One of the most commonly known life hacks is the old trick where you put your wet electronics into a bag or bowl of uncooked rice. The rice is supposed to help dry it out by absorbing the extra water. I think just about everyone I know has tried this method at least once. It seems to be tried-and-true. Hell, my mom once put her old Macbook into a giant tub of rice (I kid you not) and it turned on after a few days.
Well, I don’t know if saving wet iPhones is cutting into Apple’s billion dollar bottom line or not but the company just put out a warning against this method. According to Apple, doing so could “allow small particles of rice to damage your iPhone.” In fact, they recommend merely leaving the wet device on the counter to dry. That’s so old school of them. They actually advised several different things to try in the event of a wet iPhone. All are common sense techniques.
Instead of resorting to rice, Apple provides users with an alternative solution. If your iPhone or charging connector is wet—in the latter case, an alert will appear and disable charging—Apple recommends the following:
Unplug the cable from your iPhone and unplug the other end of the cable from the power adapter or accessory. Don’t plug the cable in again until your iPhone and the cable are completely dry. Tap your iPhone gently against your hand with the connector facing down to remove excess liquid. Leave your iPhone in a dry area with some airflow. After at least 30 minutes, try charging with a Lightning or USB-C cable or connecting an accessory. If you see the alert again, there is still liquid in the connector or under the pins of your cable. Leave your iPhone in a dry area with some airflow for up to a day. You can try again to charge or connect an accessory throughout this period. It might take up to 24 hours to fully dry. If your phone has dried out but still isn’t charging, unplug the cable from the adapter and unplug the adapter from the wall (if possible), and then connect them again. In case Apple’s advice doesn’t work, it’s safe to say that you probably need help from professional repair experts and may even need to prepare yourself to buy a new iPhone. Whatever you do, resist the temptation of reaching for the rice.
Okay, so the cynical part of me that has anecdotal evidence that the rice trick works without causing damage thinks “In case Apple’s advice doesn’t work, … [you] may even need to prepare yourself to buy a new iPhone” kinda sounds like the statement that gives the game away, no? Apple also mentioned some fairly obvious no-gos such as using external heat to dry the phone (no blow dryers, people!) or sticking Q-tips into the connector (that’s a thing?). All that said, I’ve never really thought about it before, but I’m willing to concede that there could be better or equally effective ways at trying to salvage a wet iPhone.
Last summer, my son went into a pool at my SIL’s house and forgot to take his watch off. She gave us one of those silica gel packets to put it in. We put them both in a ziploc bag for 24 hours and it worked like a charm. Honestly, if you live in a dry environment, you can probably just leave it on the counter to air dry out. Idk, there’s just something (the cost and our reliance) about wet electronics that triggers our anxiety and having something extra to help the process along feels calming.
Photos credit: Andrea Piacquadio and PhotoMix on Pexels and via Instagram
It just so happens that the length of a grain of basmati rice is equal to the width of the charger port of an iPhone Should said of grain of basmati rice lodge itself into the port, it is nearly impossible to get it out. Especially if the grain of rice goes unnoticed before someone tries to repeatedly jam the charger into the port. If that happens, it’s possible the iPhone will never charge quite right. Not that this has ever happened to me.
How about putting iPhone in an open plastic baggie inside of a big bag of rice? (Not smothered, just placed at the top.)
I collect the silica packets that come with a vast number of items and put them in a big Ziploc—if something gets wet it just goes into the bag and is sealed.
That makes sense, rice can be dusty unless you rinse it well. I dropped my iphone in the toilet once (yes, ewwwwwwwwwwwww) and it was fine. I dried it and wiped it all over with alcohol wipes and it was fine, I was very surprised, but I think a really quick dunk isn’t enough time for it to fill up with water
That happened to me too! I forgot it was in my back pocket and when I pulled my pants down, it fell right in there. Thank God it was still unused lol. But yeah I pulled it out real quick and there was no damage thankfully. I think the new phones are pretty water proof other than the charging port.
same, but with side pocket. They always talk about lack of pockets in women’s clothing but we need to talk about inadequate pockets too!
My kids aren’t teenagers anymore (thank goodness) but we’ve had phones go in the toilet, pool, lake. Chargers and earpods end up in washing machines. We ‘minute rice’ bagged them all. Never use the slender grain, needs to be rinsed rice. How could anyone afford phones for teenagers without rice?
I have cracked my screen, dropped it in water, washed my air pods. After paying for repairs and a new set of Airpods I now have Apple Care for all my products and will never not have it for myself or the kids. I learned the hard way…. cracked screen on a new phone, $300 later….
I still have some PTSD working retail and doing returns or trade ins for electronics and having to look for the sticker that would show if there was liquid damage and people getting ANGRY when I showed it to them. The number of people who accused me of being a magician and being able to produce this sticker from no where and put it on the device in front of them without them seeing me do it.
Couple of months ago I dropped my phone in the washing machine. It went through the whole cycle! I even called it, looking for it whilst it was in there. My heart sunk to my toes – it was a gift from my sister to replace my very old phone that some features had simply stopped working on.
Found it as I was pulling clothes from the washer into the dryer. So scared. Turned it on and it worked!! It was fine!
I’ve lost mine in the toilet, too, used rice (brown rice) trick and it was fine, though a little wonky. I also dropped the old phone more than thrice (the old one, which is likely why some features stopped working). I’ve dropped the new phone, too, but it seems to be hardier than the old one. I still cannot believe it went through the whole wash cycle and still worked, and I lived it!
Currently though, a little problem has arisen…it vibrates when a call comes through, but has stopped ringing, which makes it way harder to find when I’ve put it down or it’s hiding under a bushel somewhere.
You can buy a TON of silica gel packs cheaply on Amazon. Might be a good product to feature on the wrap-up – they are so useful, not just for when you drop a piece of tech in water, but also to pack in with anything going to storage.
Funny you say that, @Enis! I added silica gel packets to my draft yesterday, haha. Stay tuned tomorrow! 🙂
They’re being reasonnable up until the “[you] may even need to prepare yourself to buy a new iPhone”. But perhaps the rice method doesn’t work as well as it used to because the quality of their products is way worse.
During covid lockdown my sister had the tinniest crumb of bread in the connector of her macbook, she couldn’t see it and we were getting shocks of eletricity every time we were trying to plug it in. I didn’t trust Apple before that and I trust them even less since.