The iPhone has long been the staple for modern-day devices, be it about monitoring your health or automatically contacting your emergency contacts in case of need. SOS on iPhone allows you to contact emergency services and your emergency contacts easily, and pretty quickly. You can do this either by pressing and holding the Sleep/wake button and Volume buttons, or, by pressing the Sleep/wake button three times on your iPhone.
However, if you — or your kid, more appropriately — repeatedly bashes that combo, then it could send out the SOS needlessly and thus you may want to disable it. Further, these buttons can also be mapped to other functions and can also be used in Switch Control. This can sometimes lead to incorrect activation of SOS, which can be quite annoying. If you’re looking to disable SOS, then here’s how you can do that on your iPhone.
Related: What is Safety Check on iOS 16?
How to disable SOS on iPhone
Here’s how you can disable SOS on your iPhone.
Open the Settings app.
Scroll down and tap Emergency SOS.
Tap and turn off the toggle for Call with Hold. The toggle will turn grey once it is turned off.
Similarly, tap and turn off the toggle for Call with 3 Presses.
Lastly, if you’re using an iPhone 14 Pro or higher, then turn off the toggle for Call After Serious Crash.
Tap Turn Off to confirm your choice.
And that’s how you can disable SOS on your iPhone.
How to remove emergency contacts on iPhone
Now that you’ve disabled SOS, you can also choose to remove your emergency contacts. Here’s how you can do that on your iPhone.
Open the Settings app and tap Health.
Now tap Medical ID.
Tap Edit in the top right corner of your screen.
Scroll down to the Emergency Contacts section and tap the delete 
icon next to your emergency contact.
Tap Delete.
Repeat the steps to remove any additional emergency contacts you might have added and tap Done in the top right corner.
And that’s it! You will now have removed emergency contacts from your iPhone.
How to disable satellite SOS on iPhone 14 or higher
You can also choose to disable satellite SOS in case you don’t wish to subscribe to this new feature from Apple. iOS 16 does not offer a clear way to disable satellite SOS, but the feature requires location permission to function as intended. If the location permission has been disabled, you will be prompted to enable and grant it to use satellite SOS when you do not have any network. Hence, disabling location permissions should help you disable this feature on your iPhone 14 or higher. Use the steps below to help guide ae you through the process.
Open the Settings app on your iPhone.
Tap Privacy & Security.
Tap Location Services at the top.
Now scroll down and tap System Services.
Tap and turn off the toggle for Satellite Connection from the list on your screen.
And that’s it! Satellite SOS will now be disabled and will require you to re-enable this toggle the next time you wish to use it.
Related: How to Turn Off Focus on iPhone
FAQs
Here are a few commonly asked questions about SOS on iPhones that should help you get up to date with the latest information.
Will iPhone call my emergency contacts when SOS is triggered?
No, a call is only made to the emergency services in your region. Your emergency contacts will instead be notified via an SMS containing your current location, which will be shared with them. Any changes in your location will also be sent to your emergency contacts, and your iPhone will remind you about the location being shared every 4 hours for the next day.
Will iPhone automatically call emergency services?
This will depend on your region. If you’re in North America or Europe, then iPhones will automatically connect with the emergency services in your region. If you’re, however, in a region like mainland China, you will be given the option to choose the emergency service you wish to get in touch with in your region.
We hope this post helped you easily disable SOS on your iPhone. If you face any issues or have any more questions, feel free to reach out using the comments below.
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