Phone wet and won’t turn on? Why Apple says you should NEVER put it in rice

After dropping your phone in water, you might be willing to try anything to get it working again.

From leaving it in rice to drying it with a hair dryer, there are dozens of supposed ‘hacks’ online guaranteed to fix your phone.

But Apple has now revealed that some classic bits of advice might actually be damaging your iPhone.

If your phone isn’t turning on, or if you’re seeing the ‘liquid-detection alert’, Apple now says the best advice is simply patience. 

So, if you happen to have taken your phone for an accidental dip, here are five dos and don’ts to help you out. 

What you should do

Getting your phone wet can happen to the best of us and can be very worrying, but the most important thing is not panic. 

It might be tempting to try turning the phone on or plugging it into a charger to check it works, but this is definitely something to avoid. 

As obvious as it might sound, the first thing to do is get the phone away from water as quickly as possible and wipe away any excess with a clean dry towel.

The longer the phone remains in water, the more time the water has to penetrate into something important and the longer it will take to dry.

Next, Apple recommends that you unplug any cables from your iPhone and removed the cables from the wall.

If the phone is totally soaked it can also help to turn it off as soon as possible. 

To remove any excess water from the charging port, Apple recommends to ‘tap your iPhone gently against your hand with the connector facing down.’

Once you’ve done that, the only thing left is to leave your phone in a dry area with good airflow and wait.

If you only have a ‘liquid detected’ warning, rather than having fully dunked your phone, this means that there is some moisture in the charging port. 

If you see this message, Apple recommends waiting at least 30 minutes before trying again. 

Because of the moisture detection feature the phone won’t take any power if there is water in the charging port so there is little risk of damaging your phone by testing it. 

However, Apple recommends leaving the phone for up to 24 hours for it to dry fully. 

What not to do 

It might have been repeated since the launch of the very first iPhone, but Apple has now confirmed that there is no advantage to putting your phone in a bowl of uncooked rice.

The idea behind this theory is that the dry rice acts as a desiccant, much like those silica gel packets, which draw water out of the phone.

In reality, rice doesn’t work like this, and leaving the phone in rice can actually inhibit the airflow.

This trick appears to work because leaving the phone in rice keeps it out of sight and reduces the temptation to turn it on or charge it before it dries.

So, when you eventually take the phone out of the rice it appears to have been miraculously fixed. 

But, in new guidance Apple specifically warns against trying this trick, warning that ‘doing so could allow small particles of rice to damage your iPhone.’

If your phone is really soaking wet you might want to try and dry it quicker with some external source.

But, while a hair dryer might seem like a good idea, Apple has also warned against this.

In the guidance, Apple says not to ‘dry your iPhone using an external heat source or compressed air’.

Apple doesn’t elaborate on why but presumably getting your phone very hot is a recipe for disaster, while compressed air could feasibly result in water being blown deeper into the phone. 

But whatever the reason, it is still better to be patient while your phone dries naturally rather than trying to rush the process. 

And if you are stuck with an annoying ‘Liquid Detected’ warning, these same rules apply.

If you have waited half an hour or so and are still seeing this warning it is because there is still water in the connector or under the pins of the charging cable.

If you’re in a rush to charge your phone it might seem sensible to try and draw out this water with something absorbent like a paper towel or cotton bud. 

But, once again, Apple specifically advises against this kind of impatient behaviour. 

Inserting any foreign object into the charging port risks bending the pins out of position or getting something stuck in there, both of which can stop your phone from charging.

So, if you have doused your phone, remember that it is always better to leave your phone out somewhere dry and wait it out than to rush and risk damaging it further.