Your Phone Got Wet — Here's Exactly What to Do in the Next 30 Minutes

Water damage is one of the most stressful things that can happen to a phone, and it's one of the situations where doing the wrong thing quickly makes it significantly worse. Here is exactly what to do.

The first 60 seconds

Get the phone out of the water immediately. Every extra second submerged increases the volume of water that enters the device. If it's in a pool, toilet, sink, or puddle — get it out now.

Power it off immediately. Do not check if it's still working. Do not attempt to use it. Turn it off. Water and electricity running through internal components simultaneously causes corrosion and shorts. The faster you cut the power, the better the chance of recovery.

Remove the SIM tray. This opens a path for water to escape and prevents corrosion on those contacts.

What not to do

• Do not put it in rice. The rice-in-a-bag trick is a myth that persists online. Uncooked rice does not absorb moisture effectively from inside a sealed device, and it wastes time while the real damage is happening.
• Do not use a hair dryer. Heat can damage internal components and force water deeper into the device.
• Do not charge it. Running power through a wet device is how you permanently damage the charging circuit or motherboard.
• Do not shake it vigorously. This spreads water to areas it hasn't reached yet.

What actually helps

Pat the outside dry with a cloth. Wipe down the ports and openings. Then leave it — powered off — in a dry environment with good airflow. A sealed bag with silica gel packets (from product packaging) is genuinely effective if you have them handy.

Give it at least 24–48 hours powered off before attempting to turn it on.

When to bring it to a repair shop

If the phone was submerged for more than a few seconds, or if it was in salt water (which is far more corrosive than fresh water), professional cleaning is the right call. A technician can open the device, clean the board with isopropyl alcohol to remove mineral deposits before corrosion sets in, and assess the damage.

The sooner this happens, the better the outcome. A phone that was wet yesterday has a much better recovery rate than one that's been sitting powered off for a week with corrosion already spreading.

Note: We currently take water damage jobs on a best-effort basis. We can open the device, assess, and clean — but water damage outcomes depend heavily on which components were affected and how long corrosion had to develop.