The mute switch on my iPhone broke this week. I spent some time at the beach– maybe I got sand in it? Not sure. Until I get it fixed, there is an easy way to turn the ringer on and off using a built-in accessibility feature.
If you find yourself in the same situation, here’s what you can do:
Step #1: Get into the general settings menu by pressing “Settings” and then “General”
Step #2: Next press “Accessibility” and then “AssistiveTouch”
Step #3: Turn on AssistiveTouch by pressing the switch. A grey-rounded square should appear on your screen. Pressing this square activates the AssistiveTouch feature.
After AssistiveTouch is turned on, you can toggle the mute switch by pressing the grey-rounded square, pressing “Device,” and then “Mute” or “Unmute.”
This was tested on an iPhone 6 running iOS 8. The screenshots were prepared using the apps Skitch and LongScreen.