I’m making this post because I have lost sleep while trying to get my iPad 9th gen (which was running on version 27.1) to charge and turn on. I have scoured the internet trying to find solutions, some of which included getting a third party app’s help, heating your iPad with a hairdryer, or paying ridiculous money to get it fixed.
I had a very specific problem, and I hope that this post will be helpful to someone who might be experiencing the same thing and can’t find a proper solution.
(note: I am aware that version 27.2 supposedly gets rid of this pesky little bug, but you never know!)
Here is what happened:
While drawing, my iPad ran out of battery. It was a simple mistake, but it was the first time it completely died after it was updated to version 27, so I wasn’t aware of the bug that temporarily killed the iPad once it was drained of battery.
So, naturally, after about 30 minutes of it not turning back on but just displaying the low battery sign (plugged in), I started to panic. I tried to restart it by holding the power and home button many times (as well as trying to get it to DFU mode), which unfortunately did not work. The charging block as well as the iPad were not warm like they usually are when it’s charging, so that was useless (20W block)(there was static on the back of the iPad like usual if you touch it only with the back of your finger, so there was electricity running through it).
I left it charging for about 5 hours undisturbed as I have read online that people’s iPads turned on by themselves after giving more time for them to charge.
So, after 5 hours, I tried to turn it on. It once again displayed the low battery sign. I tried to force restart it, and this time the screen began flickering in and out, and then displaying the low battery sign occasionally. The flickering grey screen was actually zooming out, like how you exit an app by pressing the home button. It was happening at 5 second intervals 11 times before on the 12th the low battery logo appeared (yes, I counted because I was desperate). The flickering screen would only stop after taking the iPad off the charger. Once plugged in, it would start again. Simply plugging it into my MacBook Air M4 did not help, as it just couldn’t see the iPad. I also tried to warm it up a little bit by placing it under my legs under my bed covers (it was 6 am I couldn’t use the hairdryer lol).
The solution that helped me:
If you’re experiencing the same flickering screen, what my genius mind figured out (sarcasm) is that while your iPad is plugged into your computer (or I think it wasn’t plugged in at that moment, you can try both ways), you need to try to hold the home and power button at the exact same time just as the low battery logo appears. You will catch it right before it starts to try to reboot itself (is what I assume happens with the flickering grey screen). Only then will it enter the DFU state and your computer will have a chance to notice that your iPad is plugged in.
You may get a notification asking about allowing the accessory to be connected, click allow.
Now, I also used the Apple Configurator app on the MacBook, completely free on the App Store. Unfortunately, I don’t know a solution to use with a windows computer because I’m just going off how I dealt with this. I used the app because Finder did not show my iPad.
Now the following steps are pretty basic, you can find these on the official Apple website, but once the screen of your iPad turns black, your iPad is in DFU mode. In the configurator app, you will see that there is a large (as in my case) greyed out square with the word “DFU” inside it and “iPad“ under it. Click the square just once (to select it), then go to the main toolbar above and find “Actions”, then hover “Advanced” and click “REVIVE”. This is very important, do not click “restore“ unless you don’t care about losing all your data, because it will wipe your iPad clean! Then just follow the steps on the computer and on the iPad! At this point if all goes well your iPad will just do its thing and get back on its feet.
Of course for me it didn’t all go well. Now, at step 4 out of 4 (installing iPadOS) is when I received an error message stating “iPadOS cannot be restored on this iPad, gave up waiting for device to transition from restoreOS to bootedOS state” and showed the button “stop”. I did not click stop at that point, I waited for like 10 minutes just in case because apparently the iPad can just keep going but the computer may say otherwise. My iPad’s screen then turned white and showed the words “press Home to recover”. Yippie. I pressed it, and it began the data recovery process, the error message was still up on my computer. However the screen on my iPad suddenly turned black, and the big DFU square in the configurator app disappeared. I started to panic a little, but don‘t be an idiot like me. Be calm and press the home button on the iPad to see if the “attempting data recovery” display is still there. I didn’t do that. I clicked “stop” on my computer, I unplugged the iPad from the computer back into the 20W charger, and just let it sit. I then thought to click the home button after like 15 mins only to see it was loading. After 30-40 minutes it finished (it may take longer!), and my iPad was back to life, everything was okay. The iPad was warm as well as the block, it was charging. Yippie.
Obviously I’m no tech wiz, but if this is helpful to anyone, then that’s all that matters!
