How to fix your Galaxy S9 when Bixby Home button stops working

Welcome to another Galaxy S9 (#GalaxyS9) troubleshooting article for you today. As always, we bring you some of the S9 issues sent our way by some members of our community. Some of the cases may sound familiar but that’s because they are some of the common problems affecting Samsung devices.

If you are looking for solutions to your own #Android issue, you can contact us by using the link provided at the bottom of this page. When describing your issue, please be as detailed as possible so we can easily pinpoint a relevant solution. If you can, kindly include the exact error messages you are getting to give us an idea where to start. If you have already tried some troubleshooting steps before emailing us, make sure to mention them so we can skip them in our answers.

Problem #1: How to fix Galaxy S9 Plus that won’t fast charge

Had my S9 Plus for about 2 months. Takes about 4-6 hours to charge. I’ve used the fast charger plug with several USB plugs. It shows fast charging. I’ve tried battery detection apps but same.

Solution: Your S9 Plus may fail to fast charge if its actively running tasks or many apps in the background. Try to see how fast it charges when it’s on safe mode. Third party apps and services won’t run on safe mode, limiting the possibility of third party apps from interfering. Here’s how to restart the device to safe mode:

Turn the device off.
Press and hold the Power key past the model name screen.
When “SAMSUNG” appears on the screen, release the Power key.
Immediately after releasing the Power key, press and hold the Volume down key.
Continue to hold the Volume down key until the device finishes restarting.
Safe mode will display in the bottom left corner of the screen.
Release the Volume down key when you see Safe Mode.

If there’s no change and your S9 won’t fast charge even on safe mode, try to do a factory reset. Afterwards, see how fast charging works again.

To factory reset your S9 Plus:

Create a backup of your data.
Turn off the device.
Press and hold the Volume Up key and the Bixby key, then press and hold the Power key.
When the green Android logo displays, release all keys (‘Installing system update’ will show for about 30 – 60 seconds before showing the Android system recovery menu options).
Press the Volume down key several times to highlight ‘wipe data / factory reset’.
Press Power button to select.
Press the Volume down key until ‘Yes — delete all user data’ is highlighted.
Press Power button to select and start the master reset.
When the master reset is complete, ‘Reboot system now’ is highlighted.
Press the Power key to restart the device.

Battery drain issue and slow charging can sometimes be interlinked. Both can be caused by several factors at once. Factory reset is one of the effective ways to help you establish a benchmark and a good point from where to continue your troubleshooting.

Other factors that may cause slow charging issue includes

high number of apps
malware
screen brightness
inefficient firmware coding
poor battery performance
defective charging port
general hardware malfunction

Try to narrow down these other factors if factory reset will not help. There’s no direct way to help you figure out the root cause for this problem at all. We suggest that you read other articles from the web that may help you identify the cause.

Sometimes, even the most complicated issues are fixed by a simple troubleshooting step. Don’t forget to force reboot your S9 Plus before you do any advanced steps in the future.

These are the steps to force reboot:

Press and hold the Power + Volume Down buttons for approximately 10 seconds or until the device power cycles. Allow several seconds for the Maintenance Boot Mode screen to appear.
From the Maintenance Boot Mode screen, select Normal Boot. You can use the volume buttons to cycle through the available options and the lower left button (below the volume buttons) to select. Wait for up to 90 seconds for the reset to complete.

Problem #2: How to fix your Galaxy S9 when Bixby Home button stops working

My Bixby doesn’t work at all. Does absolutely nothing. I have tried every troubleshooting method that I could find. Reset to factory. Reset safe mode soft reset all of it. I can scroll over to the Bixby home and see the cards but when I click my bixby nothing happens. when I click tutorial nothing happens. a lot of the features are blocked out and unclick able. Not one part of bixby works. My bixby button does absolutely nothing.

Solution: Bixby is an integral feature in Samsung’s latest flagship devices so it’s sad to hear that it’s not working as expected. We’ve actually not came across this issue before but some users were able to successfully fix Bixby-related problems by doing simple workarounds. Let’s see what you can try.

