# iPhone unlock not working consistently



## Nom (Oct 30, 2018)

I’ve had my car (M3 AWD) for about 5 months. Unlock with phone has been flawless. Upgraded to 8.5 a week or so ago. But in last 2 or 3 days, sometimes, when I get to the car, it won’t unlock. I try, try the handle again. Eventually take out my phone thinking I’d check Bluetooth is on, or that I’d use the app to unlock. But before I do anything, the car unlocks. 

One time it rebooted on its own. Other times, no reboot. Other times all worked fine.

Advice?


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## MelindaV (Apr 2, 2016)

Nom said:


> Eventually take out my phone thinking I'd check Bluetooth is on, or that I'd use the app to unlock. But before I do anything, the car unlocks.


take out the phone from where? bag? front pocket? back pocket? 
BLE does not transmit thru items (like bodies) well and if you walk up to the car with your phone in your back pocket, or in a bag behind you, it will very likely NOT communicate with the car.


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## BSElectrons (Dec 2, 2018)

I’ve had the same issue occasionally, not just on 8.5. For me just unlocking my phone does the trick. Hopefully it’ll be resolved one day.


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## Nom (Oct 30, 2018)

@MelindaV - front pocket - same for the past 5 months.

@BSElectrons - that might be doing the trick for me. I'll experiment.


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## Kizzy (Jul 25, 2016)

I had a few delayed unlocking last week on 12.1.1. Either the car was a little sluggish, my phone (iPhone 6S) was on the side of my body facing away from the car, or my phone was a bit sluggish.

It has since mostly been normal (I don’t usually have problems).


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## mswlogo (Oct 8, 2018)

Make sure background processing AND location Always are enabled on the app and that phone is not in power saver mode. 

I never take my phone out and it always works.


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## B.Silva (Sep 30, 2018)

Same thing happened me twice today. Never had a problem before unlocking the car with the phone in my pocket. Till today. I had to take the phone out of my pocket and open the Tesla app, and then the car unlocked. I'm on 12.1.2.


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## FurryOne (Apr 19, 2019)

I had the same thing happen to me yesterday - my phone was on my hip, right next to the car - no open. Took out the card and tried that - no open. Everything worked fine before. What's worse, now I have to use the key card to start the car, (even with my iPhone in the center console charging!) and even that is flakey! Oh, the only way I got into the car yesterday was to unlock it with the "Stats" application! Something definitely changed in the last few days.


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## FurryOne (Apr 19, 2019)

Addendum: One thing I've noticed lately... the Bluetooth phone connections are "growing".  I used to have one connection called "Tesla Model 3". Now I have 4 other connections, listed as:

S1a3b7cef2858e0c7C
S1a3b7cef2858e0c7D
S1a3b7cef2858e0c7P
S1a3b7cef2858e0c7R

These 4 connections just showed up, and all 4 say "connected", while the "Tesla Model 3" says "Not Connected". Turning BT off & on removes these entries for now - but where'd they come from?


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## FurryOne (Apr 19, 2019)

I just did a quick test. I turned off BT, then turned it back on. Those "phantom" connections disappeared. Then I went out to my car, and the door opened on the first try, and "Tesla Model 3" connected. It also started ok. However, after a few seconds the Phantom connections above again appeared! This looks like a software problem that was introduced in the latest update. How do we report this to Tesla?


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## B.Silva (Sep 30, 2018)

FurryOne said:


> I just did a quick test. I turned off BT, then turned it back on. Those "phantom" connections disappeared. Then I went out to my car, and the door opened on the first try, and "Tesla Model 3" connected. It also started ok. However, after a few seconds the Phantom connections above again appeared! This looks like a software problem that was introduced in the latest update.


I've seen those weirdly named BT connections before; they are not new to this release. I've not had problems unlocking the car with phone in pocket though till today.


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## Bokonon (Apr 13, 2017)

FurryOne said:


> These 4 connections just showed up, and all 4 say "connected", while the "Tesla Model 3" says "Not Connected". Turning BT off & on removes these entries for now - but where'd they come from?


Those "phantom" connections are "low-energy" (BLE) connections with sensors near the car's doors and trunk. These BLE connections allow your phone to work as a key, and are typically active when you're near your car, regardless of whether it's powered on. If your phone is properly connected to one of these, the Tesla app's "phone key" status will show as "Connected".

The "Tesla Model 3" connection is a regular Bluetooth connection with the car's MCU and supports phone calls and music from your phone. It is only active while the car is powered on and you're within range.


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## Nom (Oct 30, 2018)

So, it continues to happen. I've noticed that simply taking my phone out of my pocket allows the door to unlock. *Front pocket*, jeans. What the? Seems like I don't even need to wake up the phone. But I haven't been very disciplined in the experiment. Could the Jean's fabric be enough to weaken the signal? No way. But somethings different is happening when I take the phone out of the my pocket. Again, this has always worked prior to now.


