How to Turn Off FaceTime on iPhone, iPad, and Mac - MacRumors
Skip to Content

How to Turn Off FaceTime on iPhone, iPad, and Mac

by

There's a serious bug affecting FaceTime right now, which lets someone who calls you hear the audio on your iPhone, iPad, or Mac even if you don't answer the call.

There does not appear to be any way to avoid getting these unwanted calls, short of turning off FaceTime. Luckily, it's easy to do.

facetimehowtodisable

How to Turn Off FaceTime on Your iPhone and iPad

  1. Open the Settings app.
  2. Scroll down to ‌FaceTime‌.
  3. Click on the toggle next to "‌FaceTime‌."

This will turn off ‌FaceTime‌ on your specific device, but you will need to deactivate ‌FaceTime‌ on all of your iPhones and iPads to avoid unwanted spy calls if you use ‌FaceTime‌ connection methods other than a phone number.

How to Turn Off FaceTime on macOS

  1. Open up the ‌FaceTime‌ app.
  2. Click on "‌FaceTime‌" in the menu bar.
  3. Select "Turn ‌FaceTime‌ Off."

You can also choose "Preferences" and deselect "Enable this account to deactivate ‌FaceTime‌.

With ‌FaceTime‌ disabled, no one will be able to secretly ‌FaceTime‌ call you to listen to your audio. With ‌FaceTime‌ enabled, anyone can exploit a Group FaceTime bug to place a call to you that will allow them to listen to your audio even if you don't accept the ‌FaceTime‌ call.

Top Rated Comments

93 months ago
I'm still on iOS 10. Looks like I'm still enjoying the best iOS version.
Some would stay that would be iOS 6. ;)
Score: 2 Votes (Like | Disagree)
zorinlynx Avatar
93 months ago
The big downside to this is most people will probably turn off FaceTime and never turn it back on, even after the bug is fixed.

I like being able to call people with FaceTime audio, because the sound quality is far better than a cellular call. This may prove less reliable in the future.
Score: 2 Votes (Like | Disagree)
arn Avatar
93 months ago
This doesn’t work between my wife’s iPhone 8 (11.4.1) and my ip7+ (12.1.3) both devices must have to be on iOS 12.
I think that's b/c Group FaceTime was an iOS 12 feature.
Score: 2 Votes (Like | Disagree)
-BigMac- Avatar
93 months ago
How to turn off Facetime.

Click “Turn off Facetime”.

The more you know;)
Score: 2 Votes (Like | Disagree)
AZMecha Avatar
93 months ago
I'm still on iOS 10. Looks like I'm still enjoying the best iOS version.
Not :p:p:p
Score: 1 Votes (Like | Disagree)
93 months ago
[doublepost=1548735503][/doublepost]Of if you get a call from anyone you dont trust, just power off your phone immediately.
Seems like overkill. If someone was actually worried about a FaceTime attack of this kind, easy enough to decline the call and that ends the whole thing right there.
Score: 1 Votes (Like | Disagree)

Popular Stories

iPhone 18 Pro Deep Red Feature

iPhone 18 Pro Launching Later This Year With These 12 New Features

Wednesday March 18, 2026 7:39 am PDT by
While the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max are not expected to launch for another six months or so, there are already plenty of rumors about the devices. It was initially reported that the iPhone 18 Pro models would have fully under-screen Face ID, with only a front camera visible in the top-left corner of the screen. However, the latest rumors indicate that only one Face ID component...
Apple Logo Sketch Feature

Apple Has Now Unveiled Eight New Products This Month

Tuesday March 17, 2026 9:25 am PDT by
Apple has unveiled a whopping eight new products so far this March, including an iPhone 17e, iPad Air models with the M4 chip, MacBook Air models with the M5 chip, MacBook Pro models with M5 Pro and M5 Max chips, an updated Studio Display, a higher-end Studio Display XDR, and now the AirPods Max 2 this week. iPhone 17e features the same overall design as the iPhone 16e, but it gains Apple's...
ios 26 4 yellow

Here Are Apple's Release Notes for iOS 26.4

Wednesday March 18, 2026 11:56 am PDT by
Apple provided developers and public beta testers with the release candidate versions of iOS 26.4 and iPadOS 26.4, which means we're going to see a public launch as soon as next week. The RC versions of the software include Apple's official release notes, giving us final details on what's included in the update. Apple Music - Playlist Playground (beta) generates a playlist from your...