Restart and remove SIM

Some users said that their Bixby problem was resolved after turning off their phone, removing the SIM card, and turning the phone back on. Once the phone has restarted, swipe the screen to bring up the Bixby page. Then, tap the More settings icon (three-dot icon at the upper right, then select Bixby Home in the list.

The fix may not come on right away but many people have tried this effective solution. Make sure to try it on your device as well.

Clear system cache

Another workaround we found is to clear the phone’s system cache. This is actually one of the maintenance tips that every Android user must do once every months. If you don’t know how to do it, follow these steps:

Turn off the device.
Press and hold the Volume Up key and the Bixby key, then press and hold the Power key.
When the green Android logo displays, release all keys (‘Installing system update’ will show for about 30 – 60 seconds before showing the Android system recovery menu options).
Press the Volume down key several times to highlight ‘wipe cache partition’.
Press Power button to select.
Press the Volume down key until ‘yes’ is highlighted and press the Power button.
When the wipe cache partition is complete, “Reboot system now” is highlighted.
Press the Power key to restart the device.

Sign in again to your Samsung account

For some, signing out of their Samsung account then signing back in did the trick. You can also try this step if nothing has worked so far. Just go under Settings > Cloud and accounts > Accounts to sign out your Samsung account. Once you’ve done that, restart the phone before signing back in.

Problem #3: Galaxy S9 won’t charge

My husband has an s9 and it used to say moisture error. So we got him a cover for it and it stopped saying that. A week or 2 later it doesn’t want to charge. He plugs it and sometimes charges for a few minutes and stops. We put it in the wireless and does the same thing. Any solution you may offer?

Solution: If both cable and wireless charging have stopped working, the problem is most likely hardware in nature. Try doing a factory reset to confirm if that’s the case. If it still doesn’t charge after it’s been reset, you should contact Samsung so it can be repaired or replaced.

Problem #4: How to fix Galaxy S9 black screen issue

My phone been acting up a few months now but i made do with it. the problem i have now is a Blank or black screen. I didn’t drop my phone or anything. i was just sitting one night well last week, and all of a sudden my screen had all this green lines and all of the display turned greenish. so i decided to turn off my phone because i thought it was overheating because it was a bit hot. when i turned it back on the screen was blank or black. I’m still using my phone even with the blank screen, the touch on the phone responds so i can unlock my phone by guessing where the code is to turn on my flashlight or play music or even make the phone silent and all.

I can’t make calls but i only can receive lol (obviously) . Would really appreciate your assistance because in Fiji the S9 screen is expensive they are gonna charge $240FJD for the replacement which is $118USD for a new screen. answering calls is like answering calls from a public phone you don’t know who is calling.

Solution: Because your phone is not totally dead, it’s probably just suffering from a software glitch, or its LCD or monitor simply quit on you. Try to see if you can boot the phone to Recovery Mode first. If the screen works in Recovery, which means you’ll actually see the Recovery Menu options, you can most likely fix the problem with master reset. Here’s how to boot to Recovery:

Turn off the device. This is important. If you can’t turn it off, you’ll never be able to boot to Recovery Mode. If you are not able to shut the device off regularly via the Power button, wait until the phone’s battery is drained. Then, charge the phone for 30 minutes before booting to Recovery Mode.
Press and hold the Volume Up key and the Bixby key, then press and hold the Power key.
When the green Android logo displays, release all keys (‘Installing system update’ will show for about 30 – 60 seconds before showing the Android system recovery menu options).

If the screen stays black, or if your S9 fails to reach Recovery for whatever, you have no other choice but to have the screen fixed. The screen assembly has three major components — the digitizer, monitor/LCD, and flex cable. The problem lies on the LCD since the digitizer is still working. The digitizer is the part that converts your touches into command inputs. It’s a transparent layer on top of the screen.

Because there’s no software solution that can repair a damaged or malfunctioning LCD, you have to let a professional check the hardware so the screen assembly can be replaced.