Is the native camera app broken in IOS27 for the Voiceover users?

By eyesfreesight, 1 October, 2026

Forum
iOS and iPadOS

Hey everyone!
I finally got my brand new iPhone 18 Pro 2 days ago. I was stoked to try to use the center stage feature (the one that tracks your face when filming with a front-facing camera). I came from the iPhone 13 and it didn’t have this feature….
So, I realized Voiceover doesn’t speak where in the frame my face is on IOS 27. I tried to close the Camera app and restart the phone. The problem is still there..
Can someone please check their iPhones if you updated yours to IOS 27?
If it was taken away, I don’t know what else should happen to make Apple actually work on their bugs and errors!….
P.s. I’ve run into multiple various errors and mistakes trying to transfer my older iPhone and my grandma’s iPhone. The latter venture failed even after around 5 hours of trying, updating, restarting and talking on the phone with Apple Support…. I’ve done iPhone transfers over 10 times for different people with very old and latest phones since 2022, never encountered anything like that. I believe it’s just the general tendency of not giving a f*ck…. If those things are a norm nowadays, how can we even begin to speak about accessibility problems that haven’t been tackled for years?….

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Comments

By eyesfreesight on Saturday, October 3, 2026 - 08:10

I still haven’t gotten any feedback on this which is quite frustrating. the more we’re “dragging our feet” in the blind community which is very small totally blind Voiceover users-wise, the longer it takes for Apple to tackle the issues. It already takes very long even if we report things together, but it takes even more time if fewer users talk about it

By eyesfreesight on Wednesday, October 28, 2026 - 18:43

I don't know why everybody seems to ignore this post, as if no-one cares about the accessibility and a camera!
I also know there are some totally blind people here who have the iPhone 18 Pro like me and who could put in their 2 cents about it....
Maybe there are no totally blind video bloggers? I think there are some, especially given the fact that it's also about the photo mode in the native Camera app as well....
Maybe there no totally blind camera users with the iPhone 18 Pro?

By OldBear on Wednesday, October 28, 2026 - 20:53

I just took a selfie of sorts half an hour ago and it told me I was centered. But I'm using an SE3 and don't have what you're talking about. So... it is with whatever the new phones have if it is an issue.

By Джксер on Wednesday, October 28, 2026 - 21:49

I use iphone 16 pro and I don't see such a problem, maybe it affects the latest model or certain settings

By Umbreon on Wednesday, October 28, 2026 - 23:14

I just checked and with either the front camera or back camera, VoiceOver is no longer reporting face position in Apple's camera app. Running iOS 27.2 on an iPhone 18 Pro Max. I'm personally just now responding to your post because it got buried in the avalanche of "test my app posts."

By Earle on Wednesday, October 28, 2026 - 23:50

I have an iPhone 18 Pro Max, and I’m having no trouble at all using the camera. Even though I am totally blind, the camera helps by telling me when it is centered and level. Once it confirms the phone is level, I just snap the photo, and everything works perfectly.

By Earle on Thursday, October 29, 2026 - 00:18

You are right. I don’t receive any information about my face position. I just assume everything is OK when it tells me that it is level. If I’m aiming the camera at a person’s face, I just assume everything is all right when it says it’s level.

By Singer Girl on Thursday, October 29, 2026 - 04:55

By far the worst ever update for me not just in 27.2 but 27 in general. I hate this iOS this year. There’s so many issues for all the stuff they were supposedly trying to fix. They actually broke a whole bunch of stuff. Phone calls, and dictation stuff they were supposedly trying to fix. It’s so crazy and frustrating. You can see it in other posts I’ve made on here. I don’t know about the camera. I don’t have that feature. I use a 15 regular in an SE 2022.

By Seanoevil on Thursday, October 29, 2026 - 05:54

There are changes in the Camera App for sure, but I am not convinced if they are broken or just different. And, depending on your preferences, worse.
In my testing on an 18Pro on IOS 27.2 the Camera App did a great job of describing the scene, adjusting pertinent details as I panned the camera. It also let me know if the camera was level.
It did not, however, tell me if faces was centred, etc.
I guess the ideal scenario is a combination of the two. A feedback system that advised the framing of faces as well as the contents of the image.
However, if it was a binary choice I would choose the scene description. It gave me background perspective that I had no access to before and provided useful information about the subject of the photo.
Hopefully Apple hears your complaints and adds some mor framing info to the SIRI Image Description.
SeanoEvil

By Singer Girl on Thursday, October 29, 2026 - 09:17

Still no voice feedback and recovery mode. Had to use the iPhone 15 camera on a phone call with Apple Accessibility to get that phone back into operation. It’s crazy. That’s OK though they saw it and they got all the info and giving it all to the appropriate people so yeah this is ridiculous. There’s no way I could’ve done that without signing help. But they came in my house, Accessibility. Don’t worry about this the dictation is nuts. There’s nothing at my house. There’s just no way that I could do this without sided people opening this. Dictation is still another major issue and by the way it’s not just with voice dictation itself. I think Apple is purposely messing with older phones. I really do. I don’t tell them that, but I didn’t think that’s what’s going on here.

I hate to break it to you but relying on just the information about the level is not that stable as relying on both, the position of a face in the frame and how even the level of the camera is....

By eyesfreesight on Friday, October 30, 2026 - 18:45

Finally somebody found my post! Now would you please also report this to the Apple Accessibility department, just like I did? The more people report this absurd, the quicker it'll be fixed....
Also, please mention the inability to know the orientation of a video right away.... It's also very annoying and, to my opinion, very unfair to the blind community from a brand that claims to serve the blind as well. I understood if it was some Android device, but Apple....

Here's a message I just put together you're free to steel and use to report to Apple's Accessibility:
Hello! Hope you're having a wonderful day :)
My name is (insert yours) and I'm a TOTALLY BLIND video and photo creator.
I got the brand new iPhone 18 Pro over a month ago and I'm really disappointed with the native Camera app regression!!!
I realized Voiceover doesn’t speak where in the frame my face is on IOS 27.2, no matter what camera I switch to. I tried to close the Camera app and restart the phone. The problem is still there..
I placed the article about this problem on Apple Vis and got several comments from some Voiceover users who got their hands on the latest and greatest iPhone 18 Pro Max and other phones....
Also, the problem with Voiceover not announcing the orientation of videos(portret/landscape) right away makes it even worse.
Please fix these problems asap.
I believe that such a reputable company who claims to care about users with different abilities and disabilities listens to the users and fixes those errors that inevitably happen due to the technology being a lot more complex than it used to be,but those errors significantly hinder the general capabilities of the latest devices.
Thank you advance :)

By hittsjunk on Friday, October 30, 2026 - 20:38

Hi. I just took a selfie with my iPhone 17 pro running iOS 27.2. it did detect my face with the front camera, so it appears Apple will be having difficulty solving this problem. I'm curious, do you put focus into the viewfinder when you're trying to take a picture? I tend to do that because that gave me better results in the old days

By Dominic on Friday, October 30, 2026 - 21:51

Not really sure myself, all I know is that during the beta cycle when I was using my iPhone 11, even though Apple had added the paus recording button to the camera app. The pause button wasn't accessible to VoiceOver. I wonder if that's been fixed now I hope so.