8 ways to fix an iPhone that's not ringing properly

If your iPhone is in Do Not Disturb mode, incoming calls won't ring and they'll go straight to voicemail. The same goes if you have a Focus mode enabled that's set to block calls on iOS 15. 

To check if you have Do Not Disturb or Focus turned on, swipe down from the top-right corner of your iPhone's screen to open the Control Center. There, look at the rectangle next to your brightness controls — if it says Do Not Disturb, Driving, Sleep, or something similar, it's turned on.

Tap this button to disable your Do Not Disturb or Focus mode.

It's possible that your phone is "stuck" in headphones mode, meaning that it's sending your ringtone to a device that's not actually connected. This might include earbuds that aren't plugged in or a Bluetooth device that isn't turned on.

Here are a few things you can try to "wake up" your iPhone's audio connection so it's working properly:

• Plug earbuds into your phone and remove them again to coax the phone into recognizing there are no earbuds plugged in. 
• Make sure you're not connected to another audio device by swiping up on the screen to display the Control Center. Then tap the Airplay icon in the music pane — it looks like a triangle with three circles — and if anything other than the iPhone is selected, choose the iPhone.
• Enable and disable Airplane Mode by tapping the airplane icon in the Control Center.

If the phone won't ring for a specific caller and that person isn't blocked, then check to see if it's a custom ringtone you assigned to them that isn't working.

You can change a contact's ringtone through the Phone app.

Open the Phone app and tap Contacts at the bottom, then select the contact whose ringtone you want to change. Tap Edit in the top right corner of the contact's page. Tap Ringtone, then select a non-custom ringtone from the list of available options and then do a test call to see if your iPhone still won't ring. 

Apple gives you the ability to block specific phone numbers, which is handy if you get a lot of telemarketing and other spam phone calls.

To make sure you didn't accidentally block an important number by accident, open the Settings app and tap Phone, then scroll down to select Blocked Contacts. If there's anyone on this list that shouldn't be, swipe left on them and tap Unblock.

Make sure that your iPhone's Ring/Silent switch isn't in the Silent position. You can find your iPhone's Ring/Silent switch on the left side of the phone, above the volume controls.

It should be closer to the screen. If it's flipped down (with a red band visible), it's set to silent.

It's possible the phone's volume is too low to hear it ringing. To fix a volume issue and make your iPhone louder, press the Volume up button on the left side of the phone until you can hear something.

You can then test if your iPhone ringer isn't working by playing music or a video. If you hear noise, the issue is low ringer volume, not your ringer not working.

If all else fails, consider restarting or resetting your iPhone. This is a great way to fix all sorts of hardware and software issues.

If none of the other troubleshooting tricks solved your problem, you probably have a hardware problem issue, like a damaged speaker or a fried port. 

You can go to Apple's support page and set up an appointment to have someone look at it in-person.