How to get water out of your phone speaker

A phone that has been in the rain, the pool or the sink usually keeps working but starts to sound wrong: quiet, muffled, tinny, or buzzing. In most cases that is not damage. Water is sitting in the speaker grille and against the speaker, damping it. This guide gets it out safely, in about ten minutes, without opening anything.

Step by step

1. Shake out the excess. Take off the case, then tap the phone gently against your palm with the speaker and charging port facing down.
2. Turn the volume up and disconnect audio. Raise the media volume to maximum and disconnect headphones and Bluetooth audio, so the tone plays through the phone's own speaker.
3. Play the 165 Hz tone. Open the speaker cleaner, choose Water eject, and press Start with the speaker pointing at the floor. It plays for 1 minute.
4. Wipe and repeat. Dry off droplets that appear on the grille, then run the tone again. Two or three rounds clears most splashes.
5. Let it air-dry. Leave the phone in a dry place with some airflow, speaker down. Wait at least 30 minutes before charging with a cable.
6. Test the speaker. Play music or run the speaker test. If it is still muffled, give it more drying time before trying again.

Why playing a sound works

A speaker is a thin diaphragm driven back and forth by a magnet. Low notes make it travel furthest, so at full volume a 165 Hz tone pumps air through the grille hard enough to break up droplets and push them out. You can often see them bead on the outside of the phone while it plays.

Apple uses the same principle on Apple Watch. When you turn off Water Lock, the watch plays a series of tones to clear water left in its speaker. A phone has no built-in equivalent, which is what a water eject tool is for.

The tone is not magic, though. It clears water from the speaker and its grille. It does nothing for water inside the phone, which only time can dry out.

What not to do

Most damage to wet phones comes from the attempt to dry them. Apple's guidance for iPhone is clear on several of these:

• No rice. Small particles of rice can get into the phone and damage it, and rice dries a phone no faster than open air.
• No heat. Apple advises against drying a phone with any external heat source — a hair dryer, oven or radiator. Room temperature and some airflow are enough.
• No compressed air. It can push water and dirt further in.
• Nothing poked into the openings. Cotton swabs and paper towel can leave fibres behind; pins and clips tear the speaker mesh.
• No cable charging while wet. A wet charging port can corrode. Wait at least 30 minutes, and longer if the phone warns that liquid is detected; it can take up to 24 hours to dry. A wireless charger is fine once the back of the phone is dry.

On iPhone

The tool asks Safari to treat the tone like video sound, which on current versions of iOS means it plays even when Silent mode is on. If you hear nothing, turn Silent mode off and press Start again. If your iPhone shows a liquid-detection alert when you plug it in, unplug it and leave it to dry; that alert is about the charging port, which the tone cannot reach.

On Android

Press the volume-up button while the tone is playing, so you change the media volume rather than the ringer. Many Android browsers also let the cleaner run the phone's vibration motor alongside the tone; the option appears under the controls when your phone supports it. Some phones also have their own moisture alerts or speaker cleaning options in their settings — where the maker gives instructions, follow them.

Water, or damage?

A few signs help tell trapped water from a real fault:

• It gets better each round. If the tone sounds cleaner on the second and third run, it is water, and drying will finish the job.
• Buzzing that fades. A rattle while water is still present is normal: the droplets vibrate with the speaker.
• Crackling that never changes. Distortion at every volume and pitch, long after the phone has dried, points at a damaged speaker. The speaker test's frequency sweep makes this easy to hear.
• Silence. If no sound comes out at all, check the volume, Silent mode and Bluetooth first. If a chime from the speaker test is silent too, the speaker may need repair.

Salt water, pool water and drinks

The tone pushes out any liquid, but it cannot remove what that liquid leaves behind. Salt, chlorine and sugar can dry into a film on the grille. Wipe the outside with a soft, slightly damp, lint-free cloth, let it dry, then run the dust removal sweep. If the sound stays poor, or buttons feel sticky, have it looked at.

When to get it repaired

If the speaker is still muffled or distorted after a full day of drying and a few rounds of the tone, more of either is unlikely to help. Contact the manufacturer or a repair service, and mention that the phone got wet — water exposure can affect warranty cover, and an honest history gets a faster diagnosis.