iPhone 12 animation lag caused by RunningBoard?

Apologies if this isn't the right venue for this, but I figured the developers on here might have some insight.

I've been looking into a problem which I'm experiencing on my 12 Pro, and others have also reported: when closing apps, occasionally there's a stutter in the animation, like dropped frames. It seems to start occurring after I've opened many apps since my last restart. It's been an issue since launch, on iOS 14.1, 14.2, and now the 14.3 Public Beta 2. I've also tried reinstalling iOS and setting up as a new device, with no change.

Based on when I see it, my theory for the cause is basically: when you close an app, but the memory allocated for suspended apps is already full, the OS needs to clear out some of that memory, and there's a lag/stutter in the UI while it does this.

To test this out, I plugged my phone into my Mac, and pulled up the Console app to watch for error/fault messages in the iOS log. Almost every time I close an app and see this stutter, there are error messages from runningboardd (RunningBoard), such as the following:

Code Block
error 17:38:41.087985-0700 runningboardd RBSStateCapture remove item called for untracked item <RBProcessMonitorObserver| qos:0 qos:(null) configs:{
}>


Such errors do not occur when an app closes smoothly with no stutter. It's not always the same error, but there's a pretty consistent correlation between seeing the stutter and seeing a runningboardd error.

Some light googling tells me that RunningBoard is a new-ish part of iOS used to track active processes.

Does anyone have more experience with RunningBoard errors, or has a good idea for further troubleshooting steps?
  • I have notice similar effects especially when loading the Apple ‘App Store’ I consistently get a lagging effect while it opens, it takes up to a minute or more consistently to finally load, icons do not always have images, some of the icon images that do load are the same image for every app until it finally stops loading, and then when I go to close the app it will shutter like a butterfly. I have performed several troubleshooting techniques and they have a immediate positive effect however after a few given days it will go back to the same shutter and lagging effects.

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Hello Guys.

I've been dealing with this issue on my iphone 12 Pro since I bought it 2 months ago and I found a simple solution that worked for me: Hard Reset. (Click volume up, click volume down and then click and hold power button for 10 seconds until apple logo show up)

Before that I've tried Update the iOS, format the entire phone and nothing seemed to work. Then I've just hard reset yesterday and the stutter is gone!
I've been using for almost 24 hours now and didn't experience any stutter whatsoever. I don't know if this solution would work for everybody, but definetly is worth a try.
Having the same problem since i bout my iPhone 12 Pro max day one. Not sure if its an iOS bug or its a hardware issue. Well we can say the hardware and the OS aren’t optimized but thats took too long to be fixed which make me feel thats its just a stutter gate. Im really really frustrated whenever i swipe home it’s randomly stutter like an old cheap phone. Im on 14.4.2 (18D70). I started to feel that apple cant and wont do anything about it, I hope I'm wrong but this is what its seems like so far. I hate it whenever i gi back to my iPhone XS Max i feel like its newer, faster and better in every way. Not to mention force touch 😒. I really regret upgrading from my XS max to the 12PM. 😣
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I have a newspaper app (Volkskrant, the Netherlands) which makes my iPhone 12 really warm when I use that app.
I suspect a link to the “stuttering motion when closing an app” problem.

since 2 days, I kill that App after using it. I have not experienced the stuttering anymore since then, while before, I experienced it multiple times per day.

so my theory is that the stuttering motion happens because another app in the background (not necessarily the one you are closing) is consuming too much resources.
I reported this to Apple. They wanted to replace my iPhone. I didn’t want just another refurbished phone as I don’t believe it’ll resolve the problem.

so frustrating 🤦🏻‍♂️🤦🏻‍♂️🤦🏻‍♂️
Same on the iphone xr bro
Same issue here on iPhone 12 Pro, since I bought it.
I’ve also been having this issue with an iPhone 12 Pro, I read somewhere that iOS 14.5 fixes the issue. I upgraded to the beta and I haven’t been having the issue since. Hope this helps others.
I was having the same issue for months on my 12 Pro Max, and iOS 14.5 has fixed the issue for me, it's like I got a new phone !
i also have this issue, my iphone 12 pro max has often dropped frame rates when opening apps and running some apps and whenever, i have tried contacting apple and run diagnostics with it they said my phone was okay but still im experiencing dropped frame rates, i got the dropping frame rates since i got my phone and i thought this was normal but it kept happenig on my iphone for 3 months so i tried contacting apple yesterday and they will give me a call today i hope i get my iphone replaced as it is so annoying

Guys, any update about this? I got the same issue in my iPhone XR since iOS 15 betas and I don’t think it’s because of any of the apps that I have. I’m on iOS 15.1 Beta 3 and still can’t get out from this problem.

  • I’m having same problems you all have on my iPhone xr. Lags and stuttering basically everywhere; typing, scrolling etc its a mess. My phone has never been near to be good in terms of performance (don’t understand why) but with ios 15 its even worse.. i have no words.. apple fix your toys

  • Same here, lags here and there, the most annoying ones are the stutters that appears when swiping up to close an app, it feels cheap like if i was using an iphone 5 or something, so dissappointed for apples poor optimization. Also it seems like you'rs on the beta program? Can you inform them about this issue on the feedback page?

  • Already did that. I send a feedback with screen records of the problem where you can see the stutter in the closing app’s animation. Right now I’m on iOS 15.2 Beta 1. Nothing’s resolved, the problem’s still here.

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A whole product and software release cycle later, and this issue has yet to be fully addressed by Apple, despite numerous bug reports from members on this forum as well as my own feedback. Admittedly, I’m running older hardware(11 series) but the UI frame rate issues appear to even be present on the 13 series, although the 120hz models seem to be largely unaffected. Has anyone attempted to email Federighi or any other senior level staff? I am strongly considering spending the time to craft a well documented email outlining these issues, but surely they are aware at this point? For F’s sake, budget teir android phones are starting to have a more consistent UI frame rate than iOS!

  • On god, they should focus on the UI and basically ios performance in general, they just keep releasing features while the optimization is non existant. All they do is accumulate bugs, lags and glitches. iOs is some android level thing now.

  • We need to do something. I reported this problem in the feedback app, ma still get the problem, and I’m on iOS 15.2 Beta 1. I love iPhone, or at least I loved it once. I couldn’t even move to Android like that, ‘cause I got AirPods and an Apple Watch. I’d basically throw away thousands of money spent on these products. I want the real iPhone back, I wanna be sure once again that iOS is the best optimized OS, even (and especially) in animations and transitions.

  • Huge disappointment that this issue has regressed in iOS 15! On the iPhone 12 Pro, they fixed it with the release of 14.4, but I immediately noticed it again when iOS 15 was released. It also does affect the 13 pro with the 120Hz screen. Very disappointing!

i have the same issue on iphone 11

Hi. Little lags also on ios 15.4 on 13 pro max. I think it’s a software issue on intelligent memory management. The issue started to show up when I closed all apps the first time (never do that)

I’m facing exact same issue. Please someone from dev team of iPhone, Please fix that.