In some situations, direct lighting, bright lights, sun light, or a glare can shine directly on the light sensor on the MacBook Pro or MacBook Air, and when this happens the illumination indicator and controls become locked.

The solution to this is simple enough: Simply shine a flashlight or bright light near the FaceTime camera at the top of the screen, and the backlit keyboard will go dark. Precent the bright light source from hitting the camera area and the keyboard will be backlit again.

Sometimes the sensitivity issue can be resolved with the 3 solution offered below, but another solution is to just use manual backlight controls and stop the automatic lighting adjustments.

How to bring back a physical Escape key on the new MacBook Pro with Touch Bar | Macworld

Now you must use the F5 and F6 keyboard keys to manually control the key backlighting levelthis becomes the only way the illumination is impacted. That may sound a little contradictory, but disabling the automatic illumination feature gives you complete manual control over the backlit keys, which lets you set a brightness level you want to use all the time and it will stay consistent, regardless of external lighting conditions hitting the sensors or not.

Just be aware that the illuminating keys will no longer adjust themselves at all, so if you do notice any negative battery consequences you may wish to set the brightness on the lower end. You may need to reset the System Management Controller SMC to get things back in order again. The SMC controls a variety of hardware options and system level power functions, and sometimes things can go haywire throughout the course of major OS X version upgrades or for no obvious reason.

Do note this is fairly rarely needed, but if everything else has failed you can follow our instructions or the official walkthrough from Apple Support. This is pretty unlikely, but the best thing to do at this point is aim for the official channels through Apple support.

Contact AppleCare or set up an appointment at the Genius Bar, they should be able to figure it out and get the keys working again, or replace a defective lighting system in the highly unlikely event there is an actual hardware issue.

Do note that liquid contact and minor splashes onto the keyboard can impact the backlit illumination while the remainder of the MacBook retains full functionality, so if the Mac had a fluid encounter that could be culprit as well. Subscribe to the OSXDaily newsletter to get more of our great Apple tips, tricks, and important news delivered to your inbox!

Enter your email address below:. You told me what Apple for some strange damn reason could not. Their CS sucks so bad!!

Keyboard Backlight Not Working on a MacBook Pro / Air? Try 3 Simple Fixes

Solution 1 was my issue. When I put my thumb over the camera, I can adjust the keyboard backlight but, as soon as I remove my thumb and option key on keyboard macbook pro kathy lien forex book pdf is nasd stockbroker series 7 exam hitting the camera, coles opening hours on anzac day melbourne keyboard goes back to being dark.

Looks like a change of lighting or positioning is all that is needed. My Macbook air had a water damage and got fixed, however, they told me that the keybord light was completely doomed. This week, about 6 months after the spill, I thought I saw the lights on for a sec when I was opening it, but I let it go.

I ran into this problem, and none of the approaches in the article resolved it.

I decided to erase the drive and reinstall the OS, and then the backlighting started working again. What macbook do you have? Do you reckon there maybe a bug? What OS did you reinstalled? I still got Yosmite. The track pad works he uses a mouse it is ok the keys will not type. Took top off to make sure keyboard connection ok to top case, is ok. The only button that works is the power button.

What (and where) is the Option key on Mac? | What is the Apple key? - Macworld UK

Can get on Internet et cetera but he needs to be able to type. Do keyboards all of a sudden just go bad?

Please help you can email me at donnamaesplace at gmail. MacBook Pro trackpad works but keyboard will not type keyboard not working? Mail will not be published required. About OSXDaily Contact Us Privacy Policy Sitemap.

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