iPhone X so hot it burned my hand

[redr]

i woke up this morning and reached to pick up the phone and it was VERY hot. It literally burned my palm but everything seems to be working ok in my limited testing in the last few mins.

The phone was plugged in to an Apple 29w charger about 8 hours ago but it was at around 90% power at the time.

Currently flags is disabled with a message saying the phone has to cool down first!

Anyone else had this? Any idea what might have caused it?

 

[Marshall73]

Sounds like it’s faulty.

 

[akash.nu]

Take it to the store and get a replacement.

 

[deadworlds]

Take it to the store and get a replacement.

I agree, you don’t want the next time this happens for the phone to burst into flames on your night stand

 

[deany]

It may be still Reindexing, putting strain on the system. Better safe than sorry though, Apple store for a quick diagnostic is called for.

 

[redr]

Remote diagnostic showed nothing. Aaaaand now I don’t trust this thing.

 

[simonmet]

Was the phone covered at all?

 

[jayf]

I’m going to guess that rapid charging is meant to rapidly charge. 29w charger should probably not be left for 8+ hours?

 

[ManuCH]

I’m going to guess that rapid charging is meant to rapidly charge. 29w charger should probably not be left for 8+ hours?

It will stop automatically when fully charged.

I still think it's faulty. The rapid charger will make the iPhone X very warm, but not hot enough to burn your hand. Also it should be at 100% after way less than 8 hours. It seems like for some reason it's not stopping because it's never detecting the battery as full.

Power-cycle the iPhone and try again. I've had the charging logic screw up on other iPhones before that were due to a software glitch.

 

[jayf]

It will stop automatically when fully charged.

I still think it's faulty. The rapid charger will make the iPhone X very warm, but not hot enough to burn your hand. Also it should be at 100% after way less than 8 hours. It seems like for some reason it's not stopping because it's never detecting the battery as full.

Power-cycle the iPhone and try again. I've had the charging logic screw up on other iPhones before that were due to a software glitch.

Your probably right I’ve seen quite a few posts on here about battery not fully charging or being stuck at xx%. Looks like the X has a software bug. Crappy. Hope they recognize and update ASAP.

 

[ManuCH]

Your probably right I’ve seen quite a few posts on here about battery not fully charging or being stuck at xx%. Looks like the X has a software bug. Crappy. Hope they recognize and update ASAP.

Mine was stuck at 98% on its first day right after restoring from backup. Same for my friends setting it up the same time as I did.

After a reboot, charging completed properly. The last 2 nights were also fine.

 

[TheRealAlex]

i woke up this morning and reached to pick up the phone and it was VERY hot. It literally burned my palm but everything seems to be working ok in my limited testing in the last few mins.

The phone was plugged in to an Apple 29w charger about 8 hours ago but it was at around 90% power at the time.

Currently flags is disabled with a message saying the phone has to cool down first!

Anyone else had this? Any idea what might have caused it?

Coming from the RC and Racing Drone hobby one thing that is a Major No No is Rapidly Charging Lithium Ion cells.

It is possible just asking for problems.

 

[ManuCH]

Coming from the RC and Racing Drone hobby one thing that is a Major No No is Rapidly Charging Lithium Ion cells.

It is possible just asking for problems.

Apple has really made this "idiot proof". You're supposed to be able to rapid charge the iPhone without any issue, as all the circuits and software should take care of stopping/slowing down at the right time, etc.

This is nothing like RC and drones where you actually need to have some know-how. iPhones are supposed to be "plug it in and forget about it". Apple even *sells* fast chargers.

 

[Apple_Robert]

The phone can get warm when charging and indexing. It should not get as hot as the OP experienced. I would start a return and get a new phone.

 

[redr]

It will stop automatically when fully charged.

I still think it's faulty. The rapid charger will make the iPhone X very warm, but not hot enough to burn your hand. Also it should be at 100% after way less than 8 hours. It seems like for some reason it's not stopping because it's never detecting the battery as full.

Power-cycle the iPhone and try again. I've had the charging logic screw up on other iPhones before that were due to a software glitch.

This was also my first thought.

Your probably right I’ve seen quite a few posts on here about battery not fully charging or being stuck at xx%. Looks like the X has a software bug. Crappy. Hope they recognize and update ASAP.

Thanks for the suggestions guys. Now power-cycled the phone for the first time since the initial upgrade & restore when it arrived. Interesting to hear others have had it "stick" instead of recognising that it was fully charged. Fingers crossed. I'll post back with an update on the outcome.

Unfortunately I expect a fight from Apple re swapping it since their diagnostics didn't show anything wrong. They told me the diagnostic would show historical temperature issues too which is either false or the diagnostics are faulty :-/ Especially considering the phone itself knew it was hot and disabled the flash.

I'm not returning the damn thing - can't go without a phone for a month!
[doublepost=1509884917][/doublepost]Update: after the reboot it very quickly “charged” up to 100% without getting very hot. In fact as I unplugged it it was cooler than it has been since I got it!

