Water damage: the first 10 minutes.

Why the first minutes decide everything

Water itself doesn't instantly kill a phone. Corrosion does — and corrosion is dramatically accelerated by electricity flowing through wet circuitry. A phone that's switched off and wet is in far less danger than a phone that's switched on and wet. That's the whole game: stop current flowing through the board until the inside can be properly cleaned and dried. Everything below follows from that one principle.

It's also why "it still works!" is a trap. A phone can power on fine immediately after getting wet and then fail days later as corrosion spreads across the board. Working right now does not mean it's safe.

The myths that make it worse

• Rice. Largely a myth. It dries the outside slowly while corrosion continues inside, does nothing for trapped internal moisture in the critical window, and rice dust/starch can clog ports. Mostly it just burns the hours that actually mattered.
• Hair dryer / heat. Pushes moisture deeper into the phone and can heat-damage the battery and screen adhesive. Don't.
• "Charge it to see if it works." This is the single worst thing you can do — it's the exact "current through a wet board" scenario that converts a recoverable phone into a dead one. Do not charge a phone that has been wet, even if it looks dry.
• Shaking / blowing into ports. Spreads liquid across more of the board. Gentle is the rule.
• "It's water-resistant, it's fine." Ratings degrade with age and damage and generally don't cover salt water, hot water, soapy water, or pressure. A rating improves the odds; it doesn't make damage impossible.

What actually helps (and its limits)

The honest truth: there is no reliable at-home fix for water that's gotten inside a phone. What you can do at home is limited to damage control — keeping it off, dry on the outside, and getting it professionally opened quickly. The real fix is a technician dismantling it and ultrasonically cleaning the board before corrosion sets in.

• Power off, stay off. The most important action, and free.
• Remove SIM/case and dry all external surfaces and the SIM area with a soft cloth.
• Stand it port-down on a towel in a normal, dry room. Airflow at room temperature is fine; heat is not.
• Get it to a shop fast. Hours matter. A board cleaned within a day has a far better outlook than one left a week "drying in rice."

What professional repair costs

Caught early, the standard fix is a professional teardown and ultrasonic board clean. 2026 Australian independent-shop guide: commonly around $80–$180 for cleaning if there's no component damage yet. If corrosion has already taken out specific parts (charging circuit, screen, etc.) the cost rises and — being honest — outcomes are not guaranteed even with good work. That uncertainty is precisely why the free first-10-minutes steps matter more than anything paid later. A reputable shop will be upfront that water-damage repair is best-effort, not a guaranteed fix.

DIY, honestly

Your DIY role here is the damage control above — off, dry, fast to a shop. That's genuinely the highest-value thing anyone can do and it costs nothing.

Beyond that, this is firmly a professional job, and not a normal repair-curiosity case: doing it right needs the phone fully dismantled and the board cleaned in an ultrasonic bath with the correct solution, then inspected under magnification for corrosion. Opening it yourself and "drying it out" without that clean usually just delays the corrosion, not stops it. Water damage is a shop job, and it's time-critical — the sooner a technician gets to the board, the better the odds.

Common questions