It’s the summer, and it’s a pretty uncomfortable time for gadgets to be around. Phones struggle to regulate their temperature, and they run into many issues when this is the case.
All phones grow warm when they sustain high performance for extended periods. This is a normal occurrence, and iPhones are not an exception. However, when your iPhone gets so hot that it becomes uncomfortable or even impossible to hold, there is a problem.
Here, you’ll learn why your iPhone might suddenly heat up and what you can do when that happens.
Why your iPhone can Get Excessively Hot
Before proceeding, you should note that ‘excessively hot’ isn’t specific by any means. It isn’t a specific degree, and it is subjective to the user.
To some coming from phones with better cooling systems, the normal operating temperature of the iPhone might be ‘excessively hot.’ However, others don’t think their iPhone is excessively hot until it can hard boil an egg.
Whichever group you are, there are many reasons your iPhone can suddenly get hot.
First, running performant apps for extended periods is usually the main culprit. Playing a tasking online shooter game over cellular data will push your iPhone to its limits, increasing its temperature.
Since iPhones (or phones in general) have no fans to cool them down, unlike computers, you don’t usually have to worry when your phone gets excessively hot while playing a game.
If you’re not running any games or apps whatsoever, there is cause for concern. If your iPhone starts to grow hot and hotter over time, it’s almost certainly the sign of a hardware issue.
While iPhones are not some poorly built phones that explode from battery malfunctions, you shouldn’t ignore unwarranted heat.
In the next section, you’ll learn what to do when your iPhone starts to heat up, either due to excessive-performance loads or just out of the blue.
How To Fix A Hot iPhone
There are many things you can do to cool down an overheating iPhone, returning it to its normal temperature.
However, putting your iPhone in the fridge is always a bad idea. While the fridge is cold and should provide an instant solution, that’s where the problem lies.
Electronics are unable to handle a sudden thermal surge. If the temperature of your iPhone spikes or drops suddenly, you should start kissing it goodbye.
Here are some ways to fix an overheating iPhone without tossing it in the fridge.
- Remove the case and restart your iPhone
iPhones are usually metallic. From general experience, you can agree that metals cool down faster than plastic. With a plastic case attached to your iPhone, the cooling process slows down.
That’s why it helps to remove your iPhone’s case. Also, restarting your iPhone kills all the apps that might be straining the processor and heating the phone.
After restarting the phone, you may want to wait for about half an hour to see if your iPhone’s temperature has reduced.
- Keep your iPhone away from the sun.
It’s the summer, and electronics don’t have a field day under the hot sun. If you have to go out with your iPhone, avoid leaving it in a car.
However, you can protect your iPhone from being heated up by the sun, do it. Excessive exposure to heat from the sun can take its toll on your battery, draining your battery very quickly.
It can also affect other device components, slowing down your iPhone and making it painful to use.
- Turn off all features that you don’t use.
Useless features are good at one thing: hiding away so that they can silently consume your system resources without you even noticing.
Sometimes, iPhone users tend to leave features like Bluetooth, GPS, Wi-Fi, and even cellular data active without actually using it.
These create processes in the background, using your iPhone’s resources without your knowledge.
While you may be unable to keep tabs on each of these features, you can turn on Airplane Mode to turn all of them off. Toggling Airplane Mode off and on does a lot more than you think.
You might also want to turn off Background Refresh, a feature that constantly refreshes your most-used apps in the background.
While this is useful if you like your Twitter feed fresh each time, it can also heat your iPhone as it needs many background processes to keep it working.
- Buy a phone cooler
No, I’m not talking about those non-functional apps that claim to cool down your iPhone. Here, I’m talking about physical products with working fans in them.
If you only use your iPhone for Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and playing light games, buying a cooler isn’t necessary. iPhones should perform those tasks effortlessly by design.
However, if you use your iPhone to join multiplayer online FPS while streaming it to Facebook Gaming simultaneously, you’ll need something more than the iPhone’s default cooling system.
Momen Gaming Controller & Phone Cooler is one such device. Note that we haven’t tried them, and Apple hasn’t commented about these products.
However, they’re worth giving a try if you need your iPhone to run a bit cooler so that the processor doesn’t throttle quite as much.
- Get it fixed at the Apple Store or an authorized repairer
If this issue pops up when your iPhone is still under warranty, you should get a repair or replacement.
If your iPhone is out of warranty, you can still have Apple fix it for you, albeit with payment. You can also take it to an authorized repairer to have it checked.
Conclusion
iPhones are pretty capable phones until they start to heat up, dramatically limiting the phone’s performance potentials.
If your iPhone gets excessively hot to touch, you should address the issue immediately. Procrastinating might cause even more problems like irreparable damage to the internals of the iPhone.
If you follow the advice given above, you should have a working iPhone of the usual temperature in no time.