Weird iOS 11 bug infuriates iPhone users by preventing them from typing the letter ‘i’ – here’s how to fix it

Apple iPhone(Image: Photographer's Choice)

A bizarre bug in Apple’s latest mobile operating system, iOS 11, is infuriating iPhone users.

Several people have reported that every time they try to to type the letter “i”, it gets replaced by the letter A and a strange character.

The additional character is typically a question mark in a box, but occasionally appears as five horizontal bars, according to reports.

Other users are reporting that the letter “i” is sometimes being corrected to an exclamation mark and a question mark in a box.

The error first surfaced almost a week ago, following the release of iOS 11.1 – a software update that brought bug fixes as well as introducing a whole range of new emoji.

However, not everyone who updated to the latest software is affected by the problem, and it’s still not clear what is causing it.

Emojipedia’s Jeremy Burge suggests that the issue is most likely caused by an auto-correct bug in iOS 11.1.

“What’s really going on is that the letter ‘I’ is being appended with an invisible character known as Variation Selector 16 when auto-correct kicks in to replace the lowercase ‘i’,” he explained in a blog post .

Apple iPhone iOS 11.1

(Image: REUTERS/Jason Reed)

“This VS-16 character is intended to be used to make the previous character have emoji appearance. When used in conjunction with the letter ‘I’ it displays in some apps as ‘A ⍰’.”

Those who are affected claim that the bug affects every app that uses this keyboard – including Messages and Safari as well as third-party apps like Twitter and Instagram.

How to fix the bug

Apple has acknowledged the issue , and advises anyone who is affected to set up Text Replacement for the letter “i” until the bug is fixed in a future software update.

Here’s how to set up the work around:

  1. Go to Settings > General > Keyboard > Text Replacement.
  2. Tap +.
  3. For Phrase, type an upper-case “I”. For Shortcut, type a lower-case “i.”

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SOURCE: Mirror

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