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Nb27

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Sep 11, 2016
11
0
Hi everyone,

I was just curious as to whether or not running your iphone 24 hours a day without turning it off negatively impacts your device?

I read somewhere that it is a good idea to power it down for an hour a day.

I thought I'd follow up and ask users here what they thought.
 

Mlrollin91

macrumors G5
Nov 20, 2008
14,172
10,181
I restart my phone once or twice a week, but never turn it off completely unless its starting to heat up or overheating. Then I will turn it off for like 20 minutes, but thats it.
 
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daviddth

macrumors 6502a
Jun 29, 2009
787
104
Australia
I might reboot my p[hone every month or so, but otherwise it never gets turned off. Been the same since the 3G days, and my iPhone 5 bought on release day, so that over 4 years old now, is still being used daily by my wife and again it gets turned off when she forgets to charge it, that's all.
 

eyoungren

macrumors Penryn
Aug 31, 2011
29,600
28,359
I'd say no. We've left our phones on in the 16 years we've had cell phones. My current 6s+ operates as my nightstand clock.

Turning our phones off would mean being out of contact as we do not have a landline for a home phone.

We've never had an issue.

I do however, use an Activator action (my iPhone is jailbroken) to restart my phone automatically every morning. My wife never turns her phone off though. Can't recall the last time she even restarted it.
 

andyp350

macrumors 6502a
Aug 14, 2011
807
460
The only time my phone gets switched off is if I need to restart it due to a software glitch or software update. Never noticed it doing any harm but then I don't keep mine for longer than a year
 

44267547

Cancelled
Jul 12, 2016
37,642
42,494
I typically turn it off once every two weeks. Otherwise, I leave my iPhone all the time.
 

Conan86

macrumors 6502
Apr 9, 2012
353
156
Singapore
There's no real need to turn the phone off unless you foresee you're not gonna use it for a long time, just to make sure the battery doesn't drain out.
 

OneMike

macrumors 603
Oct 19, 2005
5,830
1,811
Other than software updates or rare times battery fully runs out. I never power device down.

I don't think either practice has any impact.
 

Mr.C

macrumors 603
Apr 3, 2011
5,525
1,519
London, UK.
Mine stays on 24/7 and all my iPhones since the original have. The only time it gets turned off is for the occasional restart.
 

Newtons Apple

Suspended
Mar 12, 2014
22,757
15,254
Jacksonville, Florida
Hi everyone,

I was just curious as to whether or not running your iphone 24 hours a day without turning it off negatively impacts your device?

I read somewhere that it is a good idea to power it down for an hour a day.

I thought I'd follow up and ask users here what they thought.

Why would you shut it down for an hour a day. What is the logic there. I have owned all of the iPhones and never shut them down unless there is a problem. Months have gone by between a shutdown.

Do not think it will hurt your device to shut it down but I do not see where it serves a purpose unless wanting to reboot for a reason.
 
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daviddth

macrumors 6502a
Jun 29, 2009
787
104
Australia
I read somewhere that it is a good idea to power it down for an hour a day.

Thinking about this comment, it actually may even shorten the life of the device due to thermal cycling. A lot of hardware failures in ultra compact devices are actually due to parts getting hot and cold hundreds and thousands of times. By turning things off you are forcing them to drop to the ambient temp, then warm back up when turned on, and this thermal cycling can set up physical stress and cause solder joints or in-chip sections to eventually fail. We are only talking fractions of a watt causing the heating, but in chips the sixe of a grain of rice, that can get them to a reasonable temp. Add to that any inrush currents causing localised heating (Less of an issue at fractions of volts, but it does happen)

We often see items that are left powered up for years or decades way outlast items that are turned on an off daily, or even more often.
 
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joeblow7777

macrumors 604
Sep 7, 2010
7,185
9,026
The phone reboots itself when an OS update is installed. This is pretty much the closest I get to powering off my phone. Smartphones and tablets are designed to be always on and just put to sleep/standby when not in use.

If you ever want to clear your devices cache/RAM and such and stop everything that may be running in the background there's a simple trick you can use rather than a reboot/turning off: Hold the power button like you're going to shut down. When "slide to power off" appears, instead of doing that, press and hold the home button for a few seconds.
 
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TrueBlou

macrumors 601
Sep 16, 2014
4,531
3,619
Scotland
Dear god no just leave it on, well on standby ;) I've never switched my phone off for more than a minute or two, or if I have to while flying.

The old saying in the electronics biz (and I mean really old :p I've been out of that game for a long time) is that completely powering down frequently is more likely to cause issues than leaving it powered on. Due to the thermal characteristics, things contract ever so slightly when cool and expand when hot. So constantly going between them put more stress on the circuits.

Of course that could be long since irrelevant :D But I leave all of my electronics powered on/standby 24/7 and never had a problem that wasn't just related to a devices natural useful life or an inherent fault that would happen regardless in a looong time.
 

C DM

macrumors Sandy Bridge
Oct 17, 2011
51,392
19,461
Hi everyone,

I was just curious as to whether or not running your iphone 24 hours a day without turning it off negatively impacts your device?

I read somewhere that it is a good idea to power it down for an hour a day.

I thought I'd follow up and ask users here what they thought.
Where did you read this, out of curiosity? And what was the reasoning for it that was given?
 
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timeconsumer

macrumors 68020
Aug 1, 2008
2,135
2,173
Portland
I've never switched off any iPhone I've owned. I usually own them for a year then buy the latest and pass the phone to a family member where they will keep it for another 2-3 years without shutting it off either.

I restart my iPhone once every few weeks but that's usually because I have an app that won't update correctly or some other issue which requires a restart.
 
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