FYI like another poster I also restored from a backup (from a 7-plus) when I first got the phone, so maybe there’s a pattern emerging. Could be coincidence of course but at this point I’d say a power-cycle after a restore to the iPhone X is worth doing (or don’t charge your phone unattended!).

As for me this thing is still going to be under suspicion for a few cycles.

Battery capacity is reporting as 2759 out of the design capacity of 2701 so with luck it wasn’t damaged too much by the event.

Glad it didn’t get any hotter though.

 

[Puddled]

Apple has really made this "idiot proof". You're supposed to be able to rapid charge the iPhone without any issue, as all the circuits and software should take care of stopping/slowing down at the right time, etc.

This is nothing like RC and drones where you actually need to have some know-how. iPhones are supposed to be "plug it in and forget about it". Apple even *sells* fast chargers.

Except that you are wrong.

Apple manage the battery to last 500 cycles/12 months only. After that, its your problem.
To that end, not using fast charging unless you need it is sound practice and will help with longevity long after the warranty has gone. Not letting the battery or phone get warm or hot at all if it can be helped will reduce degredation even further.

Yes, the iphone is designed for idiots, but with a little smart thinking you can improve your experience.

 

[ManuCH]

Except that you are wrong.

Apple manage the battery to last 500 cycles/12 months only. After that, its your problem.
To that end, not using fast charging unless you need it is sound practice and will help with longevity long after the warranty has gone. Not letting the battery or phone get warm or hot at all if it can be helped will reduce degredation even further.

Yes, the iphone is designed for idiots, but with a little smart thinking you can improve your experience.

Yeah, 500 cycles / 12 months is more than enough for me. YMMV of course. But my phone is being sold and replaced after 12 months.

That said, of course I take good care of my phone and my battery because I do know how batteries work. My point was that the average consumer may get along with it without taking particular care, fast charging or not. It certainly doesn't require major know-how like for RC drones and the like.

 

[mrklaw]

Coming from the RC and Racing Drone hobby one thing that is a Major No No is Rapidly Charging Lithium Ion cells.

It is possible just asking for problems.

Aren’t you normally fine to stick at or just below 1C for charging? IPhone X has a 2700mah battery so a 2.4A charger should be completely fine.

Not sure what a 29W charger with USB-C delivers (I assume the iPhone doesn’t accept full 29W)

 

[Gryzor]

Rapid charging, way to go to cripple your battery capacity and performance. Overnight you want to be charging as slowly as you can get away with. Fast charging is for the odd occasion when you need to juice up fast...clue is in the name.

 

[Newtons Apple]

This was also my first thought.


Thanks for the suggestions guys. Now power-cycled the phone for the first time since the initial upgrade & restore when it arrived. Interesting to hear others have had it "stick" instead of recognising that it was fully charged. Fingers crossed. I'll post back with an update on the outcome.

Unfortunately I expect a fight from Apple re swapping it since their diagnostics didn't show anything wrong. They told me the diagnostic would show historical temperature issues too which is either false or the diagnostics are faulty :-/ Especially considering the phone itself knew it was hot and disabled the flash.

I'm not returning the damn thing - can't go without a phone for a month!
[doublepost=1509884917][/doublepost]Update: after the reboot it very quickly “charged” up to 100% without getting very hot. In fact as I unplugged it it was cooler than it has been since I got it!

FYI like another poster I also restored from a backup (from a 7-plus) when I first got the phone, so maybe there’s a pattern emerging. Could be coincidence of course but at this point I’d say a power-cycle after a restore to the iPhone X is worth doing (or don’t charge your phone unattended!).

As for me this thing is still going to be under suspicion for a few cycles.

Battery capacity is reporting as 2759 out of the design capacity of 2701 so with luck it wasn’t damaged too much by the event.

Glad it didn’t get any hotter though.

Next time take a picture of it to take to the store. It should not be getting so hot that it has to cool down before use.

 

[winterny]

Coming from the RC and Racing Drone hobby one thing that is a Major No No is Rapidly Charging Lithium Ion cells.

It is possible just asking for problems.

Coming from the Tesla world, I wouldn't call what Apple does "fast charging".

Tesla can go from 0% to 100% in ~1 hour, and yes that does require a lot of advanced cooling. With that cooling, I've done probably hundreds of Supercharging sessions, and still have only about ~1% of degradation (car is 3 years old, almost 40K miles).

Apple's iPhone "Fast Charging", most likely, throttles it's charging speed based on battery temperature. From all the charts I've seen, it only completes this charging in about ~2 hours. The first 50% is somewhat faster than charging with an iPad charger, but it's ultimately only 15 minutes faster for the full process. Most of that time is saved in the first 50%.

I've charged every prior iPhone with an iPad charger exclusively, and typically noted ~7% degradation in the first year -- which I would mostly chalk up to the fact that apple charges to 100% and not 90% (100% puts more stress), and the fact that the iPhone is not thermally managed in any way -- if I'm out at the beach, the phone/battery is gonna get over 100F, and that's that.

I would be extremely surprised if charging with the 29W brick caused any long term issue.