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## Jay79 (Aug 18, 2018)

I'm having major bluetooth problems since 12.1.2


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## mswlogo (Oct 8, 2018)

B.Silva said:


> Same thing happened me twice today. Never had a problem before unlocking the car with the phone in my pocket. Till today. I had to take the phone out of my pocket and open the Tesla app, and then the car unlocked. I'm on 12.1.2.


I'm on 12.1.2 as well and it's been fine.

Try rebooting both the car and phone. It will probably settle down.


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## B.Silva (Sep 30, 2018)

mswlogo said:


> I'm on 12.1.2 as well and it's been fine.
> 
> Try rebooting both the car and phone. It will probably settle down.


Yep, I did a shutdown and reboot after the second time it happened. So far so good.


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## Jetstreamsky (Aug 6, 2018)

Three refusal occasions so far on 12.1.2 and this morning it let me in only after using the unlock function in the app but wouldn't drive until I passed the keycard over the console sensor.


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## ChristianZ (Nov 10, 2018)

It has happened 3 times since 12.1.2. In the past 5 months before the update, it probably only happened 3 times.


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## centex (Nov 18, 2018)

I have had some problems with BT connections for the last couple of weeks even before updating to 12.1.2 end of last week. My phone (iPhone SE) has mostly worked to unlock the car but have had to open the Tesla app a couple of times to unlock the car. My wife's identical iPhone would only unlock the car if the Tesla app was opened - only then would the 4 BT Tesla connections show up in the iPhone BT screen and if the Tesla app was closed they would dissappear and the phone would not unlock the car. Also this morning noticed that our phone BT connection for phone calls was unavailable but could not reconnect them or remove them. Tried several times to re-establish BT connection for phone calls, including rebooting car and phone several times but was never able to reconnect the phones to the car. This afternoon tried one more time to BT connect phones with the car and it worked as it should. Also, now my wife's phone shows the 4 BT Tesla connections on the iPhone BT screen without the Tesla app being opened. All of this was not due to 12.1.2 but not sure why it is working corrected this evening.


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## sduck (Nov 23, 2017)

The OP and several other posters with problems don't specify which version of iphone they're using. Knowing that might help people diagnose problems.

Me, I have an iphone X, and haven't had any problems so far using it as a key. I typically carry it in my left front pocket, and don't have to take it out or anything to get it to work ever.

The 4 bluetooth connections is a non-issue, those have been there forever.


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## B.Silva (Sep 30, 2018)

sduck said:


> The OP and several other posters with problems don't specify which version of iphone they're using. Knowing that might help people diagnose problems.
> 
> Me, I have an iphone X, and haven't had any problems so far using it as a key. I typically carry it in my left front pocket, and don't have to take it out or anything to get it to work ever.
> 
> The 4 bluetooth connections is a non-issue, those have been there forever.


I have an iPhone XS. No problems till yesterday and it failed to unlock with the phone in my left front pocket twice. I was able to get the phone to connect and th door to one by opening the Tesla app. I did a shutdown and reboot after it happened the second time and it hasn't happened since.


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## MelindaV (Apr 2, 2016)

sduck said:


> The OP and several other posters with problems don't specify which version of iphone they're using. Knowing that might help people diagnose problems.
> 
> Me, I have an iphone X, and haven't had any problems so far using it as a key. I typically carry it in my left front pocket, and don't have to take it out or anything to get it to work ever.
> 
> The 4 bluetooth connections is a non-issue, those have been there forever.


here also have never had an issue with my iPhone X unlocking/connecting in the 8 months of ownership.


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## jdbunda (Nov 7, 2018)

Same here. I have had my car for 8 months, never a problem unlocking until just recently. I tried killing off apps in my phone (iPhone 7), and haven't had the issue for a few days.


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## Jetstreamsky (Aug 6, 2018)

Jetstreamsky said:


> Three refusal occasions so far on 12.1.2 and this morning it let me in only after using the unlock function in the app but wouldn't drive until I passed the keycard over the console sensor.


Using iPhone 7 Plus, always worked previously without taking my phone from my pocket, but thinking about it now, the week prior to installing 12.1.2 I had a few occasions where the app wouldn't connect or wake the car, I had to pull the door handle to get things moving, but since 12.1.2 that issue disappeared to be replaced with the car ignoring me even when pulling the door handle which was resolved on each occasion using the App to unlock the car.


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## Bigriver (Jan 26, 2018)

Using iPhone 7 Plus, we initially had a lot of trouble until we started leaving the Tesla app open in the background on the phone. We sporadically still have problems. Seems to occur the most when we switch cars amongst us (there is no my car, your car in our house, so there is a lot of variation on who is driving what) and/or multiple phones have been around the car that have the same Tesla account open on the app. That seems to really confuse the situation.


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