Phones can get hot, really hot. While it usually isn’t dangerous, it can be uncomfortable to hold, particularly on a summer day. Beyond ordinary heat, there are plenty of stories about phones bursting into flames. If your phone is too hot to touch, it might have a problem that needs immediate attention.
Let’s explore the many reasons phones get hot, which can shorten the life of your phone, and what you can do to prevent overheating.
How hot is too hot?
It’s not unusual for a high-performance Android phone to feel warm or become hot when used for demanding tasks. Google and Samsung state the optimal ambient operating temperatures are 32 to 95 degrees Fahrenheit.
Ambient temperature is how warm your surroundings are. That means you shouldn’t leave your phone in a hot car or expose it to strong sunlight for extended periods. The heat builds up and could affect battery life, degrade components, and increase the risk of explosion, a reaction in lithium batteries called thermal runaway.
If you live in a hot climate, your phone might be warm before you use it. Temperatures over 100F are normal in some cases. However, if it hurts to touch your phone, you should take action to cool it down right away. It might be dangerous to continue using it.
What makes a phone get hot?
The best Android phones use super bright HDR screens, high-performance processors, and high-speed internet connectivity to deliver a great user experience. At the same time, these devices are thin and light. It almost seems like magic, but it’s not.
Those powerful features require electricity, and when current flows through the device, there’s a side effect of heat generation. Until we have superconducting materials that operate at room temperature, your phone, laptop, and computer will keep getting hot as you give it more demanding tasks.
While a tower computer has a fair amount of empty space inside and strong fans to remove heat, your phone is tightly packed with electronics with limited space for cooling. Android phones tend to throttle the processor’s speed and lower screen brightness to protect the phone from overheating.
Here’s a list of common situations that can cause your phone to get hot:
In rare cases, a phone overheats due to defects or bugs:
How to prevent overheating
The latest version of Android has security features designed to protect your phone from malware. It requires ongoing vigilance to stay ahead of hackers, so it’s important to keep your phone updated to avoid malware that can cause overheating.
In the same way, app updates often contain security and optimizations that protect your phone and reduce the amount of power used. Most developers work hard on efficiency and security as well as new features. Updating apps can help with battery drain and overheating.
If your phone comes with a charger and charging cable, that’s a reliable way to charge it. Using the manufacturer’s charger and cable ensures compatibility. Plenty of great phone chargers are available, but you must check the specifications to make sure to use one that works with your phone.
We have alist of great USB phone chargers to help you find the best solution. Wireless chargers deliver less power to the phone but can still overheat since they use induction, which is less efficient than a wired connection. In ourlist of the top wireless chargers, you can find fast chargersthat don’t generate too much heat.
If you use your phone while it’s charging, it tends to get hotter than normal. That’s because you’re combining two sources of heat that usually happen separately. Charging a phone pushes electricity into the battery, raising its temperature. Using your phone runs current through the processor, screen, and other components, adding even more heat.
Screen brightness affects the temperature of your phone. When your screen shines brightly, it uses a lot of power. That heats the battery as well as the screen. When using your phone indoors, it’s best to use adaptive brightness to dim the screen automatically in low-light environments. If you need toreset adaptive brightness, we have a guide that shows you how.
Gaming is known to make a phone hot,particularly games with 3D graphics and eye-catching effects. To generate that amazing imagery, the phone’s CPU and GPU work hard and run at high performance. When your phone gets hot, take a break from the game.
When youuse your phone as a Wi-Fi hotspot, it works like a modem and router, receiving cellular internet to transmit high-bandwidth signals to other devices. That requires a large amount of power. Everything heats up when energy flows from the battery and through a phone. Limit the amount of time you have the Wi-Fi hotspot turned on to prevent overheating.
Cool phones are happy phones
Manufacturers recommend using your phone in moderate temperatures. Overheating is particularly bad for lithium batteries. Use a compatible charger and allow your phone to cool down when it gets hot from normal usage. Cool phones are happy phones, so follow the suggestions above to keep your phone working well for a long time.
If you think your Android phone might have malware or a virus, we havea guide to help you remove Android viruses and malware.
