Smartphone Overheating and Battery Draining Fast: Possible Causes and Fixes

It is absolutely normal for a smartphone to heat up and get slightly warm sometimes. This can be the result of excessive charging, too many applications running in the background, or general system overwork.

However, when you notice your phone starts to overheat from the slightest of usage – like when you make a call – you should know something is wrong somewhere.

In this post, we’re going to be looking at the common reasons smartphones (Android and iPhone) overheat. We’ll also be looking at the reasons behind fast draining batteries. Because, apparently, when smartphones overheat, their battery life tends to suffer, too.

Of course, both cases can be easily handled and rectified by a service centre near me. But before you walk into a repairer’s shop, we believe you should at least have an idea of what’s wrong with your device. That way, you can prevent future overheating or battery damage.

When does a phone overheat?

A smartphone may overheat under any of the following conditions:

• When used to play games (especially graphically-intensives ones)
• While charging
• When you use the camera for long periods
• When you keep the screen brightness at the highest level for long periods
• And so many others

Common Reasons Mobile Phones Overheat

1. Intensive Usage:

Just like how our heads ache when we work for too long, a smartphone is bound to overheat when worked for long periods. Intensive mobile phone usage means the processor gets to run for long hours, and this generates a lot of heat.

If you’ve been observant, you will notice your phone suddenly gets toasty when you run certain apps or do certain things for long on it. This is telling you that you’ve subjected the processor to overload, and now it’s dissipating heat on your phone’s body.

2. Malware from software update

We are all guilty of running different apps on our mobile phones. App is life, so I can’t really fault anyone for that.

However, you have to know that some of these apps sometimes come with buggy files, especially during updates. This is particularly true of those apps you get from untrusted sources.

When you have a buggy app update on your phone, it can cause the app to be stuck in an endless cycle, causing unnecessary processor overwork. Besides this, buggy app updates may also lead to excessive memory consumption. This, too, may cause excessive heating of a phone.

Please note that malware from app updates is a very serious issue – one you cannot joke with. Besides overheating, it can lead to the leak of your financial and personal information.

That is why we advise users to quickly find a proficient mobile phone technician on the Nicelocal.com site once they discover their phone is overheating. A phone repair technician can help you figure out whether there is malware disrupting your phone’s activities.

3. Charging when the ambient temperatures are high

A mobile phone can overheat when you charge it in a hot environment. For example, under direct sunlight, in the summer heat, or in a room that’s generally hot.

If you live in tropical areas like Africa or Asia, where the weather gets hot all year round, you may experience this more often. Also, people who live in temperate regions like Canada, the US, and some parts of Europe can experience this on hot summer days.

Charging your phone while being kept on your car’s dashboard for too long can also cause overheating. This is particularly true for cars without a functioning air conditioning system.

4. Unfavorable charging conditions

If you’re the type that charges your phone with a pouch on or you use your phone while it’s charging, it’s more than certain the phone will overheat.

5. Charging with a bad or incompatible cable or charger

I’m willing to bet you’re one of those people that quickly pick up their friend’s charger anytime they can’t find theirs. Well, I’m sorry to break it to you, but that may be the reason your phone is overheating.

Every mobile phone has a specific charging power output designated to it. Charging with a charger or cable whose wattage is outside the allowable range for a phone can cause the phone to start heating up.

Reasons Your Phone Battery Is Draining Fast

1. Increased brightness

Running your phone on maximum screen brightness is a recipe for a fast-draining battery. If you want to stop your phone battery from going from 60 to 30 in a short while, try to dim the screen brightness.

What’s more? Switching from light mode to dark mode can also save you some battery life.

2. Background apps

When you allow apps like VPN, Calendar, Video players, anti-virus, and so on to run in the background, you leave room for your battery to drain fast.

Remember, the phone’s processor is what’s responsible for running apps. So, even though you aren’t operating these apps on the main screen, the fact they’re running in the background gives the processor more work to do. And the more work a processor completes, the faster the battery drains.

3. Overheating

Whether during its charging phase or while in use, avoid situations that cause your phone to overheat. This is because your battery drains much faster when the phone gets too hot. The reason for this is that heatwaves impair a battery’s ability to stay cool. And when a battery can’t stay cool, it becomes impossible to hold on to the energy it’s drawn.

Phone overheating and battery draining fast even though you aren’t doing anything

Unfortunately, we’ve seen situations where phones suddenly overheat without doing any heavy task. In most cases, this overheating is usually accompanied by a fast-draining battery.

If you ever experience this, know that one of two things has occurred.

1) There’s Half-Sorting in the circuit board of the phone

Half-Sorting implies that certain components around the battery connector have gone bad. These components can be an SMD capacitor, SMD resistor, or SMD diode.

You need a phone repair technician to help you fix this problem because it involves removing the faulty component from the PCB and then replacing it with a new one.

2) There’s Full-Sorting in the circuit board

When an overheated phone goes into Full-Sorting, it normally goes off completely. In that case, no matter how hard you try, the phone won’t Turn On.

Full-Sorting means that the phone’s IC has gone bad and needs replacement.

Final Words

As you’ve seen, a number of things can be responsible for a phone heating up or battery draining fast.

If you are unsure what’s causing your phone to overheat or its battery to drain fast, please contact a phone repair person quickly. You can use the Nicelocal.com site to find the nearest repair shops to you.

EDITOR NOTE: This is a promoted post and should not be considered an editorial endorsement