The world of consumer electronics has its own share of urban myths. Some of them are actually so mainstream that no one even dares question their efficacy. Burying a wet phone in rice is one of them.
Research has repeatedly proved that it’s a futile trick, but for folks that need to hear it from the source itself, well, Apple has also made it clear that the rice-drying trick doesn’t work. Whether you have aniPhone 15 Proor a model that’s a few years old, it’s time to stop this useless practice.
“Don’t put your iPhone in a bag of rice. Doing so could allow small particles of rice to damage your iPhone,” says an Applesupport pagethat was first spotted byMacWorld.
Instead, if liquid gets inside your iPhone cavities, the best way forward is to keep it in an open area with airflow for a day to let the phone dry out. Do not use external heat to vaporize the liquid — or even compressed air.
Also, I can tell you from my own experience that rice isn’t some magical absorbent and certainly not enough to suck out the water droplets lodged in a phone’s speaker, SIM slot, or charging port.
If you need some scientific evidence rather than personal experiences, there’s a healthy bunch of it. The teardown-happy folks atiFixitfound that there’s no evidence the rice trick works and outlined some actual solutions to help with your wet gadget predicament.
“Rice also has this problem of not being able to absorb water which is out of its direct contact,” says an analysis byXbitLabs.TekDry, which offers emergency electronics rescue services, warned users all the way back in 2014 to stay away from the rice-drying technique.
Their scientific study, which involved creating simulated drying conditions stretched across 48 hours, proved that not only is rice ineffective as a drying agent, but it is also less effective than allowing the device to air dry naturally. However, neither approach will completely dry the device.
Here are some methods that actually work, however:
Follow these tips — and stop putting your iPhone in rice.
