, so it is truly the nuclear option. Before you reset, back up your phone. On iPhone, use iCloud (Settings, then your name, then iCloud, then iCloud Backup) or connect to a computer and use Finder or iTunes. On Android, use Google's built-in backup (Settings, then System, then Backup) or your manufacturer's backup tool. Once backed up, on iPhone go to Settings, then General, then Transfer or Reset iPhone, then Erase All Content and Settings. On Android, go to Settings, then System, then Reset Options, then Erase All Data (Factory Reset). After the reset, set up your phone and test GPS before restoring your backup. If GPS works on a fresh install but breaks after restoring, one of your apps or settings is the culprit. In that case, set up the phone fresh and reinstall apps one at a time instead of restoring from backup. If GPS still does not work after a factory reset, the problem is almost certainly hardware. Contact your phone manufacturer or visit a repair shop to have the GPS antenna checked.
A setting toggled off, a battery saver quietly killing location services, a compass that needs a figure-eight. Those are the cheap explanations, and they are why the first six steps are the quick ones and the destructive fixes come last. If you have worked through all nine and your GPS still refuses to cooperate, the antenna itself may need professional attention. And if you head into the backcountry, carry a way to navigate that does not need a signal at all. Our guide on how to use a compass covers the basics.
Questions we get asked about this
Answers from experience, not a textbook.
Some car windshields and window tints contain metallic particles that weaken the signal, as the tip in step 4 explains. Try placing your phone on the dashboard or closer to the windshield to see if the signal improves. If it does, the tint is likely the issue. A phone mount near the base of the windshield usually helps enough for reliable navigation.
GPS.gov puts a typical GPS-enabled smartphone at 4.9 meters (16 feet) under open sky, and adds that accuracy worsens near buildings, bridges, and trees. It does not put a number on how much worse, and neither will we. What happens in a city is that tall buildings hide some satellites outright and bounce the signals from others, so your phone is working from a poorer view of the sky than the open-sky figure assumes. Your phone compensates by using Wi-Fi, cell towers, and Bluetooth to narrow down its position, which is why keeping those radios on improves accuracy.
GPS itself does not use mobile data. It receives signals directly from satellites, which is free. However, your maps app uses mobile data to load map tiles, traffic information, and route calculations. If you are worried about data usage, download offline maps in Google Maps or Apple Maps before you leave Wi-Fi. Your phone will still use GPS for positioning but will not need data to show the map.
When your phone has been off or has traveled a long distance while powered down, it needs to download fresh satellite position data before it can calculate your location. This is called a cold start, and it can take a few minutes instead of the few seconds you are used to. Once your phone has a fix, subsequent GPS locks are much faster because it caches the satellite data. Keeping Wi-Fi on helps speed up the process because your phone can download satellite data over the internet instead of waiting to receive it from the satellites themselves.
Standard plastic, silicone, and leather phone cases do not block GPS signals. However, cases with metal plates (often used for magnetic car mounts), built-in batteries, or metallic card holders can interfere with GPS reception. If you use a case with a metal plate, try removing it and testing GPS without it. If the signal improves, switch to a case with a non-metallic mount system.
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