Is your iPad frozen, keeps freezing, or is locked up? Finding that your iPad is unresponsive to any touch on its screen?
iPads occasionally stop responding for various reasons, which is often frustrating, especially if you’re in the middle of something important.
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Quick Tips 
If your iPad keeps freezing, give some of these quick tips a try and see if they resolve your issues
- Restart or force restart your iPad
- Place on a charger and allow iPad to charge, without any use, for at least 1 hour
- Close all open apps and restart
- Reset All Settings
- Restore iPad
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iPad Frozen Tip #1: Restart
Try restarting your iPad. To do this, simply press and hold the Sleep/Wake button when the iPad freezes until a red slider appears on the screen. Slide the slider to trigger the shutdown process. 
To turn back on, press and hold the Sleep/Wake button until the Apple logo appears.
Are you using iOS 11+?
- For folks using iOS 11 and above, there’s another way to shut down using a software command.
- Go to Settings > General
- Scroll all the way down and choose Shut Down
- Slide to power off
iPad Frozen Tip #2: Force Reset
If the first tip didn’t work, or if your iPad keeps freezing, try resetting your iPad–also called a Hard Restart or Force Restart.
To force restart your frozen iPad or iPhone device:
- On an iPhone 8, iPhone X Series or iPad with no Home Button: Press and quickly release the Volume Up button, then press and release volume down. Next, hold the power button on the side or top of the device until the Apple logo appears
- On an iPhone 7 or iPhone 7 Plus: Press and hold both the Sleep/Wake and Volume Down buttons for at least twenty seconds, until you see the Apple logo
- On an iPhone 6s and earlier, iPad with Home Button, or iPod Touch: Press and hold both the Sleep/Wake and Home buttons for at least twenty seconds, until you see the Apple logo
Some of our readers mentioned that performing tip#2 on older iPhone or iPad models required them to hold the two buttons down for about 30 seconds.
So if the first time fails and your iPad is still locked up, try it again with a 30 second hold.
Home Button Not Working?
- Wait until the battery is fully discharged and then plug it in to reboot
- Or restart using Assistive Touch for a virtual home button
iPad Frozen Tip #3: Charge
If the above tips don’t work, the issue could be that the battery is fully depleted. Plug it into a wall outlet for a while and see if your battery holds a charge. 
Please note that it can take up to 20 minutes of charging before the iPad starts up.
Ideally, plug in your device and let it charge for up at least one hour!
Don’t See The Charging Screen? 
- If, within an hour, you don’t see the charging icon on your screen or you see the connect to power screen, check the charging port on your iPad, USB cable, and power adapter
- Make sure that everything is plugged in firmly, free of debris, and not damaged
- Try a different cable or power adapter
iPad Frozen Tip #4: Close Apps (if possible)
Another tip that often works is closing all your open apps and then restarting.
How To Close Apps on iOS Devices: iPhone, iPad, or iPod Touch
- Double press the Home Button or swipe up the Home Gesture Bar
- This action should open the app switcher
- This action should open the app switcher
- Swipe up, off the top of your screen, all the app previews until you only see your Home Screen
- Restart your device
iPad Frozen Tip #5: Reset Settings (if possible)
Sometimes a random setting is getting in the way, so let’s reset all those settings back to factory defaults.
How To Reset All Settings on an iPad
- This is usually the last resort since it resets all your personalized features back to factory defaults
- Go to Settings > General > Reset > Reset All
- This resets to default everything in Settings, including notifications, alerts, brightness, and clock settings like wake up alarms
- Resetting all settings also reverts all your personalized and customized features like wallpapers and accessibility settings back to factory defaults.
- Performing this action does not impact any of your personal device data, including photos, texts, documents, and other files
- You need to reconfigure these settings once your iPhone or iDevice restarts
No Time? Check Out Our Video Tips to Fix a Frozen iPad!
Continuing Problems
If you are still having problems with your iPad freezing, try connecting the device to your computer and launch iTunes. Then select Restore.
This may erase some of the newer items saved to your iPad that you haven’t yet synced to the cloud, but it will also prevent iPad freezes.
If problems persist, you might need to use iOS Recovery Mode or DFU Mode.
Back Up!
Once you get your iPad back to working condition, it’s a good idea to backup.
To back up your iPad to iCloud
- Go to Settings > Apple ID Profile
- Tap iCloud > iCloud Backup > Back Up Now
To back up your iPad with iTunes
- Connect your iPad to a computer and open up iTunes
- Tap the iPad device icon near in the upper left-hand
- Choose Summary
- In the Backups section, choose This computer and Back Up Now
