Has anyone else on iPhone Air noticed text-selection issues in the ChatGPT iPhone app?
On my iPhone Air, when I long-press to select text and then drag right to extend the selection, the app can swipe or shift instead of extending the text selection.
I deleted and reinstalled the app. That improved it, but did not fully fix it.
I’m wondering whether the iPhone Air screen profile may be a factor. It has a narrower/taller device profile than the more common iPhone models, so I’m curious whether that could be exposing a ChatGPT app gesture or text-selection issue on this device.
I’m not saying that is proven. I’m saying it seems like a pattern worth checking.
If you’re using iPhone Air and have seen anything similar, I’d be interested to know.
Hey @PatternSignal, totally get why that’s annoying, especially when you’re just trying to grab text and the whole screen shifts on you.
I’ve seen a few folks mention similar “drag turns into swipe” behavior on newer or less common screen sizes. It doesn’t seem specific to one model, but the taller/narrower layout like on iPhone Air could be making the gesture boundaries a bit more sensitive. So your hunch isn’t off.
What’s likely happening is a bit of overlap between the text-selection gesture and the app’s horizontal/vertical scroll handling. Reinstall helping a bit lines up with that, but not fully fixing it suggests it’s more of a UI tuning gap than a one-off bug.
A couple things that have helped others:
- Try a slightly longer press before dragging, gives the selection mode time to “lock in”
- Drag slower and more vertically first, then sideways
- If it keeps happening, switching to copy via the selection handles instead of drag can be more reliable
Would be good to see if more iPhone Air users can confirm, since that pattern could help narrow it down. Curious if it happens more in longer responses vs short ones?
-Mark G
Thanks, this is helpful.
Yes, reinstall improved it but did not fully fix it, which is why I suspected it might be more of a UI tuning issue than a one-off bug.
For me, it is not limited to long responses. It also happens in short draft text while I am editing my own message. For example, after dictating a short sentence, I tried to select and remove a couple of words, and the app swiped instead of letting me extend the text selection.
So the issue appears to affect text selection more broadly in the ChatGPT iPhone app, not just long assistant responses.
I also did not have this issue on my previous iPhone 15 Pro with the ChatGPT app. This started for me on iPhone Air.
@PatternSignal, from what you’re describing, it does seem less like a one-off glitch and more like a broader touch or gesture handling issue in the iPhone app, especially around text selection vs swipe recognition. The fact that it started on iPhone Air and not your 15 Pro is a really helpful signal too.
I’m going to pass this along as feedback to the team, particularly the part about short text + selection getting overridden by swipe. That kind of repro detail is exactly what helps narrow it down.
If you notice any pattern like specific keyboards, dictation, or orientation making it worse, feel free to add it here. That kind of detail helps a lot.
-Mark G.
Thank you, Mark, this is helpful.
One thing I wanted to add is that this is not a one-off issue. It does not happen every single time, but it happens often enough in normal use that I felt it was important to report in detail.
If the team tests this on an actual iPhone Air device, I do not think it should take long to reproduce. It happens often enough to be noticeable in regular use, not just as a rare edge case.